Ever since Enron decided that carbon trading could do more to enhance its business than any other initiative and started lobbying for it, people on the right-libertarian side of politics have been wary of it.

With good reason. Two investigations today expose the fraud and inequity that carbon trading represents.

The Financial Times today launches its expose of the frauds and inefficiencies of carbon trading.

Meanwhile, the Congressional Budget Office has released a report on the effects of carbon trading on household income. Unsurprisingly, the rich benefit and the poor suffer unless there is some form of Carbon Welfare rebate, which would increase costs to the economy as a whole In all scenarios but the welfare one, the annual incomes of people in the poorest quintile drop by at least 2 percent.

This should come as no surprise to anyone who has recognized that carbon trading is in fact a legalized carbon cartel. Yet John Kerry and a host of envrionmental groups continue to push it. To his credit, Al Gore has distanced himself from the idea lately in favor of a “revenue neutral” carbon tax.

Carbon trading as a middle ground needs to be abandoned. The debate should be one about taxes, and whether or not they’d be beneficial in the end. That’s a debate worth having, without the rent-seekers and cowboys who’d love cap and trade pushing their oar in.