Pirate's Cove

Glenn Reynolds, of Instapundit fame, who’s fond of writing “I’ll believe it’s a crisis when the people who tell me it’s a crisis act like it’s a crisis”, offers up an interesting opinion piece at the USA Today

To fight climate change, start with Leonardo DiCaprio’s private jet lifestyle
Even though Donald Trump withdrew from the Paris climate agreement, there’s plenty Congress can do.

It starts off by noting the hypocrisy of the Warmists, which is worth the read, and gets to legislative offerings

First, we need to tax the “blue zones.” That is, we need to impose steep taxes on property in coastal areas that will be flooded by the sea-level increases that global warming is supposed to bring. By discouraging people from living or building there now, we’ll save ourselves from big problems in the future. Sure it’ll drive down property values, but those values should go down — they’re values for property that’s going to be flooded anyway, remember?

Second, we need to ban taxpayer-funded air travel to conferences. State legislatures could ban reimbursement for travel outside their states; Congress could require that no federal grant money be spent on air travel to conferences and similar events. A lot of academic conferences would fail, but that’s a small price to pay for saving the planet.  And besides, it will encourage the development of Internet-based conference alternatives. A whole new industry might result: Green jobs!

Third, we need to ban private jet travel. At first I thought about just taxing it heavily, but with the planet at stake, that might not be enough. It’s nice that John Travolta can have his own Boeing 707, or that Leonardo DiCaprio can jet around the world speaking against climate change, but the carbon emissions involved set a bad example that outweighs anything he might say. So no more private jets. Bigshots will just have to fly commercial like everyone else, the way they did in the 1950s. (And sorry, Leo, but massive yachts have to go, too). Politicians, too, should have to fly commercial. No more government-funded “executive jets” for them.

He also offers a fourth suggestion, a 25% tax on homes that are twice the size of the average American home. These are all common sense reforms, for which Republican lawmakers in Congress should submit legislation. It would be hilarious when the Democrats object to these solutions to fight ‘climate change.’ They could call it the “Practice What You Preach Act Of 2017.” And I’m sure there are plenty of other things they could institute that would essentially affect mostly just the Warmists.