Climate action?

Anybody optimistic about climate action should read the New Yorker profile on White House budget-meister Peter Orszag:

[A] senior White House official told me that they were exploring an energy deal that would include a “serious” and “short-term” increase in domestic production—perhaps opening up for oil exploration places like the waters off the coast of California—that would appease the “Drill, baby, drill” crowd, while also adopting a cap-and-trade plan that could take effect one or two (or more) years after 2012, which is when Obama’s current plan would start.

Notice that one or more years after 2012 is also after Obama is or isn't re-elected. This is bad bad news if you want Obama to be serious about climate. And even if his heart and mind are in the right place (and I personally believe they are) there's the U.S. Congress to consider:

The [budget] resolution could not even mention the words “cap and trade,” because they had caused a revolt among Democratic senators sensitive to the interests of oil, coal, and natural-gas companies. “I told him at that meeting that, after talking to colleagues, it was clear to me that ‘cap and trade,’ if it was included as the President did it, we would have a very difficult time passing a budget resolution,” [Senator] Conrad said.

PS. In happier news, the New Yorker reports that Orszag uses a behavioral economics site called stickk.com (the brainchild of Yale economist Dean Karlan) to push himself toward his goals in running marathons &etc. He picks an "anti-charity" like the George W. Bush Presidential Library and commits to making a donation if he doesn't meet his running target :)