NEWS FLASH

Grover Norquist Plots 2012 Assault On States’ Successful Clean Energy Standards | Grover Norquist, the anti-government ideologue who runs the powerful right-wing lobbying group Americans for Tax Reform, is preparing an all-out assault on state-level renewable energy standards, one of the shining bipartisan achievements of 21st-century American energy policy. Twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia have binding renewable energy standards, helping states end their dependence on dirty, toxic energy and encouraging clean industry. “Legislators in states around the country are now working with Americans for Tax Reform to repeal renewable energy mandates in 2012,” Norquist writes in Politico. “The iron is hottest to strike in states where Republicans recently took control of both the Legislature and the governorship — including Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio and Pennsylvania.” He also names North Carolina and New Hampshire as future targets if Republicans take the governor’s races in 2012.