The Journal editorial page has fun with its cap-and-trade autopsy today. Planet Gore covered much of this ground last week – but we were lax in not attributing “the mother of all earmarks” line to Senator Bob Corker.

Until last week, the Democratic M.O. on climate change was to lash the Bush Administration for its supposed inaction and then pass responsibility onto regulators and the courts. Proponents thought they had the whip hand. Yet this time they had to defend an actual piece of legislation — and once it was subjected to even preliminary scrutiny, the Democrats crumpled faster than you can say $4 gas. Bad timing was the least of it. Republicans methodically dismantled the cost and complexity of “cap and trade,” which sounds harmless but would inflict collateral damage on the wider economy in lost GDP and higher prices up and down the energy chain. Conveniently, the Democrats would also bestow unto Congress (read: themselves) some $6.7 trillion in new tax revenues and carbon welfare handouts over the next four decades. Some of the most effective opponents – like freshman GOP Senator Bob Corker – support climate regulation but view the current scheme as frivolous, dishonest or both. Their task was helped along by the incompetence of the Democrats, especially floor manager Barbara Boxer. Environmentalists deemed it blasphemy that anyone would oppose their grand ambitions, instead of trying to persuade. “I resent the Senator from Tennessee saying our bill is a slush fund,” Ms. Boxer said at one point, apparently serious. After Mr. Corker called the bill “the mother of all earmarks” and “a huge unnecessary transference of wealth,” Ms. Boxer was reduced to arguing that it’s really “a huge tax cut for the American people” and “will not increase gas prices.” These are delusions, or worse. Cap and trade is designed to raise energy prices, which are supposed to spur the investments and behavior changes needed for a less carbon-intensive economy. Such realities are beginning to seep into liberal precincts. After the bill bottomed out, no fewer than 10 Democrats from the Midwest and South – whose economies rely on coal-fired power or heavy industry and thus will be disproportionately affected – registered their displeasure with Mr. Reid and Ms. Boxer. Including Sherrod Brown (Ohio), Carl Levin (Michigan), Jay Rockefeller (West Virginia) and Jim Webb (Virginia), the Senators said they could not support cap and trade “in its current form” because it would cause “undue hardship on our states, key industrial sectors and consumers.”