With incidents of prolonged drought, rising sea levels, and flooding on the rise, U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) introduced a bill on Wednesday to require federal natural resource agencies to plan for the long-term effects of climate change, and encourage states to prepare natural resources adaptation plans. The Safeguarding America’s Future and Environment Act (SAFE) Act also would create a science advisory board to ensure that the planning uses the best available science. The proposed legislation would require the development of a coordinated national adaptation strategy:

Not later than 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, the Panel shall develop a strategy to protect, restore, and conserve natural resources so that natural resources become more resilient, adapt to, and withstand the ongoing and expected impacts of climate variability and change.

It would also encourage, but not require, state-specific adaptation plans.

Effects of climate change mentioned as examples in the legislation are droughts and heatwaves, storms and floods; wildfires; outbreaks of forest pests and invasive species; flooding and erosion of coastal areas due to rising sea levels; melting glaciers and sea ice; thawing permafrost; shifting fish, wildlife, and plant population ranges; disruptive shifts in the timing of fish, wildlife, and plant natural history cycles, such as blooming, breeding, and seasonal migrations; and ocean acidification.

The legislation is cosponsored by Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), also a member of EPW. Baucus has repeatedly opposed action to limit climate change pollution.

Download the SAFE Act (as prepared for introduction).

Sens. John Kerry (D-MA), Patty Murray (D-WA), and Max Baucus (D-MT) have been named to the fiscal super committee tasked with constructing a bipartisan plan to rein in the long-term federal deficit. Considering that Republicans have practically proscribed new revenues, new investments, or eliminating tax subsidies, the committee is likely to continue America’s slide into austerity.

However low the likelihood, the committee does have the opportunity to put together a package that actually addresses the real long-term threats the nation faces, with desperately needed clean-energy and climate-resilience infrastructure spending funded by strict taxes or a cap on carbon pollution.

Kerry has said he believes that climate change “biggest long term threat” to national security. His 2010 climate bill was scored by the Congressional Budget Office to reduce the deficit by $19 billion, even using its extremely conservative assumptions that a massive investment in clean energy and infrastructure would somehow slow economic growth. A more aggressive climate plan that reflects the true urgency of the climate crisis would do even more to restore jobs and cut the deficit.

“We owe it to our children and future generations to get this issue under control and soon,” Murray argues about climate change.

Unfortunately, Kerry and Murray have not yet spread their climate-hawk wings and pointed out that the only solution to the nation’s long-term fiscal outlook involves solving the climate crisis. On Meet the Press, Kerry described his view thusly:

And the real problem for our country is not the short-term debt. We can deal with that. It’s the long-term debt. It’s the structural debt of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid measured against the demographics of our nation. That, then juxtaposed to the lack of jobs and job creation and growth. That’s our problem, structural.

In a joint statement with Baucus, Kerry and Murray said:

Our challenge is to find common ground without damaging anyone’s principles. We believe we can get there.

Their challenges is to save this nation’s long-term economic future. One can only hope they choose reality over compromise, even if Republican Party principles like denying science are damaged.

A ThinkProgress analysis finds that a majority of the members on the congressional special fiscal committee oppose regulation of global warming pollution. Even with the three House Democrats left to be named, seven of the 12-member committee are known to be climate zombies. Every Republican on the so-called Super Congress, as well as Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), have voted to reverse the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) work to limit greenhouse gas pollution. Most of the Republicans named to the committee are proud torchbearers of global warming denial:

Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI): “I do not say that it is man-made.”

Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI): “From what I have read, there remains a great deal of uncertainty with regard to the scientific evidence about climate change.”

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA): “There has been an increase in the surface temperature of the planet over the course of the last 100 years or so. I think it’s clear that that has happened. The extent to which that has been caused by human activity I think is not as clear. I think that is still very much disputed and has been debated.”

Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH): “When you analyze all the data, there is a warming trend according to science. But the jury is out on the degree of how much is manmade.”

Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) — whose top contributors include Koch Industries — has joined Camp and Upton in numerous votes this year to deny the threat of climate pollution, including H.R. 910, the House bill introduced by Upton to overturn the EPA’s scientific finding that greenhouse pollution endangers public health and welfare.

Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) also voted in April in a failed attempt to overturn the EPA’s scientific finding. Toomey and Portman were co-sponsors of that legislation.

Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) also tried in April to prohibit the regulation of greenhouse gases from a wide range of polluters.

However, Baucus has claimed that he has wanted Congress to lead on fighting climate pollution while opposing the EPA. He has the opportunity to become a climate hawk and insist that the fiscal package his committee devises include a civilization-saving, economy-spurring, and deficit-reducing carbon tax or cap and trade program.

Of the nine members already named to the committee, only Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) have been unequivocal about their efforts to fight greenhouse pollution.

This week, the U.S. Senate will debate and vote on how much to cripple the EPA’s efforts to protect civilization from global warming. 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 (S. 493). 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).

Call your Senators and ask them to vote against any legislation that would block the EPA from limiting greenhouse pollution: 202-224-3121