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Van Jones seeks a “Healing for our Politics”: “Lets be One Country” PLUS my response to Tapper’s tweets — Should journalists twitter?

By Climate Guest Blogger on Sep 4, 2009 at 7:01 pm

I am a big fan of green jobs czar clean energy jobs handyman Van Jones (see “Van Jones argues we can “” and must “” fight poverty and pollution at the same time” and “Must Read: Van Jones and the English Language“).  The right wing hates the clean energy jobs message (see “Department of Energy eviscerates right-wing Spanish ‘green jobs’ study“) so it’s not surprising they are going after Van Jones.  This repost from Brad Johnson of Wonk Room helps sets the record straight.  It ends with a zinger tweet from ABC’s Jake Tapper that I reply to.  I pose the question — should journalists twitter? — and would be interested in your comments.

White House green jobs advisor Van Jones is under attack from Fox News as an “avowed radical revolutionary communist” and from ABC News as a “truther” with a “history of incendiary and provocative remarks.” In an attempt to assassinate the character of Van Jones, the right-wing media are distorting his past political activism and cherry-picking Jones’s critiques of the pollution and injustice that still haunt this nation. However, Jones’s true record is one of turning away from anger and finding hope, abandoning division and seeking consensus.

Speaking at the National Clean Energy Summit 2.0 in Las Vegas this August, Van Jones argued that “for all of the battleground politics that’s going on,” energy policy should be “the one place that should be a safe harbor for all of us.” Van Jones praised the “bipartisanship” of Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, who as a representative from Los Angeles succeeded in getting “the first president ever to sign into law a green jobs act, President George W. Bush.” He recognized that the summit participants came to find a “healing for our politics” in a “common ground agenda”:

Many of you have taken chances to start companies, you’ve written books, you’ve been grassroots champions for the change that we need. And I think you’re seeking not just a healing for our economy or a healing for our planet, but a healing for our politics. And I want to acknowledge that many of us are here because we are seeking something deeper. This is the common ground agenda. It should be the common ground agenda. We should be able to come together as a country on this one. Finally.

Watch it:

Jones then explained that “the values that underlie this clean energy conversation” are “the common ground values of America.” Underlying the call for clean energy is the value that “clean air is better than dirty air for the health of our children.” Underlying the call for energy efficiency is that value that treating our country’s resources “with wisdom and respect is more important than wasting them.” And “if we have the opportunity to fight both poverty and pollution by putting people to work in these new industries, we would be wise as a country to do that.”

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Media

Beck Includes Senate-Confirmed Staffer (Twice) In His Photo Of ‘Czars’ ‘Not Confirmed By Congress’

By Matt Corley on Sep 4, 2009 at 7:00 pm

On his Fox News show today, Glenn Beck featured one of his patented spooky-music video packages, this time fearmongering about the Obama administration’s “czars.” “He has 37 czars to oversee and advise him directly,” said Beck. “Never before have there been so many executive posts that were not confirmed by Congress and who answered only to the president.” Watch it:

As is common with conservatives making the “czar” attack, Beck simply has his facts wrong. Many of the positions he refers to as czars are actually long-standing positions. Additionally, in Beck’s photo gallery of czars, he includes Elizabeth Warren, who in her position as chair of a Congressional oversight panel, works for Congress — not the White House. Beck also includes Cass Sunstein, who “cruised” through his confirmation hearing for his nomination to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, but his final confirmation is being held up by Senate Republicans.

Additionally, in his photo gallery of “czars,” Beck included two pictures of director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy John Holdren, who was also confirmed by the Senate. Look:

czarsnew

Last month, Beck referred to OMB Director Peter Orszag, who is Senate-confirmed, as a “czar.” He later acknowledged his mistake after he was called out on it.

Climate Progress

Energy and Global Warming News for September 4: Coal with carbon capture and storage in China to face ˜staggering costs

By Climate Guest Blogger on Sep 4, 2009 at 5:41 pm

Coal with carbon capture and storage is not cheap (see Harvard stunner: “Realistic” first-generation CCS costs a whopping $150 per ton of CO2 “” 20 cents per kWh!).  Nor is it easy (see Harvard stunner: “Realistic” first-generation CCS costs a whopping $150 per ton of CO2 “” 20 cents per kWh!)  The low-carbon, low-cost future for China is efficiency, wind and concentrated solar power, I think.

