You probably have, but just in case:

http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=789

David, Thanks for Jonathan Adler's comments and the other useful materials on Mass vs. EPA. I thought Linda Greenhouse's article in the New York Times was useful too. She sees the same division on the court on the matter of standing as do other commentators - that Clarence Thomas would join Justices John Roberts Jr., Antonin Scalia, and Samuel Alito on one side (denying that the plaintiffs have established standing), and with Steven Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, John Paul Stevens and David Souter on the other side, leaving Anthony Kennedy with the deciding vote.

What I find most interesting about this case are the unexpected views (namely yours, David) on whether the EPA should regulate greenhouse gases. (Assuming that the Supremes - if they agree that the plantiffs have standing - would go on to determine that greenhouse gases are pollutants under the very broad definition under the Clean Air Act.)

I think I understand your arguments here and in your Do the Split comment, but the idea that we should try to keep the feds away from regulating CO2 emissions until the Democrats are in the White House seems tortuous. If controlling global greenhouse emissions is important (and of course it is, incredibly so), then surely in the US this should be the responsibility of the federal government. The "state experiments" are only happening because the EPA has so far refused to fulfil its responsibilities as mandated (in general terms) by congress. Nor am I persuaded that that - if the Supremes did find that the EPA is obligated to act - that this would necessarily endanger existing or future state programs to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

The joint brief by 18 eminent US climate scientists (including James Hansen, head of NASA's Goddard Space Center) is excellent, by the way, and provides cogent reasoning about why the EPA should undertake prompt regulatory action as soon as possible.

Robert Delfs