OK, so this fight is a bit lopsided, given that the bloggers are Dean Baker and Greg Mankiw, while the newspaper columnists are Tom Friedman and Terence Corcoran of the National Post in Toronto. The subject du jour is energy policy in general, and some kind of carbon tax in particular. Friedman gives it his best shot:

Nothing would be more potent for Democrats now than to capture energy security and all the issues that surround it — from improving our trade deficit by not importing more oil to improving the climate to improving U.S. competitiveness by making us leaders in alternative fuels.
So does this mean the public would accept a gasoline or B.T.U. tax? No, said Mr. Greenberg. The public wants government to impose much higher auto mileage standards on Detroit and much more stringent energy codes on buildings and appliances. People want a tough regulatory response, à la California.

Baker filets him nicely:

The California regulations, while a step in the right direction, will not get us close to energy independence. We will have to go much further than these regulations, and maybe have a target date of something like 2050, unless the public is interested in some serious taxes.

To be fair to Thomas Friedman (and I hate being fair to Thomas Friedman), he's not actually talking about energy policy and what may or may not be a good idea; he's really talking about electoral politics and what Democrats should say that they want to do if they want to get elected. But still, it would be helpful if he bothered to ask whether such policies might make any difference.

Meanwhile, Corcoran is on a tear:

The Pigovian tax concept is based on the same old, same old economic theories that supported the idea that a government can plan and run the economy better than the market. Arthur Pigou was a great interventionist...
The problem with a Pigovian gasoline tax is that it means using the same tools that failed planners everywhere over the past century... What does government do with the money collected -- except launch a program of subsidies and spending to run alternative economic initiatives?
There is no end to the planning mayhem that could be generated once Pigovian taxes become the economic norm. Taxes on cigarettes have risen hundreds of per cent over the years, in part to offset the alleged externality of rising costs of treating cancer and other diseases caused by smoking. Still people smoke.

Mankiw is perfectly laconic in response, being quite happy to let Corcoran's frothing-at-the-mouth speak for itself. The Economonitor, however, doesn't quite have Mankiw's self discipline, so I'll point out that yes, taxes on cigarettes do decrease the number of people smoking. And that Pigovian taxes do not need to mean higher government spending – they can be offset with tax cuts elsewhere, or even used to do something crazy like pay down the national debt. I'm sure that Corcoran doesn't really believe that the present tax structure in Canada and the US is the optimal way of raising a given amount of money, but he seems perfectly happy to forget that for the time it takes to write this column.

The Debate on Energy Taxes