WASHINGTON — The global political battle over climate change was also being fought at the US Supreme Court on Wednesday as judges bickered over the role of greenhouse gas emissions in global warming and disagreed on whether the Env­­ir­on­mental Protection Agency had the power to refuse to regulate such emissions. Hearing a case that could have a big impact on emission politics in the US Congress and beyond, judges listened to a Bush administration official defend the notion that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) should stay out of greenhouse gas regulation. They also heard from the state of Massachusetts, which insists that its coastline will be threatened unless the EPA steps in. Environmental activists, frustrated by the failure of Congress or the Bush administration to act on global warming, brought the issue to the Supreme Court with the case Massachusetts v EPA. The court heard oral arguments in the case yesterday but will rule only sometime next year. Massachusetts brought the suit, backed by California, New York and several other states, to try to force the EPA to regulate exhaust emissions from new cars. The EPA says it does not have the authority to regulate such emissions, […]