10 year old boy caned for possible non-Islamic food in "moderate" Islamic country of Malaysia

Tweet 11/10/10, Ten year old boy caned in Malaysia for bringing non-Islamic food to school for his lunch. This is one of the supposedly 'good' 'moderate' Islamic countries.

• "Jakim to probe man's creed after son caned over sausages," theMalaysianInsider.com

via Weasel Zippers

Growth slows across Europe in 3rd quarter, Spain abandons dozens of jobs projects. Soros has to be thrilled

Tweet 11/12/10, BBC, "Growth slows in Europe's leading economies"

"The pace of economic recovery has slowed in Europe's major economies, according to official estimates.

Germany, Europe's largest economy, has seen a sharp slowdown in the third quarter,

• with growth of 0.7% compared with the record expansion of 2.3% it reported in the previous three months.

In France, GDP grew by 0.4% between July and September, compared with growth of 0.7% in the previous quarter.

• The 16 eurozone members grew 0.4% on average, down from 1% growth before.

Italy also saw its rate of recovery decline, to 0.2% from 0.5% in the second quarter."...

• Hey, how about those GREEN JOBS Obama said were so great in
  
• SPAIN!

March 27, 2009, Bloomberg: "Subsidizing renewable energy in the U.S. may destroy two jobs for every one created if Spain’s experience with windmills and solar farms is any guide.

For every new position that depends on energy price supports, at least 2.2 jobs in other industries will disappear, according to a study from King Juan Carlos University in Madrid."...

• (There is no such thing as a 'green job,' as most know. ed.)
  

11/11/10, "The government has

• suspended dozens of road and rail projects and cut civil servants' wages as

• part of deep spending cuts aimed at reining in the massive public deficit."...

Communists in India burn Obama in effigy

Tweet

"Activists from the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) (CPI-ML) shout slogans as they burn an effigy depicting U.S. President Barack Obama during a protest in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad November 8, 2010" Reuters photo

via Weasel Zippers

Under the guise of 'caring,' and endless pressure of hedge funds, Californians declare Americans guilty of climate crimes & beg to pay reparations

Tweet Here are the FAQs. California Cap and Trade/American cap and trade will go into effect after the suicidal and over-worked voters in California turn down Prop 23 (a result of billionaire hedge fund backing) on Tuesday, Nov. 2. Some collapse at the sight of a movie star, do anything a hedge fund thug demands, and with corrupt politicians in endless supply, how can Soros and the UN ever lose? Highlight from these FAQ's: They are negotiating to be traded on a major COMMODITY EXCHANGE. This program like others makes a lot of serious sounding statements. You would be ridiculed if you questioned them (so most people don't). Like the others it is impossible to police and perfect for organized crime. As George Soros said, financial speculators like it because the system can be "gamed."

• The average person would need to spend all his time studying this matter to begin to learn the fraud committed on him and his country by billionaire thugs in the name of 'caring about the planet.' They've made it complicated, knowing the chump taxpayer won't know what hit him until it's too late.
  

FAQ for Climate Action Reserve, the group who will oversee the Calif. cap and trade program:

1. "Q: Do you accept CDM methodologies as approved Reserve Protocols? Do you recognize Gold Standard projects? A: No. Only project protocols that are developed by the Climate Action Reserve are accepted for use in our system. The Reserve often turns to CDM methodologies as a starting point for our protocols, but CDM methodologies (on which the Gold Standard relies) do not have the standardized additionality and/or baseline criteria that are built into our protocols. CDM methodologies are also designed for projects in developing countries, which are not always appropriate for use in the United States.