‘Clean’ Coal in China Said to Face ‘Staggering’ Costs

Western governments pushing China to use clean-coal technology may need to lower their expectations for the world’s largest producer of greenhouse gases.

Costs will total as much as $400 billion over 30 years to install systems to capture carbon dioxide from power plant smokestacks in China and bury it underground, said Richard Morse, a Stanford University research associate and author of a study on the technology. China has little incentive to invest because it will raise power prices and it’s unclear if wealthier nations will pick up the bill, Morse said in an interview.

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu and European nations have championed carbon capture for nations including China as vital to slowing global warming while keeping coal in the energy mix. China, the biggest producer of coal, gets about 80 percent of its electricity from burning the fuel, which spews more heat- trapping gases than natural gas or oil.

“The idea that carbon capture has to happen in China is a western idea,” said Morse. Proposals by developed nations that seek Chinese cooperation ignore the “staggering” costs of clean-coal devices, Morse and colleagues said in the new report.

Companies developing capture systems in the U.S. include American Electric Power Co., the nation’s biggest producer of electricity from coal, and Duke Energy Corp. In Europe, Alstom SA, E.ON AG, RWE AG and Vattenfall AB are testing the devices.

Himalayas hotspot of climate change

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Yglesias

Canadians to Stage Fake Attack in Washington

By Matthew Yglesias on Sep 4, 2009 at 5:25 pm

Embassy of Canada, Washington DC (cc photo by mastermaq)

Embassy of Canada, Washington DC (cc photo by mastermaq)

Exciting news on the Canada beat, as our neighbors to the north are going to blow stuff up in Washington, DC:

The Taliban will attack an Afghan village set up in the heart of Washington courtesy of the Canadian Forces, who will send in a medic in a dramatic effort to save a civilian crippled by the explosion.

At least four times over two days this month, simulated IED blasts will bring the Afghan war — and Canada’s combat role in Kandahar home to Americans if an elaborate scheme based on modern training realism attracts widespread attention, as is hoped.

In other Canada news, Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper just took the interesting step of appointing a new Ambassador to the US, Manitoba Prime Minister Gary Doer. This is noteworthy because Doer is not a Conservative. Instead, he’s head of the Provincial branch of Canada’s left-wing New Democratic Party. This is perhaps tied in with some intrigue at the federal level, where the center-left Liberals are trying to topple Harper’s minority government and force a new election. This is forcing the Conservatives into a kind of tactical cooperation with the federal NDP, but neither really wants to admit this is happening.

Politics

Original ‘Birther’ Congressman Converts To ‘Tenther’: Rep. Posey Declares Health Care Reform Unconstitutional

By ThinkProgress on Sep 4, 2009 at 5:23 pm

EDITOR’S NOTE: Over the past month, ThinkProgress has traveled to town hall events across the country to report what we’re seeing on the ground. This is our seventh eyewitness report.

Earlier this week, Rep. Bill Posey (R-FL) held a health care town hall meeting in Melbourne, FL, which attracted well over 2,000 attendees. Posey is most famously known for introducing the “birther” bill — legislation that would require presidential candidates to submit their birth certificates to prove they are really U.S. citizens. But the “birther “conspiracy wasn’t the right-wing fringe theory that Posey spent his time discussing on Wednesday night.

Instead, Posey expressed his allegiance to “tentherism” — a stance adopted by many right-wing activists which posits that health care reform is an unconstitutional infringement on states’ rights. In an interview with ThinkProgress following the event, Posey told us in no uncertain terms that he believes Obama’s health care reform proposal is unconstitutional:

Yeah, I really do. There is nothing — the 10th Amendment he talked about says that all power is not delegated to the United States government — are reserved unto the states. And I absolutely support any intrusion and further erosion in violation of states’ rights. No doubt about that.

