Morning Must-Read: Ezra Klein: Obama’s Climate Change regulations Less Ambitious than Republicans in 2008

Ezra Klein: Obama’s climate change regulations are less ambitious than what Republicans were proposing in 2008: “In May 2008, Sen. John McCain traveled to Portland, Oregon…

…and delivered a speech that no Republican presidential candidate would consider giving today. It doesn’t matter “whether we call it ‘climate change’ or ‘global warming,'” McCain warned. “Among environmental dangers it is surely the most serious of all.” McCain went on to propose a cap-and-trade plan far more aggressive than the power-plant rules the Obama administration is announcing today….

In 2008, it still looked plausible that with American leadership, the world could limit the rise in temperatures to about two degrees Celsius. Today, that goal looks laughable. We’re on track to see temperatures rise by about four degrees Celsius…. The power plant regulations the Obama administration will announce today are far less ambitious than the proposal McCain offered in Oregon in 2008. They’re less ambitious than the proposals Newt Gingrich championed through the Aughts. They’re far less than what’s required to keep the rise in temperatures to two degrees Celsius. But they’re probably at the outer limit of what can be done so long as the Republican Party refuses to even believe in climate change, much less work with the Obama administration on a bill….

“We have many advantages in the fight against global warming, but time is not one of them,” McCain said in 2008. “Instead of idly debating the precise extent of global warming, or the precise timeline of global warming, we need to deal with the central facts of rising temperatures, rising waters, and all the endless troubles that global warming will bring. We stand warned by serious and credible scientists across the world that time is short and the dangers are great. The most relevant question now is whether our own government is equal to the challenge.”

We’re about to find out.