• Q: What is the difference between the Climate Action Reserve and the Chicago Climate Exchange? A: The Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) is a voluntary, for-profit GHG trading system. CCX members agree to legally binding voluntary GHG reduction targets. To comply with those targets, which are set as a percentage of a historical baseline, members must either reduce their emissions internally or purchase tradable allowances or offset credits from other members who have generated GHG reductions. The CCX has its own set of protocols for quantifying and certifying emission reductions from offset projects. However, offset credits comprise only a fraction of the total number of tradable emission certificates issued by the CCX (the majority are emission allowances).The Reserve, by contrast, is not an exchange. The Reserve is a non-profit registry that serializes and tracks GHG reductions generated in adherence to our protocols and independently verified by accredited verification bodies. Although offset credits may be transferred between accounts in the Reserve registry, credits are not traded through the Reserve system and the Reserve plays no role in setting the price for CRTs.

• Q: Can the CRTs also be sold on CCX? A: CRTs cannot be sold on the CCX system. However, CRT futures can be traded on The Green Exchange and the Chicago Climate Futures Exchange (CCFE)....

INTERACTION WITH GHG REGULATIONs

• Q: What happens to the Reserve if a federal mandate is established for offsets? A: While we cannot predict how or when the federal government will regulate GHG offsets, we are confident that we are developing a program and processes that will ultimately inform their actions. The Reserve has already been recognized as a source of high quality offsets by a number of government bodies. For example, the State of California has recognized the Reserve and its project protocols as voluntary early actions under AB 32, and Pennsylvania has named the Reserve as a recommended source of offsets for businesses operating in the state. We believe the Reserve is also well positioned to be a supplier of offsets for the Western Climate Initiative. All of this leads us to believe that the Reserve will be recognized by a federal offset program....

Q: Is there any overlap with RGGI offset protocols? Can CRTs be used to meet RGGI requirements? A: Both the Reserve and Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) have performance-based offset protocols for landfill and livestock operations, and for re-foresting of land that has been out of forest cover for a minimum of 10 years (they refer to this as afforestation). RGGI also has offset protocols for:

• Reduction in emissions of sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) in the electric power sector
• Reduction or avoidance of CO2 emissions from natural gas, oil, or propane end-use combustion due to end-use energy efficiency in the building sector

CRTs are not eligible to meet RGGI reduction requirements. More information on RGGI’s offset program is available at www.rggi.org/offsets."...

1. Q: What is the average verification cost per project? A: The cost of verification is highly dependent on a number of factors including: the size and complexity of the project, how well organized the project documents and records are, the number of years being verified, etc. Different project types also require different types of monitoring, which affects the cost of verification. We do not yet have sufficient data to provide an average verification cost per project type. Here is the current list of accredited verification bodies if you would like to seek out a quote on a particular project.

• Q: How is regulatory compliance verified? A: All project protocols contain provisions for verifying that projects registered with the Reserve comply with all local, state, and national regulations. Project developers are required to 1) sign a Regulatory Attestation that states the project is in compliance with all applicable regulations and 2) disclose specific regulations to which the project is subject. While verification bodies are not required to conduct a full regulatory audit as part of verification, they do use the information provided by the project developer and their professional expertise to assess the project’s regulatory compliance.

1. Q: How soon after a project begins operation can it be verified? A: Most projects require at least annual verification; the project developer may choose to verify more frequently. A project may be verified as soon as there are reduction tonnes to be verified. Some developers may choose to have their project verified when operations begin, just to make sure everything is being done correctly, but this is not required. The exception to this is for forest projects, which may not be verified sub-annually.

• Q: As a project developer, do you need to verify the quantity of CRTs each year, or will the Reserve assign a yearly CRT production level for the life of the project? A: The Reserve will only issue CRTs after a project undergoes a successful verification and the emissions reductions reported by the project developer have been checked for accuracy. As most projects require annual verification, we expect new CRTs to be issued for most projects on a yearly basis. However, new CRTs are not automatically issued to a registered project – verification of those tonnes must occur before CRTs are issued. Refer to the project Verification Program Manual, and individual project protocols for guidance on the requirements for each project type.

1. Q: Are consultants that provide technical assistance on a project also required to be accredited? A: No. The only part of the process for which you are required to hire an accredited third party is for verification. There are no accreditation requirements for individuals or organizations you hire to provide you with technical assistance.