Posey’s “tenther” views found strong support among the crowd. Indeed, one of the questions posed to him from a town hall attendee wondered “how are any federal solutions to the health care problems constitutional?” (Posey responded that “there are some definite constituational questions.”)

Also, Florida state representative Ritch Workman (R) — one of the panelists who Posey invited to appear on-stage with him — elicited a standing ovation when he declared his support for HM 19, a bill that demands the federal government “adhere to and be constrained by the Tenth Amendment.” And outside the town hall venue, conservative activists were soliciting signatures in support of a “tenther” petition. Watch our video report:

Security

Louisiana Senator Says Health Care Reform Will Benefit Undocumented Immigrants Because ‘It Always Does’

By Andrea Nill Sanchez on Sep 4, 2009 at 5:15 pm

At a town hall meeting in Louisiana, Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) promoted the myth that undocumented immigrants will reap the benefits of health care reform by reasoning that “they always do.” He also proclaimed that what the nation is really facing is an immigration enforcement problem (as opposed to a health care problem) because “a quarter” of the “45 or 48 million” who are uninsured in the US are undocumented immigrants:

“There’s nothing in the bill that says it covers illegal aliens. Under the four corners of the bill it does not. But guess what? There’s nothing in all of these other benefit programs that says it goes to illegals either. And in practice it absolutely does, it always does. It always does.

Furthermore, now when the other side talks about 45, 48 million uninsured, a full quarter of that figure — one quarter — are illegal aliens. Now I’ll be God-honest with ya, I think that’s the problem. But I think that’s a law enforcement problem, not a health insurance problem.“

Watch it:

Vitter’s claim that undocumented immigrants will receive health care benefits under a bill that excludes them simply because “they always do” is completely ludicrous. Most legal immigrants have difficulty accessing the few public benefits they are even qualified to receive. That’s because of the many obstacles created by stringent verification requirements which serve as barriers for eligible immigrants and US citizens alike. The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act prohibited undocumented immigrants from being eligible for most public benefits, restricted the eligibility of legal immigrants, and codified procedures for verifying elgibility in a way that guaranteed that almost no immigrant would slip through cracks in theory and in practice. In the case of Medicaid, citizenship requirements led to thousands of Americans being denied or losing coverage, new administrative costs that “far exceeded the savings” by millions of dollars, and only a small handful of undocumented immigrants were caught all within the first two years alone.

Simple math shows that even if you eliminate a quarter of 45 million from the total number of uninsured, that still leaves over 33 million citizens and legal US residents without health insurance. The fact that Vitter is willing to sidestep a situation in which millions of Americans are dying or going broke without health insurance and instead focus on harshly enforcing our immigration laws says a lot about Vitter’s ability to effectively serve the American people. Vitter has dedicated more of his political career to making life harder for immigrants than he’s devoted to improving the lives of Americans. After helping to derail comprehensive immigration reform in 2007, Vitter introduced English-only legislation that would have terminated language assistance at voting booths and federal agencies and was the only Senator who opposed the removal of the HIV travel and immigration ban. Vitter has also proposed legislation to overturn the 14th Amendment and the US-born children of undocumented immigrants citizenship.

Yglesias

The Revenue Thing

By Matthew Yglesias on Sep 4, 2009 at 4:44 pm

Internal Revenue Service headquarters, Washington DC (cc photo by cliff1066)

Internal Revenue Service headquarters, Washington DC (cc photo by cliff1066)

Ezra Klein reminds us that regardless of how the question of the public option gets resolved, health reform proponents are still going to be stuck with the question of how to pay for reform. Before the public option debate really heated up this was the main thing being argued about. And if one side or the other ever wins the public option debate, the revenue debate will still be with us.

Two major approaches to this seem to have support in congress. On the one hand, some members want to try to finance reform through the mechanism of a “surtax” on wealthy tax payers. This is consistent with the President’s campaign promises. On the other hand, some members want to try to finance reform through curbing the current practice of excluding employer provided health benefits from taxation. This is not consistent with the President’s campaign promises, but it achieves the President’s goal of “bending the curve” over the long run since the government will no longer be encouraging people at the margin to consume health services rather than other goods. The problem is that though both approaches have some support, neither has majority support. And the problem is re-inscribed within the framework of the administration’s statements—on the one hand, Obama’s promised to bend the curve, which implies taxing benefits, but on the other hand Obama’s promised not to tax the middle class, which implies going with the surtax.

