Few qualities are more dangerous in a national politician than a lack of interest in — or understanding of — science. It represents a genuine risk to the health and well-being of the nation and the world.

We get to see something close to the real John McCain only when he lets down his guard somewhat in these town hall meetings. A stunning December 2007 video revealed The real, Luddite McCain, who told a New Hampshire town hall, “The truly clean technologies don’t work.”

McCain made more revealing, shudder-inducing remarks in Tuesday’s Nashville town hall debate:

[Obama] voted for nearly a billion dollars in pork barrel earmark projects, including, by the way, $3 million for an overhead projector at a planetarium in Chicago, Illinois. My friends, do we need to spend that kind of money?

And he even came back to this would-be zinger:

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As the 110th Congress comes to a close, two of the legislators in charge of climate legislation in the House of Representatives yesterday released a draft climate plan. Rep. John Dingell (D-MI), the powerful chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA), chair of the Energy and Air Quality subcommittee, have primary jurisdiction in the House for legislation that puts mandatory limits on carbon emissions. Although such legislation has been a top priority for Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) since she became Speaker of the House in January 2007, Dingell and Boucher declared they would not be rushed, instead working on the 2007 energy bill, holding several hearings and releasing four white papers from October to May of this year. Dingell’s district is in the heart of the U.S. auto industry; Boucher represents Virginia’s coal country. Below is an analysis of some of the key issues raised in their 460-page draft legislation, an ambitious effort by the two congressmen.

EMISSIONS TARGETS. Dingell and Boucher call for emissions reductions of 80 percent from 2005 levels by 2050, in line with the minimum of scientific recommendations, but with reductions of only six percent below 2005 levels by 2020. Punting any significant reductions until after 2020 means that the Dingell-Boucher plan falls grossly short of what is needed to forestall catastrophe:

In contrast, Europe is maintaining its commitment to unilateral reductions of 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020.

REGULATORY STRUCTURE. In their letter to other members, Dingell and Boucher criticize the Supreme Court’s Massachusetts v. EPA decision that the EPA must regulate greenhouse gases, saying, “We believe that elected and accountable representatives in the Congress, not the Executive Branch, should properly design that regulatory program.” Their legislation would overturn the Supreme Court ruling by removing greenhouse gases from the Clean Air Act’s National Ambient Air Quality Standards regulations.

The draft provides a broad range of options for dealing with vehicle emissions standards, ranging from preempting the right of California and other states to provide additional protection from automotive pollution to allowing the EPA and the states to implement such protections. They also signal that they see state-level regulation of emissions as an economic threat, saying their actions “could be disruptive to interstate commerce and counterproductive to the goal of limiting national greenhouse gas emissions.” Their draft legislation would outlaw any state or regional cap and trade program.

MONEY. The Center for American Progress strongly supports the “polluter pays” principle for cap and trade programs to reduce global warming. The cost of pollution allowances should not be shifted to the taxpayer. Giving free permits to polluters would be a global warming bailout. The polluting industries are lobbying heavily to receive most if not all permits for free, particularly in initial years of the program. The European cap-and-trade system originally gave away permits, resulting in massive windfall profits for polluters. They are moving to a full auction of permits, like the new Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative cap-and-trade program that covers northeastern states.

The Dingell-Boucher draft does not take a position on how permits should be allocated initially, instead detailing four scenarios, three of which involve massive giveaways to covered industries. In every scenario, Dingell-Boucher would protect low-income consumers from increases in energy prices through tax breaks and rebates, and invest heavily in new technology deployment (e.g., renewables, advanced coal, advanced vehicles). Although their allocation scenarios are risible in detail, they do a good job of covering the competing priorities in moving to a low-carbon economy:

1. Protect low-income consumers from energy costs
2. Minimize compliance costs for covered polluters
3. Invest in technology development and deployment
4. Invest in complementary programs in efficiency and clean energy
5. Support international efforts and adaptation
6. Give rebates to middle- and upper-income consumers

Dingell and Boucher believe that low-income families must be protected, that industry should receive pollution cost protection and new technology support, and that all else is up for debate. Over half of their Democratic colleagues indicated last week a very different set of priorities, that focuses not on protecting polluters but on respecting scientific urgency, delivering economic equity, and capturing the energy opportunity.

[One of my sister websites, CampusProgress, has launched a new site you might want to share with any young people you know interested in climate action. Here is their PR.]

Amidst young people’s growing concerns about the state of the environment, today Campus Progress launched a new comprehensive campaign and website, Polar Opposites, offering information and resources for young people who want to take action to help combat climate change on their campuses, in their communities and in their daily lives.

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Grist tracked down the swing voter, Ingrid Jackson, who asked the question of the election (of the century?) on the need to respond to climate change as quickly as we are responding to the economic meltdown. She is “30, a senior psychology major at Tennessee State University in Nashville and a Children Services Officer for the Tennessee Department of Children Services.”

Here is what Jackson told Grist (don’t miss the money quote at the very end):

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Yes, he loves wind power. But beyond that, I lose more respect for the oilman every day. Consider what he wrote on his blog Friday:

Met with Sarah Palin the day after her debate with Joe Biden. She came to our Dallas offices with her husband, Todd, to talk about energy and the Pickens Plan….

Governor Palin comes from an energy state, and I’ll tell you, she gets this energy situation. We talked about it like two oil and gas professionals.

Pickens is calling Palin his equal? I guess that is what one would call “self-disqualification.”

Palin is a one-talking-point deep joke on energy (see “Sarah Palin is the fungible candidate” and “Palin in debate STILL gets global warming backwards and repeats Big Energy Lie twice” and “Note to media: Palin is NOT energy expert“). I take that back. No one who has a serious chance of becoming vice President under a 72-year-old multiple cancer survivor can be called a joke.

There are only two plausible explanations for Pickens’ comment. Either he really believes what he is saying, in which case he is losing it. Or, more charitably, he is pushing standard conservative spin, which merely proves that he still doesn’t understand which party is in favor of his big government-led renewable energy strategy and which will fight it to the death (see “Pickens learns the hard truth: Drill-only GOP hates alternative energy” and “Pickens in a pickle: He embraces progressive policies but not progressive politicians“).

If you want straight talk from a rich, conservative energy expert who gets peak oil, you’ll have to stick with Matt Simmons: “John McCain is energy illiterate. He’s just witless about this stuff.” Here is the rest of Pickens’ puff piece:

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The all-day conference is being webcast here now. The subject:

Refineries in the Great Lakes Basin are rapidly expanding to accommodate crude oil from the Alberta oil sands. This conference, How the Oil Sands Got to the Great Lakes Basin: Pipelines, Refineries and Emissions to Air And Water, is intended to provide an opportunity … to inform public opinion about the impacts of refinery expansion in the Basin…. Emphasis will be placed on the cumulative effect of refinery expansions on water quality, air quality and human and non-human downwind communities in the Basin.

The agenda is here. The panel discussion going on now and the next one on “Accelerated energy development in the Great Lakes basin and cleaner air and water: can we have both?” are the ones to catch.

The conference paper is here. It is a very interesting discussion of issues like:

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I do not recall any other debate in presidential history with as extensive and substantive a discussion of energy and climate issues. McCain reiterated his support for climate action, and Obama said his clean energy program was “priority number one.” The moderator, NBC’s Tom Brokaw, however, was arbitrary with the rules and did his best to squelch real debate.

Let’s start with the question of the election (of the century?) that took a regular person, Ingrid Jackson, to raise (transcript here):

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