• Q: Do project verification bodies have to be accredited by ANSI? A: By the end of 2010, all verification bodies will need to be accredited under ISO 14065 or enrolled in the ANSI (the American National Standards Institute) accreditation program to be eligible to conduct verification activities for the Reserve program in the United States. Verification bodies approved by the California Registry may continue to conduct verifications for the sector-specific protocols for which they have previously been approved through December 31, 2010. The Reserve also requires that verifiers successfully complete sector-specific project protocol training courses to conduct verifications. Under the recently adopted Mexican Landfill and Livestock Project Protocols, the Reserve will also allow Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) accredited Designated Operational Entities (DOEs) in relevant Sectoral Scopes to perform verification under the Reserve until January 1, 2011, if they have met Reserve training and additional requirements. More details on verification body accreditation can be found here.

  • CRTs (Climate Reserve Tonnes)

• Q: How many CRTs are issued per ton of carbon reduction? A: One CRT is equal to one metric ton (tonne) of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) emissions reductions.

• Q: Do you track the price paid for CRTs? A: No. The Reserve is not an exchange and therefore does not track or report on the price paid for CRTs. Buyers and sellers negotiate a price outside of the Reserve, and then use the Reserve to transfer CRTs from one account to another. We do not require disclosure from our account holders on the price paid per CRT.

• Q: Can you provide an estimate for pricing on CRTs? A: While the Reserve does not track the price of CRTs, a May 2009 report from New Carbon Finance put the average price of CRTs at $6.30, at the “premium end of the market”. It is also possible to view prices for CRT futures being traded on The Green Exchange and the CCFE.

• Q: How do I sell CRTs once they are in my account? Is there a specific contract template that we should use? A: All sales happen over-the-counter between buyers and sellers. At the moment there is no template contract for the sale or transfer of CRTs. However, we may develop one in the future. We are also in discussions with a major commodities exchange about allowing CRTs to be traded on their system.

• Q: Can CRTs generated inside California be traded outside California (e.g. as an offset for a project in a different state)? A: For voluntary transactions, the answer is yes. If the question is whether CRTs may be recognized for regulatory compliance in another state, that will depend on whether the other state allows and/or recognizes CRTs as offsets in their program. Currently, CRTs are only being used in the voluntary offset market and have not been approved for use in any compliance market. However, the Reserve has already been recognized as a source of high quality offsets by a number of government bodies. For example, the State of California has recognized the Reserve and its project protocols as voluntary early actions under AB 32, and Pennsylvania has named the Reserve as a recommended source of offsets for businesses operating in the state....

Q: How do you ensure that CRTs issued are real? A: Our protocols include numerous mechanisms to ensure that emissions reductions from a project are real and credible, including the performance threshold and regulatory additionality tests; rigorous emission reduction quantification methodologies; provisions to address leakage, permanence, and ownership; and the requirement for third party verification.

• Q: Do you know of any sales taxes that apply to transfers of CRTs?A: You should contact your tax advisor regarding the tax consequences of transferring CRTs....

Q: If we have a project developer account, do we also need a trader/broker account to buy, sell, and retire on the Reserve? A: No. Project developer account holders are able to buy, sell and retire CRTs on the Reserve....

1. Q: Can I hold CRTs in my active accounts on behalf of someone else? A: It depends. This activity is only possible for account holders who qualify as "regulated persons", such as banks. Please refer to the Terms of Use, available here, for more details. For all other account holders, all CRTs in the active account must be owned by the account holder. If you sell a CRT to a buyer, they become the “beneficial owner” of those reductions, even if they are not a Reserve account holder. If CRTs are sold, they must be transferred to the buyer or put into a retirement account.

• Q: What is a “beneficial owner”? A: A “beneficial owner” is one who has the benefits of ownership of a security or property even though the title is in another name. For example, when an investor purchases stocks from a brokerage firm, they become the beneficial owner of those stocks, though the brokerage firm remains the actual official owner in the system-of-record. In the case of CRTs, the beneficial owner has the right to use those reductions to offset their own GHG footprint.

