There is a huge Red States/Blue States difference in the distribution of fossil fuels along with the willingness to extract them. Everyone loses with a carbon tax or carbon cap and trade, but areas with both fossil fuels and industry that use them get hurt much worse. It’s much easier to be in favor of big government carbon dioxide restrictions in West Coast or New England states than in the Midwest or South. With carbon taxes, hydroelectric gets a windfall while coal gets hurt bad.
Coal Map: http://www.nma.org/pdf/c_bearing_areas.pdf
Regarding science and the right wing, our BS detectors go off whenever a problem is elevated to crisis level to justify a big government solution. If the proposed solution was reducing the regulatory barriers to nuclear and wind power and allowing the construction of more hydroelectric dams, the right wing would be more supportive of “climate change” legislation. We’d still be skeptical that the gradual rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide was a crisis, not a potential problem, but we’d support the deregulaion on general principle.
