The House energy committee is seeing an intense leadership fight, as four different Republicans are vying to become take over the influential post from Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), who shepherded progressive climate legislation to the House floor in 2009, before it foundered in the U.S. Senate. The four candidates “” Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI), Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL), Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), and Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) “” all want to reopen the floodgates for a deregulated fossil fuel industry. But precisely how reactionary the committee will become “” whether investigations will be launched against climate scientists and all clean-energy efforts killed “” could depend on which fossil-fueled Republican wins the intraparty fight.
Brad Johnson has the story.
The frontrunner Upton is the only candidate who doesn’t explicitly question the science of manmade global warming, though he is opposed to any policy action. It remains to be seen if the new GOP caucus “” dominated by climate deniers “” will accept Upton’s marginally realist stance, or if denial of science will be a litmus test.
FRED UPTON
Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI) is the seniormost member eligible to take over the committee. In 1990, Upton voted for the Clean Air Act, enacting a cap-and-trade system to limit the sulfur pollution that causes acid rain. Now, however, although Upton admits “we need to reduce emissions” of greenhouse pollution, he opposes “cap-and-tax,” he said in April 2009:
A cap-and-tax, cap-and-trade will essentially kick American families when they’re down. I do believe that we need to reduce emissions, but it needs to be done in a commonsense way that takes into account the economic and global realities of the issue.
Appearing at the Copenhagen climate conference last December, Upton reiterated his position that somehow greenhouse pollution be be lowered without explicit limits:
I think we can lower our emissions. I think the world will be better off if we did that, and we can do it without cap and trade.
Seeking the chairmanship, Upton is remaking himself as a Glenn Beckian conspiracy theorist (“It is also quite unfortunate that Van Jones, the former Green Jobs Czar, avoided congressional scrutiny and could not be questioned on his alarming associations with the so-called “9/11 truther” movement or on his radical leanings”) who will hound Obama climate advisor Carol Browner:
Because Browner serves as a Czar, she has not been subject to the customary Senate confirmation hearing in which her philosophy on transparency could be examined. This circumvention is wholly unacceptable, especially given Browner’s wide-ranging legislative portfolio and influence within the administration. She was the Obama administration’s point person for a massive economy-killing national energy tax in the form of a cap-and-trade scheme. Thankfully, the American people did not fall prey to the administration’s climate gimmicks and had their voices heard at town halls across America last summer. . . .
House Republicans pledge to conduct vigorous oversights of the Obama administration next year if the American people entrust us with the Majority. With Republicans at the helm and exercising its authority to oversee activities of the executive branch, we will restore the public trust and subject this White House and its dozens of czars to the scrutiny that taxpaying Americans expect and deserve.
Upton’s top donor is nuclear waste giant EnergySolutions ($38,800), with other major donors including Michigan utilities CMS Energy ($22,750) and DTE Energy ($16,900). His leadership PAC distributed $129,000 to other Republicans, which should help him in the chairman’s battle.
JOHN SHIMKUS
Eight-term Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL) is “calling members of the GOP Steering Committee and will soon reach out to rank-and-file lawmakers” to seek the energy committee chairmanship. Shimkus both denies global warming and makes absurd claims about the threat of limits on carbon pollution. Shimkus thinks climate legislation would be worse than the September 11th attacks:
I think this is the largest assault on democracy and freedom in this country that I’ve ever experienced. I’ve lived through some tough times in Congress “” impeachment, two wars, terrorist attacks. I fear this more than all of the above activities that have happened.
Watch it:
Shimkus is a Koch Industries candidate ($18,500 this cycle), and his top contributor is nuclear giant Exelon ($20,000). Other top donors include the coal-using National Rural Electric Cooperative Association and American Crystal Sugar ($10,000 each). His leadership PAC only distributed $25,500 to fellow Republicans.
CLIFF STEARNS
Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) has been angling for the energy committee chairmanship for months. Like Shimkus, his main strength against Upton is that he is a hard-right ideological conservative. Stearns has been a strong proponent of expanding drilling, claiming falsely that “ANWR alone would be capable of reversing the decline in U.S. petroleum supply within a decade.” Stearns responded to the BP oil disaster: “The Challenger and the Columbia disasters did not end our space program and this spill should not be the end of our domestic energy production.” In 2007, Stearns gave a floor speech promoting the “global cooling” myth:
Not everyone sounded the alarm about global cooling in the seventies, just like not everyone is sounding the alarm about global warming today. Madam Speaker, the fact that so many experts were wrong about global cooling in the seventies does not necessarily mean that they are wrong about global warming today, but it does at least show that experts are sometimes incredibly, incredibly wrong.
Watch it:
Like the others, Stearns repeats false claims of economic disaster from a cap-and-trade system. However, Stearns recently told Politico that “we’ve got to control CO2“:
I think all of us realize we’ve got to control CO2 and that we have various ways to do it. “¦ My position has been anything we can do to control and regulate is good, but do it through the private sector. The energy policy I’m talking about isn’t on global warming; it’s making us self sufficient.