• Q: Can I retire CRTs in my retirement account on behalf of someone else? A: Yes, but there are limitations. If an account-holder retires 100 or more CRTs for the same individual or organization within a calendar year, they must disclose the name of the buyer to the Reserve, though this information is kept confidential. If an account-holder retires 100,000 or more CRTs for the same individual or organization within a calendar year, the buyer’s information is no longer considered confidential, and may be made public at the Reserve’s discretion. These policies are meant to uphold the integrity and accountability of the system.
  

• For more information please refer to the Climate Action Reserve Terms of Use.

Q: The Gold Standard only accepts renewable energy (RE) and energy efficiency (EE) projects, and is viewed as a high-quality offset standard. Why does the Reserve’s position on renewable energy and energy efficiency differ so sharply from the Gold Standard? A: The Gold Standard was originally developed as a high-quality overlay to officially registered Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects, and its provisions and requirements are therefore largely tailored to a developing country context. The Reserve is focusing on offsets primarily in the United States, and eventually all of North America. Although we believe that U.S. investment in renewable energy and energy efficiency will be critical to mitigating climate change, there are several reasons why we are not focusing on grid-connected RE and EE projects as a way to generate carbon offsets (the Reserve is still considering protocols for EE projects that do not affect grid electricity consumption, e.g., boiler efficiency projects).The primary reason is that the United States is actively considering the imposition of cap-and-trade programs to regulate GHG emissions from the power sector. One such program, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) in the Northeast, commenced on January 1, 2009. We expect that other cap-and-trade programs (including, quite possibly, a nationwide federal program) are likely to follow soon. Once an emissions cap is in place for the power sector, it will not be possible to issue offset credits for RE and EE projects that affect emissions at capped power plants, because doing so would result in the double-counting of emission reductions. As a policy matter, the Reserve has chosen to focus on project types that affect sources (or sinks) of GHG emissions that are unlikely to be covered under U.S. cap-and-trade programs in the near term....

• Q: Am I required to upgrade if there is a newer version of the protocol available? A: No, you may use the protocol version to which your project was listed for the duration of the crediting period. If errata and clarifications are released that correct or codify certain elements of the protocol version you are using, you must incorporate the errata and clarifications posted for that version."

Chicago Tea Party video-proof that Rob Reiner flunked history and he is the one spewing hate. Watch this.

Tweet Rob Reiner calls these people Hitler. These are Tea Party people that Reiner-if he himself is not Hitler-might want to check out instead of spewing hate and lies.


9/15/10, NY Times editorial, "Primary Day 2010- The Tea Party's Snarl"
From the editorial:

• "the growling face of a new fringe in American politics...

• the tiny fraction of furious voters...
  

• appealing to the basest political instincts...

• the toxic message of the Tea Party
  

• ...the sense of national embarrassment

from each divisive and offensive utterance, each wacky policy proposal. ...

• extremism..."...

via Free Republic

UPDATE: US STATE DEPT. CHOOSES NY TIMES TO EXPLAIN 'TEA PARTY' to foreign press, Washington Examiner, 10/25, via Weasel Zippers.

'Caring' environmental legal boutiques & lack of gov. oversight strangle US taxpayers while they're busy working to enrich lawyers

Tweet 10/22, Who doesn't care about the well being of animals and the environment? Add extremely wealthy donors' tax deductible contributions and lack of government oversight, and an army of lawyers is making a fortune on the backs of US taxpayers. One group calls itself Center for Biological Diversity which is fine but it's mainly a high powered legal boutique. I like some of the causes, but after that nothing else is right about it. As the article notes, environmental lawyers aren't the only ones cashing in.

11/19/2009: "Litigation: Lawsuit abuse charge by Western lawmakers enrages enviros" eenews.com, by Phil Taylor, reporter

"Poor government oversight has allowed advocacy groups to squander taxpayer money on frivolous lawsuits that drain the budgets of federal land management agencies without the knowledge of the public or Congress, a group of Western lawmakers told Attorney General Eric Holder in a letter released this week.

