Free markets vs. government intervention? Answer: both.

Or so says Thomas L. Friedman in this amazing NY Times article discussing what to do about global warming.  11 pages long, and trust me, it's worth it.  Basically, the idea is that unlike new telephones with more features, people don't want to pay more for new methods of getting electricity or driving their cars.  So to grow the "alternative" market enough to bring prices down, especially if we want China to be able to make the switch anytime soon, the government needs to act to make fossil fuels more expensive so newer technologies can compete.  The open question, of course, is where we can find the political will to do that, since it would be immediately harmful to American citizens.

By the way: I was at two separate Step It Up events on Saturday in Redlands, in the heart of the Inland Empire, a bastion of conservatism within the mostly-blue state of California.