Why conservatives are threatened by climate change

Why does do conservatives continue to deny the science behind climate change? Partly because there's no free-market solution to reducing carbon emissions (as we pointed out in this post from February). Paul Krugman in the New York Times says:

[T]he truth Mr. Gore has been telling about how human activities are changing the climate isn't just inconvenient. For conservatives, it's deeply threatening.

Consider the policy implications of taking climate change seriously.

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals," said F.D.R. "We know now that it is bad economics." These words apply perfectly to climate change. It's in the interest of most people (and especially their descendants) that somebody do something to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, but each individual would like that somebody to be somebody else. Leave it up to the free market, and in a few generations Florida will be underwater.

There are only two viable ways to cut back on greenhouse gas emissions — a tax on emissions or emission permits — and both of them involve more of that Government Regulation. And, to conservatives, Government Regulation is bad. Therefore, climate change must not be happening.