Specifically, members of the Congressional Western Caucus charge that environmental groups have used the Equal Access to Justice Act to win back millions of dollars in attorney fees for lawsuits filed against the Forest Service and other federal agencies.

Well-intentioned law

Congress passed the Equal Access to Justice Act nearly 30 years ago to allow individuals, small businesses or public interest groups to be reimbursed for the cost of attorneys that represent them in cases of alleged wrongdoing by the federal government.

The law allows average citizens and nonprofit groups to hold federal agencies accountable

• for violations of environmental laws such as the Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act,
  

but also to provide greater government accountability in a number of other policy spheres, including

• copyright and trademark infringement, disability and retirement pay, and fair housing.

But ever since Congress lifted reporting requirements for EAJA payments in 1995, the public has been left in the dark about

• how much money groups have received under the act and for which cases, the letter says.

"We have no clue as to what is actually being spent on this program," said Utah Rep. Rob Bishop (R), chairman of the CWC and ranking member of the Natural Resources Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands. "The sad part is

• this has become a cottage industry that groups use to fund further lawsuits against the government."

Under the guise of "public interest," groups intent on sealing off Western lands to ranchers and energy companies have

• abused EAJA to further their narrow political agendas, the letter states.

"EAJA is an important tool for protecting citizens' rights against the federal government," the letter says. "Sadly, its abuse undoubtedly has

• far reaching consequences on both public lands management decisions and for all American taxpayers.""...
• (If people stop being "sad" and get "angry" instead, maybe something positive will happen. Look how far Soros has gotten with his anger. ed)
  

(continuing, EENews): "Research cited by the letter found $4.7 billion was awarded from the U.S. Treasury's Justice Fund from 2003 to July 2007, though it is unclear how much of those funds went to environmental groups. The same memo identifies less than $1.7 million in EAJA payments to environmental groups from the Forest Service from 2003 to 2005.

The CWC letter requests information on how the Justice Department keeps records of EAJA disbursements and urges the agency to bring the act "back into the sunshine" by

• building a searchable public database listing the names of organizations that have
  
• received reimbursements for attorney fees and for which cases....

Environmental groups rejected charges that they have abused the act in order to siphon money from the federal government.

• "There is absolutely nothing abusive about the EAJA paying fees to attorneys who overturn illegal government decisions," said Suckling of CBD. "That is exactly what the law was created for."

EAJA reimbursements are awarded only if a group wins a lawsuit against the government, Suckling noted. The law stipulates that plaintiffs receive $125 per attorney hour from the government when they win a case.

Groups also receive money from the

• Treasury Department's Justice Fund
  

for cases in which DOJ finds they have "prevailed," or achieved the purpose of the litigation....

As for the Congressional Western Caucus, Bishop said in a statement that its members remain concerned "that there may be abuse, but no one can know the truth about how EAJA operates

• until we begin to shed light on a program that has operated without Congressional
  
• oversight since 1995.
  

Taxpayers deserve to know how their hard earned tax dollars are being spent.""...

Soros Covert Operations threaten Democracy

Tweet 9/24/2007, IBD, "Democracy: George Soros is known for funding groups such as MoveOn.org that seek to manipulate public opinion. So why is the billionaire's backing of what he believes in problematic?

• In a word: transparency.

How many people, for instance, know that James Hansen, a man billed as a lonely "NASA whistleblower" standing up to the mighty U.S. government, was really funded by Soros' Open Society Institute , which gave him "legal and media advice"?

• That's right, Hansen was packaged for the media by Soros' flagship "philanthropy," by as much as $720,000, most likely under the OSI's "politicization of science" program."...
• (You will see this claim ridiculed, but it is not denied that Soros gave Hansen (an employee of US citizens) legal services. They can deny the amount, but unless we see bank statements of all involved parties, no one can know. "A lot of elite groups.. fly beneath the radar...") ed.
  

(continuing, IBD): "That may have meant that Hansen had media flacks help him get on the evening news to push his agenda and lawyers pressuring officials to let him spout his supposedly "censored" spiel for weeks

• in the name of advancing the global warming agenda.

