Today, the U.S. Senate will debate and vote on how much to cripple the EPA’s efforts to protect civilization from global warming. Brad Johnson has the story of the pollution lobby pushing hard to gut the Clean Air Act.
The Republicans have attached the Upton-Inhofe bill to deny the existence of global warming pollution as a Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) amendment (S. Amdt. 183) to Sen. Mary Landrieu’s (D-LA) unrelated small-business bill. A Democratic amendment from Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) would exempt the greenhouse pollution of industrial agriculture and other polluters (S. Amdt. 236). An amendment from Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) would prevent the EPA from enforcing rules for two more years (S. Amdt. 215). NRDC’s David Hawkins covers the Clean Air Act phobia well:
It’s a sad state of affairs when members on both sides of the aisle in Congress seem to think it is a good idea to attack the Clean Air Act – the landmark law that Richard Nixon signed and George H. W. Bush strengthened. Yet the hits on the Clean Air Act just keep on coming in this Congress in spite of the Act’s incredible record of cutting deaths and illness caused by air pollution – a record that has earned the strong support of the American people and the admiration of others around the world.
No amendments to force the EPA to take stronger action have been submitted. Rockefeller’s toxic amendment is cosponsored by Sens. Jim Webb (D-VA), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Tim Johnson (D-SD), and Kent Conrad (D-ND). McConnell’s climate denial amendment is cosponsored by Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Pat Toomey (R-PA), John Cornyn (R-TX), Mike Johanns (R-NE), Rob Portman (R-OH), and Johnny Isakson (R-GA).
The usual suspects are out en masse pounding the drums to demonize the EPA and at least implicitly deny the existence of global warming:
- The Koch brothers’ Americans For Prosperity attacks “higher energy costs and lost jobs that would result from the EPA distorting the Clean Air Act.”
- Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal: “the EPA plan will appreciably lower the U.S. standard of living.”
- The American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity is running radio ads in Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and other states that dis the Clean Air Act as a “40-year-old law.”
- the Competitive Enterprise Institute: “EPA regulations actually impose costs far in excess of benefits.”
- the National Association of Manufacturers is running radio and television ads in Arkansas, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, and Pennsylvania that attack “costly new regulations.”
The target senators are McCaskill, Sens. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and Susan Collins (R-ME), Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and Carl Levin (D-MI), Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR), and Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA).
– Brad Johnson in a WonkRoom cross-post.
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Sending another contribution to the Green Party, aka the only sane political party.
The Koch brothers seem to be sending a message to certain senators putting them on notice that they’ll be targeted in the next election cycle.
What’s next? Removing the catalytic converter requirement for cars?
The Democratic Party badly needs an actual leader to take on these hooker. This person is not present in the White House or among Obama’s 2008 primary opponents. They were all road tested by the oil companies and banks. RFK Jr. would be good, but he has health problems and a skeleton or two. In a country this size, there must be someone out there.
#2 Pythagoras – One of the Koch Bros political organizations publicly said (toward the end of 2010) one of the Maine senators (forget which one) would be targeted with one of their nuts during the Senators next election (2012? – because the Senator talked with the Administration to a very small extent). No under the radar messages at all. Anyone that misses their report card requirements is targeted and they’ve been successful enough that most GOP representatives are scared to death of being on that target list. Their goal is a takeover of the Senate in 2012.
We will have dodged a huge bullet if we can get by without the EPA authority being stripped here. At this point it seems likely that it is going to get stripped and that ol’ President tar sands pipeline, coal, ethanol and oil probably won’t veto it.
#1 BBHY – Its obvious most Dems (and this Admin in particular) are just as bought off as the GOP on CO2 emission regulation other than window dressing, very depressing to say the least.
“What’s next?”
Hunker down at the arctic sector with nuclear energy and then get fried with methane bulps plus nuclear meltdown from sudden earthquakes.
That’s how i imagine the last stand of what is left of the species. Going down with a whimper.
As I mentioned in comments to another post recently, poor air quality cost the CA economy over $28 Billion according to a 2008 report from California State Univ.-Fullerton economist Jane Hall.
http://calstate.fullerton.edu/news/2008/091-air-pollution-study.html
There is absolutely no economic rationale for the effort to defund or limit the EPA.
The most depressing thing is that even the big enviro organizations are not trying to win anything, just fighting to hold on to past gains and hoping to win a few big battles. That means the little skirmishes will be lost and we face the death of a thousand cuts. 4
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=AD612FFC-BE97-48FA-B462-28E372DA34F7
And, Mike (33) after reading the Riverkeeper statement on Indian Point nuclear shutdown, my level of hope for anything from Robert Kennedy Jr. is near what I give to the change I no longer believe in.
1st at reddit.com Corporate America, explained by Calvin and Hobbes
http://i.imgur.com/gdvaL.jpg
Do you want progress on clean energy? Do you want progress on any progressive issue? Do you want to take any steam out of the plutocrats’ juggernaut?
Demand higher taxes on the rich.
Yes, call your senators and representatives, write to your local paper, protect the EPA and demand clean energy. But also call for taxing the rich. The huge concentration of wealth — the easy purchase of the government and the media by our plutocracy — is the keystone issue. Today, any hope of progress requires taxing the rich.