So this is it. The whole planet earth, and the lifeforms that have developed gradually over billions of years are going to be undone because of frail and shallow human psychology.

Obama’s cap-and-trade proposal put a ceiling on the amount of carbon to be emitted each year, and would force electricity providers and other polluters to purchase permits directly from the government or from each other for their emissions of greenhouse gases. The system, if successful, would have had the effect of reducing carbon emissions to 4 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. This would not, even by administration calculations, have been sufficient to prevent the 2º C temperature rise that a consensus among climatologists insists is the maximum level the planet can sustain without dire effects taking place. But the cap-and-trade plan was chosen over a straightforward tax on carbon production in part because it enjoyed the support of not only of the likes of McCain but also major corporations such as Shell Oil and Dow Chemical, who stood to profit from it.