What exactly are we paying these Senators for?
Apparently, the latest complaint from what is supposedly the world’s most exclusive deliberative body is that it’s just too damn much for the American public to expect that their elected representatives deal with more than one big issue — health care and climate — at the same time. As the WashPost reports in a story on the state of play of the Senate climate bill:
But other legislators wonder if, when the health-care debate finally ends, the Senate will have the stomach or the attention span [!!] for another complicated fight.
And it remains unclear how much clout President Obama will have left to sway wavering lawmakers. “It’s very hard for Congress to do one big thing, much less do a couple of really big issues at the same time,” said Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.), whose state produces coal as well as wind power.
Yes, Senators exhausted from a few weeks of talking to other senators, taking a month break, and receiving large sums of money from lobbyists will need months and months of recuperation doing … what? a bunch of really small, inconsequential things, before addressing the biggest threat to the health and well-being of all Americans. Seriously!
The good news is that while Dorgan continues to raise concerns about carbon market manipulation, he actually seems to have softened his position on the bill:
Dorgan, who could be a swing vote on a climate bill, said he believes in capping carbon emissions, but not this way. He fears that cap-and-trade will create a market open to manipulation, like existing securities markets.
He remains noncommittal about his ultimate vote. “We have a whole mountain range to climb before we get there,” he said.
We’ve seen that the market manipulation issue is overblown and addressable (see “When Sen. Dorgan finds out what’s in the climate bill “” hint, hint, White House “” he might just support it” and Krugman’s Fear of carbon markets and speculation is “99% wrong and bad for the planet”).
I’m gonna Dorgan down as a definite “Maybe” [a big step up from Nate Silver's "Probability of Yes" vote (PrY) of 22%], especially on cloture to end the inevitable, immoral conservative filibuster.
Previous in TP Climate Progress
Your senators are not able to repair the health system a bit and fix down some pollution to save the people?
I recommend to kick the hundred out and put a fresh hundred in.
To my eye, the issue isn’t attention span (that’s too simplistic of course), but Congress’s habit of working out big-time compromises and horse trades. To garner sufficient support for health bill, what has to be sacrificed on energy/climate, and vice versa… Not a good scenario.
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/22/will-health-battle-wound-climate-effort/
[JR: If Obama gets a health care bill and the economy keeps recovering, then that is good for climate prospects. Those are his big 3 issues and promises. I suppose it is possible some of his political and economic team -- who aren't terribly excited about climate change legislation -- might make some back room deals, but I can't imagine Obama or Biden backing them up. Still, I'm all for taking as much time as needed on climate change legislation, as I've always said.]
I don’t believe that Dorgan’s actual problem with the bill is that Wall Street trading is going to doom the country without protecting the climate. If that were true, I think we’d hear him supporting the sort of cap-and-no-trade policies that Sen. Maria Cantwell is putting together. Instead, we mostly just listen to him complain. I think his real beef is that he is from a coal state, and this bill (is supposed to) hurt coal. He can capitalize on existing fears about trading and speculation while not appearing to be in bed with the slimy folks over at ACCCE and other fossil fuel lobbies. It’s got to be up to the grassroots in ND to show Sen. Dorgan that his state’s wind potential is the future of American energy.
Just a thought
Hey, at least there’s this guy!
http://www.themudflats.net/2009/08/03/5896/#comment-115734
Slowness from Congress? Pair what with bad opinion pieces and its even worse. I don’t think it helps when we have people still continuing to doubt what all these reforms (like W-M) are to do. Just today in the NYT, implying that climate legislation are “dividends [we'll reap] only in the long term, if at all.”
If at all? How dare we think beyond the short term that our economic system innately only cares about!
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/03/opinion/03douthat.html?_r=1
Am I alone in thinking that the Senate as an institution is a dead weight that ought to be if not abolished then reconstituted? It contains a lot of smart and experienced people we’d want to keep on, but the combination of the 2 senators per state imbalance and their staggered six year terms means that while the house is overly responsive to short term swings in public opinion, the Senate isn’t responsive to much at all.
This is leaving aside the whole campaign financing thing which of course is huge.
If we had four year terms concurrent with the Presidential terms, would we be dealing with at least a different composition in the Senate?
This can’t chew gum and walk at the same time is pretty amazing, but annoyingly, they insist in both houses in letting every committee that could be vaguely considered related to the topic of big bills get a go at it, which i wonder if they do with other bills.
I think Ben W. was correct about Dorgan’s motivation. In almost every comment that I have made a climate progress, I have expressed my concern that the power of the coal interests, along with the horse trading bent of the US Senate, will prevent the enactment of effective regulation. Take away the coal state Senators (Dorgan, Conrad, Rockefeller, Byrd) With just those 4, it would be impossible to break a filibuster. End on effective legislation from the Senate… even though we will be told it is great.
There is a great distance between the dream and the reality.
The tragic flaw in Congress is they believe in political compromise and deal making.
Totally worthless when dealing with scientific events.
Congress refuses to respect the Laws of Thermodynamics and climatology.
Pity.