Fast Times in Federal Court and the Need for Flexibility

The shifting landscape of criminal prosecutions involving designer drugs presents several novel legal issues. There are different ways to address these issues when they are the result of the production, possession, or distribution of as-of-yet unregulated substances. One way is for the legislature to enact appropriate legislation as quickly as the need for regulation or criminalization arises—a lofty, if not unrealistic, goal. The other is to guide the courts with general principles of applicability—the approach adopted by Congress through the enactment of the Analogue Act. This small but unfortunately quickly expanding area of federal criminal law supports the notion that providing the courts with flexibility is necessary and ultimately consistent with the legislative approach in this field

Implementing carbon tariffs : a fool's errand ?

Some governments are considering taxes on imports based on carbon content from countries that have not introduced climate change policies. Such carbon border taxes appeal to domestic industries facing higher charges for their own carbon emissions. This research demonstrates that there are enormous practical difficulties surrounding such plans. Various policies are evaluated according to World Trade Organization compliance, administrative plausibility, help in meeting environmental goals, and ability to deal with domestic pressures. The steel industry is used as a case study in this analysis. All considered policies arguably fail to meet at least one of these constraints, bringing into question the plausibility that a carbon border tax can be practical policy.Climate Change Mitigation and Green House Gases,Climate Change Economics,Carbon Policy and Trading,Environment and Energy Efficiency,Energy and Environment

Implementing Carbon Tariffs: A Fool's Errand?

Some governments are considering taxes on imports based on carbon content from countries that have not introduced climate change policies. Such carbon border taxes appeal to domestic industries facing higher charges for their own carbon emissions. This research demonstrates that there are enormous practical difficulties surrounding such plans. Various policies are evaluated according to World Trade Organization compliance, administrative plausibility, help in meeting environmental goals, and ability to deal with domestic pressures. The steel industry is used as a case study in this analysis. All considered policies arguably fail to meet at least one of these constraints, bringing into question the plausibility that a carbon border tax can be practical policy.carbon tariffs, climate change, environmental policy

Periodic orbits for three particles with finite angular momentum

We present a novel numerical method to calculate periodic orbits for dynamical systems by an iterative process which is based directly on the action integral in classical mechanics. New solutions are obtained for the planar motion of three equal mass particles on a common periodic orbit with finite total angular momentum, under the action of attractive pairwise forces of the form $1/r^{p+1}$. It is shown that for $-2 < p \le 0$, Lagrange's 1772 circular solution is the limiting case of a complex symmetric orbit. The evolution of this orbit and another recently discovered one in the shape of a figure eight is investigated for a range of angular momenta. Extensions to n equal mass particles and to three particles of different masses are also discussed briefly.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figures. Accepted for publication in Physics Letters