Hansen even succeeded, with public pressure from his nightly news performances, in

• forcing NASA to change its media policies to his advantage.
  

Had Hansen's OSI-funding been known, the public might have viewed the whole production differently. The outcome could have been different.

That's not the only case. Didn't the mainstream media report that 2006's vast immigration rallies across the country began as a spontaneous uprising of 2 million angry Mexican-flag waving illegal immigrants demanding U.S. citizenship in Los Angeles, egged on only by a local Spanish-language radio announcer?

Turns out that wasn't what happened, either. Soros' OSI had money-muscle there, too, through its $17 million

• Justice Fund.
  

The fund lists 19 projects in 2006. One was vaguely described involvement in the immigration rallies. Another project funded illegal immigrant activist groups for subsequent court cases.

So what looked like a wildfire grassroots movement really was a

• manipulation from OSI's glassy Manhattan offices. The public had no way of knowing until the release of OSI's 2006 annual report.

Meanwhile, OSI cash backed terrorist-friendly court rulings, too.

Do people know last year's Supreme Court ruling abolishing special military commissions for terrorists at Guantanamo was a Soros project? OSI gave support to Georgetown lawyers in 2006 to win Hamdan v. Rumsfeld -

• for the terrorists.

OSI also gave cash to other radicals who pressured the Transportation Security Administration to scrap a program called "Secure Flight,"

• which matched flight passenger lists with terrorist names.
  

It gave more cash to other left-wing lawyers who

• persuaded a Texas judge to block cell phone tracking of terrorists.

They trumpeted this as a victory for civil liberties. Feel safer?

It's all part of the $74 million OSI spent on "U.S. Programs" in 2006 to "shape policy." Who knows what revelations 2007's report will bring around events now in the news?

OSI isn't the only secretive organization that Soros funds. OSI partners with the Tides Foundation, which funnels cash from

• wealthy donors who may not want it known that their cash goes to fringe groups engaged in "direct action" - also known as eco-terrorism.

On the political front, Soros has a great influence in a secretive organization called "Democracy Alliance" whose idea of democracy seems to be

• government controlled solely of Democrats.

"As with everything about the Democracy Alliance, the strangest aspect of this entire process was

• the incessant secrecy.
  

Among the alliance's stated values was a commitment to political transparency - as long as it didn't apply to the alliance," wrote Matt Bai, describing how the alliance was formed in 2005, in his book "The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics."

Soros' "shaping public policies," as OSI calls it, is not illegal. But it's a problem for democracy because

• it drives issues with cash and then
  

• only lets the public know about it after it's old news.

That means the public makes decisions about issues

• without understanding the special agendas of groups behind them.

Without more transparency, it amounts to

• political manipulation.
  

This leads to cynicism. As word of these short-term covert ops gets out, the public grows to distrust what it hears and tunes out.

• The irony here is that Soros claims to be an advocate of an "open society."
  

His OSI does just the legal minimum to disclose its activities. The public shouldn't have to wait until an annual report is out

• before the light is flipped on about the Open Society's political action."

Investors Business Daily editorial, 9/24/07, "The Soros Threat to Democracy"
.

Ah, Copenhagen! 80% of carbon trading houses were tax fraud fronts-PBS

Tweet 10/8, "Murder on the Carbon Express: Interpol Takes on Emissions Fraud," Mother Jones, by Mark Schapiro

"While US climate legislation languishes, the rest of the world is already taking the next step—educating police on how to keep criminals out of the global carbon markets. In Lyon, France last month, undercover agents specializing in wildlife smuggling rubbed elbows with financial sleuths at a conference sponsored by INTERPOL intended to highlight the

• increasing complexity of environmental crimes

and the tightening of environmental regulations in developing and developed countries.

• "Governments should start preparing for an onslaught of environmental court cases," said Bakary Kante, head of the United Nations Environment Programme's environmental law division.

Some 200 officials and agents who will be investigating those cases came to Interpol's global headquarters in Lyon from more than 30 countries for the weeklong conference to coordinate

• strategies to fight global environmental crime networks.

