The Australian: carbon tax better than a crazy-quilt

You have to take notice when the Economics Editor of The Australian (aka the right wing mouthpiece of Rupert Murdoch and his unsavoury fossil fuel loving fellow travellers) calls for a carbon tax:

A general carbon price - most likely a carbon tax - is needed if only to counter the crazy-quilt risk from the balance of power Greens and country independent
- Worried about big slugs? Try a carbon tax

The reasoning goes that with all the inefficient climate change induced indirect taxes happening there is a need to rationalise the whole process.

some features of the crazy-quilt:
- "green car" subsidies to the motor vehicle industry
- uncertainty pushes up prices
- an initially low C tax is better than an expensive ETS
- renewable energy costs more, so a 20 percent target by 2020 is expensive
- Labour's failed home insulation scheme was indirect and disastrous
- ditto for Labor's "cash for clunkers" promise
- Independents such as Windsor are promoting rural protectionism, which can't survive in the long term
- low income earners could be compensated for increased electricity prices