Update #3
July 7th, sent by James Sledd
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The Senate Environment and Public Works held its first hearing on the Waxman-Markey bill today. From watching on C-SPAN, they looked like they went as expected. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, Mark Sanford’s replacement as the head of the Republican Governors Association, was one of the witnesses. He argued that carbon dioxide was not a pollutant, but thankfully did not share intimate details about his love life.
Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe (one of the most conservative members of the Senate) made about as much sense as an Angus bull would trying to recite Shakespeare, insisting that climate change is not real, that no evidence exists. It is, apparently, all a hoax designed to tax the American people and expand big government. People who believe this must be really scared, since that means that Al Gore is not only capable of bullying thousands of climate scientists into submission, but also melting glaciers, raising global sea levels, and somehow tampering with the entire history of atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Oh, and by the way, President Obama has no valid birth certificate.
Senator Inhofe also ranted about the EPA suppressing a recent internal report “proving” that climate change does not exist. Right-wing news programs have seized on this report, claiming that the Obama administration is ignoring the truth and relying on uncertain science. This is, of course, patently false, and debunked here.
Think the bill is too weak? It probably is. There are problems with the offsets programs that it would create to meet carbon reduction goals, and it probably doesn’t cut emissions enough. But it’s a necessary start, and an 83% cut in emissions by 2050 is real. But don’t listen to me: go to http://thomas.loc.gov and read the CRS summary and the CBO budget estimates and make up your own mind. The Congressional Budget Office cost estimates say that the bill will cost the average American only 47 cents per day, disproving critics, who claim it will cost thousands per year.
I don’t know what will happen with the bill in the senate. Al Franken was sworn in today, giving the Dems a 60-seat supermajority. That doesn’t mean that the bill is filibuster-proof, though, and it stands a good chance of being weakened further by oil- and coal-state dems like Mark Begich (AK) and Max Baucus (MT). And you can bet that climate skeptics and other naysayers will ramp up their hype machine, claiming that the bill will kill jobs and cost Americans thousands of dollars each year.
So call your senators. Tell them you support and strengthen the bill. It won’t be strengthened, but let them know that’s what you want. I hope that the Senate passes ACES now, because there’s no way that it’ll pass the house next year in an election year.
Hope you’re all enjoying your summer and had a great independence day. -James
