Rob,
I haven’t suggested anything so far in this thread.
Whether introducing a carbon tax will ultimately be good or bad for the U.S. economy depends on the future development. It’s near therm effect would be making energy consuming activities more expensive relative to other activities. If these other activities will be of greater value in the future speeding up the transition is likely to be beneficial for the economy. That’s a very possible future for U.S. but cannot claim that it’s true with certainty.
A very high carbon tax would almost certainly cause damaging distortions to the economy, but a modest one might be a good idea even on purely selfish ground.