CA Attorney General Continued "Political Stunt"

Yesterday, I wrote about the California global warming lawsuit, that was dismissed on several legal grounds. But there were a few twists in how the suit finally met its end. It was Bill Lockyer, then attorney-general, who brought the suit against 6 auto manufacturers for future damages from global warming based on their contributions of carbon dioxide emissions. Lockyer got himself elected Treasurer, and many saw the suit, introduced last September, as a "political stunt" in the run-up to the November elections. One of those guys was current attorney-general, Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown. In fact, he gave three very good reasons why the suit would probably be tossed anyway:

1) "One of the principles of tort law is that damages should not be speculative," so Lockyer's lawsuit failed that very simple test.

2) He wondered how Lockyer's suit could assert "causation" between vehicle emissions and the size of California's mountain snowpacks.

3) There was an urgent need to do something about global warming, but seeking national and international cooperation on the issue made a lot more sense than a lawsuit.

These three reasons are the same as my paraphrase of the judge's decision yesterday: [1] can't calculate future damage from global warming for a local region; [2] can't calculate autos' contribution to emissions for CO2 theory for global warming; and [3] can't use the judiciary to make legislative policy regarding emissions. Pretty scary that I'm thinking like Jerry Brown...

Yet, when Brown got in as attorney-general, he pushed this farce of a tort suit, instead of dropping it. Chris Reed's conclusions on his motives seem to be on track, considering Brown's successful emissions lawsuit in San Bernadino County: "He embraced Lockyer's lawsuit as his own even though he doubted its wisdom, because he believed it to be a political winner." Playing politics with unsettled science to further an activist agenda? Environmentalists have never done that before, have they?