The orthodox view among American conservatives and libertarians and “free market” advocates more generally is that if I want to walk up to the edge of my lawn and then turn my garden hose on and start messing up your lawn, than the correct capitalist response is to say that I’m doing something wrong. If I totally wreck your garden, that’s worse. If I spray water into your house and wreck your stuff, that’s worse too. Even if your house is kind of dumpy and poor and not worth very much money, it’s still wrong for me to just randomly spray water into it. Even if I really really enjoy spraying your house, it’s still wrong. I either need to stop spraying your house or else I need to reach an agreement with you about how I’m going to compensate you for the right to spray. If I insist on continuing to spray your house with water without mutual acceptable compensation, then shutting my operation down should be a matter of some social priority.
If that were the case, then libertarians would be out front in wanting to stop pollution, especially greenhouse gases like C02. No matter how useful or practical the action was, if it violated other people's property (even poor people!) it would have to be shut down. But as Yglesias notes, in practice free market conservatives and libertarians generally support policies that reflect the interests of their wealthy patrons.
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