Stearns’ contributions mostly reflect his position as the top Republican on the telecom committee, although he has received $5000 each this cycle from Progress Energy and and Peabody Energy. His leadership PAC has contributed a measly $2,500 to four House Republicans.
JOE BARTON
Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), the top Republican on the energy committee, will need a waiver from GOP leadership to return to the chairmanship. Yesterday, he “sent out letters to the incoming 60-and-counting Republican freshmen asking them for support,” which rail against “radical cap-and-trade legislation” and the “rotten core” of Obama’s health care legislation. Most recently famous for apologizing to BP, Barton thinks global warming is “natural“:
Barton is a sponge for oil and coal money. This cycle, his top donors include coal giant Murray Energy ($20,990), Koch Industries ($18,000), coal utility PPL Corp ($17,500), Valero Energy ($15,000), Exelon ($14,000), DTE Energy ($13,500), Exxon Mobil ($12,000), American Electric Power ($10,000), and a raft of industry trade groups. His leadership PAC has distributed $88,500 to fellow Republicans.
– Brad Johnson, in a Wonk Room cross post.
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If the Repugnican deniers convene their witch hunts, I look forward to seeing real scientists show them up to be the lying fools they are. Time to go & re-read Brecht’s “Life of Galileo.”
I sure hope that the scientific community and NGO’s are going to have Michael Mann’s back during the inevitable inquisition hearings. Our leading climate-scientists cannot be left “twisting in the wind” when the Shimkus hits the fan.
Joe, is the professional scientific community planning any king of serious, coordinated “pushback” against these GOP goons? No need to “spill any beans”, but it would be nice to know that the scientific community is now serious about fighting back.
Of course, that’s “any kind”, not “any king”…
I think a simple comparison of how our economy & society reacted during the arab oil embargo, Gulf war, etc. when energy prices skyrocketed to levels far beyond anything being contemplated through carbon taxes and cap & trade would expose “worst threat to democracy…” blah, blah, blah for the extremist drivel that it is. These people seem to forget that markets react to stimuli REGARDLESS OF WHERE IT COMES FROM. Raise energy taxes, people will innovate to reduce their bills. Start a war in the mideast, curtailing oil flows and raising prices…people innovate to reduce their bills. Though to listen to these guys any self discipline seems to result in entrepreneurs turning into drooling zombies…
Geez what a group. I guess Upton is the best (least terrible) we can hope for. Barton would be a disaster.
The GOP is likely to be remembered in history as the party in power at the time of the great global warming. How is that as a historical legacy?
I guesswe will find out how much the Koches wand to rule the world.
Perhaps Barton should be investigated for his role in the discredited Wegman report. Are there no penalties for misleading the house?
I just know something’s wrong if I’m hoping that Upton will get the chairmanship. But I bet even he would try to cover up Koch’s attempt to stop an investigation into its illegal oil drilling in native american ground. He’d just ignore the reports of water contamination at fracking sites. He would listen to some though. Pollution lobbyists will be asking him to stop the EPA from regulating mercury, coal ash, ground level ozone, and greenhouse gases. Prepare for the Republican Inquisition…
Why did someone think it was a good idea that corporations should be allowed to buy politicians?! That’s not democracy, it’s a plutocracy – a society run by the wealthiest for the benefit of the wealthiest.
Let’s remember this is going to be nothing more than a witchhunt – attempting to destroy the character of patriotic American scientists. The American traitors (Upton Shimkus Sensenbrenner and Stearns)must be called to the mat.
Joe McCarthy bullied his false accusations of Communists to the top of the Ameican agenda. Here is how it was stopped on 9 June 1954.
Mr. Welch: You’ve done enough (Sen. McCarthy). Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?
The coming inquisition must be exposed for what it is.
Reading the source of the political donations for these candidates make me very uneasy. In Sweden recently, the head of the Social Democrat party received intense media scrutiny for putting toblerone chocolate on her expense account and for attending a tennis game that she did not pay for.trivial things you might say but all were picked up and highlighted. How can it be okay to be anywhere near the energy committee when you receive money from an organisation such as Valero or Koch. Are we witnessing the death of American Democracy? this is not normal, in no way ethical and downright sickening.
and Lionel, I second you; Are there no penalties for blatant misleading actions that are so bloody obvious and Orwellian that it makes me want to cry. The climate does not giving a flying frak about their stupid ideology. It is narcissism on an unprecedented scale.
Shimkus will probably get it. Barton is just too dumb and too obvious, and Upton is practically a socialist for admitting that global warming may actually be occurring.
Any of the four is an absolute joke, and a stain on our country’s reputation. Time to go to the people. Hello, scientists- I agree with caerbannog that it’s time for them to step up and throw some punches, not cite charts or talk jargon.
Pivotal
If an actual climate change denier becomes the head of this Committee, it (the Committee), he, and the entire Republican Party will become a laughingstock and lose all credibility. Indeed, that sort of thing could actually be a great thing for the movement, eventually, because the continuance of ridiculousness and nonsense usually depends on them not becoming too in-your-face obvious.
