Carol Browner, the director of the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy, told Politico that if Congress doesn’t act to curb carbon emissions, the White House will. Browner said, “We’re not going to ignore a Supreme Court decision,” referring to a 2007 ruling that gave EPA the authority to treat greenhouse gases as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act. “We take the court’s decision very, very seriously.” In other words, if Cap and Trade fails in Congress, then the EPA may just go ahead and put caps on carbon dioxide itself. An interesting strategy for the administration, should Republicans continue their obstruction and hysteria over cap and trade, would be for the EPA to do it themselves right now to provoke the Republicans to negotiate. Since wasting a year on health insurance reform and ending up with a half-assed bill to show for it, it appears that the administration has figured out Republicans won't ever negotiate in good faith unless there's a political threat that's a stronger incentive to them than all the money and free trips and hookers that the special interests have historically offered them.