of the EPA under George W. Bush, has this to say: If nothing else, the devastation caused by Hurricane Sandy, both fiscal and physical, should put the issue of climate change front and center for President Obama's second term. It's unfortunate that Democrats failed to pass cap-and-trade to limit carbon emissions when they had control of both chambers of Congress, as getting it through the House is going to be a tough challenge now. Despite past resistance to federal cap-and-trade proposals, this solution should stay on the table. It is my hope that my Republican colleagues will see the wisdom of a market-based system for funding a public good -- all very much Republican principles. Over at The New York Times , Cass Sunstein makes his own call for climate action. Sunstein, who headed the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs during most of Obama's first term, says Obama should follow the example of another iconic two-term president, Ronald Reagan, who took action to protect the ozone layer: Reagan's economists found that the costs of phasing out ozone-depleting chemicals were a lot lower than the costs of not doing so -- largely measured in terms of avoiding cancers that would otherwise occur. Presented with that analysis, Reagan decided that the issue was pretty clear. Much the same can be said about climate change. Recent reports suggest that the economic cost of Hurricane Sandy could reach $50 billion and that in the current quarter, the hurricane could remove as