Hey kids. Why don't we just put on a show?

How's this for a scenario? We do everything we can to get everybody to burn high-sulfur coal, as cheaply and inefficiently as possible, so that large amounts of soot and ash are lifted into the atmosphere. Our supply of peat, lignite and bituminous is practically infinte, isn't it? We also liquefy coal into highly-polluting liquid fuels, and burn as much of that as we can, in deliberately untuned engines, further raising the particulate levels in the atmosphere. The idea will be to generate a partial nuclear winter that will counteract the greenhouse gases, perhaps the two will cancel out! And if they don't, the free market will quickly step in and set us straight, right?

This will solve our energy problems, and it will reassure the world into thinking we've finally got global warming licked so we don't have to worry about it, as well as pull the rug right out from under OPEC by replacing oil with coal. Not to worry, pulmonary health issues will be mitigated by the drop-off in tobacco consumption. And the coal mining, electric generating, and automotive and manufacturing industries will provide all the PR and legislative arm-twisting we need to make it happen. Major coal producing countries will eagerly sign on for a piece of the action.

Just think: cheap energy, corporate support, public acceptance and aquiescence, international harmony with our friends the Chinese, plus national security and jobs, jobs, jobs! Of course, the Petroleum lobby and its scientific and propaganda institutes and organizations will suddenly switch to a global-warming fear-mongering campaign (and get in bed with the Greens) once their profits are threatened, but no one takes them seriously anymore anyway.