As a matter of logic and policy design, you can easily enough solve this problem by opting to do “some of both.” But whether that logic carries over into congress is another question.

Politics

Steele accuses Democratic congressman of ‘climbing up on Nancy Pelosi’s lap.’

By Matt Corley on Sep 4, 2009 at 4:39 pm

Yesterday, RNC Chairman Michael Steele made appearances in Indiana and Ohio, criticizing and taunting Reps. Baron Hill (D-IN) and Zack Space (D-OH). During an appearance in Zanesville, OH, Steele took aim at Space, offensively saying that he’s “climbing up on Nancy Pelosi’s lap“:

He took jabs at U.S. Rep. Zack Space for not holding a town-hall forum on the issue and “climbing up on Nancy Pelosi’s lap” by voting for cap-and-trade energy legislation and supporting the Democrats’ proposals to reform health care.

Steele asked those in attendance to pay attention to the debate throughout the fall because Democrats “are guaranteed to bury language in the bill with triggers to do what they want to get done.”

Update

Here’s the video of Steele’s comment:

Economy

Treasury Releases Outline For New Bank Capital Requirements

By Pat Garofalo on Sep 4, 2009 at 4:06 pm

ap090727019904Yesterday, the Treasury Department released its vision for reforming regulation of capital and leverage in the financial industry. The guidelines don’t include any specific requirements yet, but they start off with a strong and obviously necessary principle: “Capital requirements for banking firms should be higher across the board.” One of the many problems evident during the economic crisis was that banks were extremely over-leveraged, and didn’t have enough money on hand to cover their losses when the downturn hit, pushing the government into facilitating mergers or bailouts.

Besides an across-the-board increase, the plan stipulates that firms that are designated Tier 1 (essentially those that are “too-big-to-fail”) have even higher capital requirements than everyone else:

Tier 1 FHCs should be subject to substantially heightened capital requirements. The failure or financial distress of a Tier 1 FHC can inflict serious damage on many other financial firms and the broader financial system. As a result, Tier 1 FHCs should be subject to higher capital requirements than other firms in order to force them to internalize the costs of such potential spillover effects. Capital requirements for Tier 1 FHCs should be strict enough to be effective under extremely stressful economic and financial conditions.

These are smart steps (many of which were suggested by Elizabeth Warren’s Congressional Oversight Panel back in January). In particular, hitting the “too-big-to-fail” firms with higher requirements is a no-brainer, as it will both mitigate some of their competitive advantages and potentially bring down overall banker compensation. Treasury’s outline also includes a strict constraint on leverage (the use of debt to supplement investment) and an increased emphasis on higher quality forms of capital, both of which make sense.

But the most interesting bit of the plan is the idea to consistently alter capital requirements — and even accounting standards — as the business cycle moves. This would help to reduce the typically pro-cyclical actions that banks take during an economic downturn. Current static capital requirements “encourage banking firms to contract lending or shed assets during a credit crunch,” which only exacerbates the downturn, leading to further cutting back by the banks in a vicious cycle. Treasury’s proposal would change that, imposing higher requirements during boom times and easing the requirements during a downturn:

Efforts to reduce the procyclicality of the regulatory capital regime, or even introduce countercyclicality, have great appeal from a macro-prudential perspective. Moreover, such policies also would contribute to the narrower micro-prudential goal of making individual banking firms less likely to fail. Capital regulation that cushions the effects of adverse system-wide shocks would better enable banking firms to absorb losses and continue operating as going concerns.

As Kevin Drum put it, “we won’t know how serious Geithner is about this stuff until he rolls out the details. But at least he seems to be singing the right songs.” Indeed, in terms of principles, this plan is a good start. Of course, “the industry is unlikely to accept new rules without a fight,” so it will be up to Treasury to turn a good vision into actual rulemaking, over the objections of the banks themselves.

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