OPINION:
Enjoy your burgers and steaks when you fire up the grill this Fourth of July weekend, as they may not be available much longer.
That’s because the climate fanatics have declared war on livestock. Turns out the biggest planet killers are apparently cows. That’s the only logical takeaway from a recent CNN headline that informs us that “The World’s First Carbon Tax on Livestock Will Cost $100 Per Cow.”
I don’t usually pay much attention to looney-tune ideas from across the Atlantic, but this is the kind of craziness that migrates across the ocean to these shores.
Denmark’s $96-a-cow tax will be imposed “for the planet-heating emissions they generate.”
If you are wondering why cows are suddenly super villains, you aren’t paying attention to the extremists running the environmental movement. You see every time a cow burps or passes gas (methane, to be exact), the planet gets warmer. The fiends!
So now we have the first nation to impose a tax on livestock — and pigs and goats may be next. The Danish foreign minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen, boasts, “We are investing billions in this transition” to a carbon-free society. It sounds like he’s angling for a Nobel Prize. The cows are collateral damage in this crusade to save the planet from heat waves.
CNN says that the global food system contributes one-third of the greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere.
PBS says it’s worse than that. It finds that “cows and other livestock animals are responsible for about 40% of methane emissions — a potent greenhouse gas. In digesting their high fiber diet, cows emit methane as a byproduct, making them one of the least climate-friendly sources of food on the planet.”
Off with their heads.
I predict that in the next 18 months, some members of Congress (Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez?) will propose a similar tax on Bessie here.
I suppose I should take some consolation that at least we finally have liberals admitting that if you tax something, you will get less of it. More taxes on cows means fewer cattle. That’s the idea here.
So why do we do tax work, save and invest? Do we want less of that, too?
What is sadly ironic about this taxing scheme is that this is the same movement that has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to save elephants, polar bears, pandas, tigers, dolphins and other “endangered species.” But apparently, we can live without cows. They aren’t cute and cuddly enough. So much for “biodiversity.”
Where is this all headed? The species that is apparently responsible for almost all of the carbon emissions is human beings. We are the real scoundrels here. We burn coal, wood, oil and natural gas to bring light, heat and cooling to factories, hospitals and schools.
Maybe we need a birth tax on humans to save the planet. What’s the old saying? This would be a great planet if there weren’t so many people — and cows. Maybe we need some public service ads riffing off the theme of the Chick-fil-A ads with cows urging people to “Eat Mor Chikin!”
In the meantime, please do your part to clean the air this weekend by giving up steaks and burgers and filling up on veggie burgers instead.
• Stephen Moore is a visiting senior fellow at The Heritage Foundation and co-founder of the Committee to Unleash Prosperity.
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