The only stance that would even be one-tenth “credible” would be some concocted stance that would involve admission of the reality of climate change, and acknowledgment of a deep concern about it, and an expressed aim to deal with it, but an excuse that “now is not the right time”. Although that is not a good argument, and it can clearly be defeated, nevertheless it’s the only stance that’s even half-way “plausible”. For example, if the Committee is led and dominated by climate change deniers, the very first thing that we should all INSIST on is that the major U.S. scientific organizations should boycott and picket and demonstrate outside of every Committee meeting, in large numbers, to indeed embarrass the Committee and the Republicans and indeed the government. If the scientific organizations wouldn’t do that sort of thing, then the “party” is over and we may as well all go home, really. If THIS Committee is led by climate change deniers, and if the leading scientific organizations don’t go “ballistic” over that, figuratively speaking, and show some guts, then I won’t know who to respect any more. Indeed, if THIS Committee ends up with a climate change denier as its head, I would expect CAP (all employees) to demonstrate at each hearing of the Committee. And nothing less. Otherwise let’s all give up and go home.
So, it’ll be interesting to see what the Repubs do on this. I actually hope that they “go extreme” and thus make a huge mistake that will allow us to make the whole matter an embarrassing issue for them.
Let’s see how stupid — and that’s the right word — they’ll be.
Cheers,
Jeff
“If an actual climate change denier becomes the head of this Committee, it (the Committee), he, and the entire Republican Party will become a laughingstock and lose all credibility.”
No they won’t. Barton was the committee chair for a few years. Over in the Senate, Inhofe, probably the best known skeptic on the GOP side, was head of Senate Environment & Public Works before Boxer and the Dems took over. I’m pretty sure they weren’t embarrassed back then.
Cross posted from Curry’s blog.
“Dr. Curry,
Perhaps a more appropriate title might have been “Ending the assault on science and scientists by “skeptics”".
Anyhow, that brings me to the point of this post. As you know there are already musing about holding McCarthy-like interrogations of climate scientists by Republicans and Tea Party ideologues. These are indeed scary times, although your actions of late may have saved you experiencing the wrath of Barton and Inhofe. Time will tell.
You volunteered recently that you have been contacted by a politician/s. You allowed Mosher to post an (illegally obtained) email. So now I am going to ask you, very nicely, in the spirit of transparency and openness, to post a legally obtained email (or emails) that you received from the politician/s. Feel free to obfuscate their details, and name their name/s.
Many of your readers here have been demanding investigations against climate scientists, so your position on such is pertinent. So your role in these developments is relevant and should be a matter for the public record given what is at stake and given that tax payers money will be used to fund any such interrogations.
Additionally, please answer these questions, again as unambiguously and clearly as possible:
1) Do you condone plans by Republicans and Tea Party representatives to launch investigations against climate scientists?
2) If yes, do you plan to do to prominently condemn such actions and what do you intend to do prevent them from happening?
3) If no. Why so?
4) If no. Do you plan to assist in any way the people launching and executing the investigations against your peers?
5) If such interrogations go ahead, do you agree that they should include interrogations/cross examination of climate scientists from both the “skeptical” (e.g., Christy, Spencer, Lindzen) and the “warmist” sides?
If such a horrid inquisition does go ahead, it will not herald the end of the war, if anything it will just make matters much, much worse. I fear the likes of Inhofe will only be content when a “warmist” climate scientist is physically hurt or worse.
Again, I am interested only in your position on this. Thank you.”
DavidCOG, It seems to me that we are seeing in America a government “of the people, by the corporations for the rich”.
The only way to turn back the tide of idiocy,ignorance and mendacity is for the climate scientists, en masse,to declare openly and publicly that the anthropogenic climate change theory is true, and take radical action. I suggest hunger strikes,occupations (say of FoxNews Ltd studios) and treating these buffoons with the contempt they deserve. Getting to Congress and toadying, addressing these fools as ‘Mr Senator’ or some such obsequiousness, as if they were deserving of respect, just will not do. These are imbeciles, representing other imbeciles,financed and hence owned by business psychopaths, and if they prevail, humanity expires. To treat them with other than the contempt that they merit is moral cowardice, in my opinion. And if they threatened to imprison you for ‘contempt’-go to gaol, with your head held high. It is long,long, time past for taking the gloves off with these climate and ecological criminals.
1. Any scientist callled by these people should refuse to answer anything as they do not have the competence to undestand the answers.
2. Someone should investigate and publish the educational bsackground of these politicians – did they actually pass any science exam? What grades?
3. The scientists who are called should hold public press conferences before the hearings to explain why the committte is not fit to do this work.
In my view, the best that scientists can do is answer the questions as accurately as possible. Unfortunately, questioners can ask “yes or no” questions for complex problems. The second thing to do is to attack any witnesses who support the denier position. For example, Monckton testified in the past and it is important to get on the Congressional record how thoroughly he has been debunked.
Climate change is by far the most important political issue.