Inside the high-security INTERPOL compound, located just a block off the meandering River Rhone, the only visual reminder of "the environment" was a heap of discarded computer parts assembled like an art installation in a corner of the marble-and-stone atrium. Emile Lindemulder, a pollution crime officer with the agency's Environmental Crime Program, assembled the e-waste pile as a reminder of one of the agency's chief responsibilities: helping national police agencies to enforce a global treaty, the Basel Convention, that restricts the international trade in hazardous electronic waste that can contain highly toxic chemicals and minerals.

Inside, police sounded much like environmental advocates as they talked about the need to be vigilant and share intelligence about environmental abuses. "We have to prove, and prevent, murder in the future," is how M.C. van Leeuwen, an investigator with the Netherlands National Police, described the challenge of environmental policing. Following the evidence to prove liability can be challenging, he said, and it often gets down to

• eco-forensics.
  

A polluter's fingerprints may have been laid down decades before. Front companies, foreign registries, and the like tend to obscure liability. Uncertainties surrounding the science of toxicology can make establishing cause and effect difficult.

All those challenges are compounded as Lindemulder and others seek to expand Interpol's mandate into an

• entirely new terrain: crime in the global carbon markets.
  

Those markets, operating in countries subject to the emission restrictions of the Kyoto Protocol, have grown exponentially over the past five years, churning through more than $300 billion worth of transactions.

• "When there's this amount of money involved," Lindemulder commented,
  
• "criminals get interested."
  

Lindemulder explained that agents from traditional environmental enforcement agencies are now compelled to understand the complexities of global finance.

• "The carbon markets involve so many parties, so many new instruments and forms of vulnerability that we haven't been aware of before."
  

(I was invited to present my findings exposing the difficulties in assessing the validity of carbon offsets, and the many uncertainties involved in turning tropical forests into carbon offsets).

• The complexity of the carbon markets,
• which operate with ambiguous oversight,
  

• presents an array of new opportunities for fraud,
  

noted Peter Younger, a veteran with Interpol and now in charge of the agency's enforcement of wildlife and forest protection in Africa. "You're talking about an international financial trade mechanism and the question is still evolving, where does the liability lie? We're still filling in our knowledge gap." The carbon commodities being traded, he said, are unlike any others: "You're obtaining not a physical entity or asset but a piece of paper."

• Take the rapid growth of interest in tropical forests serving as "offsets" to companies' carbon emissions.
  

In countries where land ownership is often disputed, the possibility for fraud is considerable, he said. "In effect, you could be falsifying ownership in something you can see in order to sell something that you can't.

• And then inserting that into the carbon markets and selling it to people."

Such a scenario is not as far-fetched as it may sound. The Overseas Anti-Corruption Unit in the

• City of London Police force is investigating allegations that a London-based offset developer,
  

• Carbon Harvesting Company, may have improperly claimed access to the forests of Liberia
  

• in order to sell the carbon rights to European and other companies.

  In other instances, traders have generated hundreds of millions of euros in illicit profits by pocketing unpaid taxes—for instance, in a case that revealed
  

• more than 80 percent of carbon trading houses in Denmark were fronts for tax fraud.

"As the price of carbon increases, we know that the more lucrative it becomes,

• the more criminals will be attracted to the market," noted the UK's new environmental minister, Lord Chris Smith.
  

"We need to be way ahead of the criminals in thinking about what they're likely to do—whether trafficking in endangered species, in e-waste, or what might happen in carbon trading as it becomes an increasingly valuable commodity."

"This article was produced by Mother Jones as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Mark Schapiro is editorial director for the Center for Investigative Reporting."

• ####via Free Republic, "It’s not so much that they want to catch the scam artists - it’s more that they want to make sure and get their cut." Free Republic commenter

• 10/9/10

"A global deal on emissions curbs by airlines struck late on Friday will allow the European Union to press ahead with plans to charge airlines for emissions permits from 2012, the European Commission said on Saturday."

• http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6981CU20101009, via Free Republic