Posted on 06/06/2008 9:04:39 AM PDT by EPW Comm Team
Excerpt: This week’s Climate Tax Bill debate revealed many useful insights into why the American people will remain skeptical of a global warming cap-and-trade system. The Wall Street Journal aptly noted on June 6 that environmentalists are "stunned that their global warming agenda is in collapse" after the Climate Tax Bill debate. "The green groups now look as politically intimidating as the skinny kid on the beach who gets sand kicked in his face. Those groups spent millions advertising and lobbying to push the cap-and-trade bill through the Senate," the paper noted. "With gasoline selling at $4 a gallon, the Democrats picked the worst possible time to bring up cap and trade," a political analyst noted. "This issue is starting to feel like the Hillary health care plan," the analyst added. (LINK) Roll Call quoted frustrated Democrat staffers as being beside themselves in anger for the way the cap-and-trade bill was presented. "We have no strategy, no message and no plan," said one senior Senate Democrat aide. "Everyone knows this bill is going nowhere. The president is opposed to it. The House is not inclined toward action on this, and now we're going to spend valuable floor time on a bill that's going nowhere ... while Republicans are champing at the bit to accuse Democrats of raising gas prices," the aide added. “Boxer is walking us off a cliff,” another senior Senate Democratic aide said, according to the paper.
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=5e344862-802a-23ad-41a5-8a26bdedff66
June 6, 2008
Inhofe Statement on Climate Tax Bill’s Demise
WASHINGTON, DC – Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), Ranking Member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, commented today on the cloture vote that effectively halted the Climate Tax Bill.
"This bill was doomed from the start," Senator Inhofe said. "When the Majority Leader filled the amendment tree and filed cloture on the Climate Tax Bill, it was obvious that the Democrats were not serious about supporting this bill. This was one of the largest bills ever considered by this Congress and probably the largest non-appropriations bill the Senate has ever considered. This bill deserved a full and honest debate, with amendments offered and voted upon. The American people did not deserve a political exercise geared toward election year politics. Republicans were prepared to debate this bill with over 150 amendments ready to be offered. The Democrats did not want to debate and vote on our amendments that were aimed at protecting American families and workers from the devastating economic impacts of this bill. The 1990 Clean Air Act amendments were considered on the Senate floor for five weeks, and this comprehensive climate bill demands at least equal debate.
"The committee process was short-circuited, the floor debate was circumvented, and the amendment process was derailed. I do not see how the Democrats use this failed bill as any kind of model for future success. As I suspected, reality hit the U.S. Senate when the economic facts of this bill were exposed. When faced with the inconvenient truth of the bill’s impact on skyrocketing gas prices, very few Senators were willing to even debate this bill."
Background:
This week’s Climate Tax Bill debate revealed many useful insights into why the American people will remain skeptical of a global warming cap-and-trade system.
The Wall Street Journal aptly noted on June 6 that environmentalists are "stunned that their global warming agenda is in collapse" after the Climate Tax Bill debate. "The green groups now look as politically intimidating as the skinny kid on the beach who gets sand kicked in his face. Those groups spent millions advertising and lobbying to push the cap-and-trade bill through the Senate," the paper noted. "With gasoline selling at $4 a gallon, the Democrats picked the worst possible time to bring up cap and trade," a political analyst noted. "This issue is starting to feel like the Hillary health care plan," the analyst added. (LINK)
On June 3, Roll Call quoted frustrated Democrat staffers as being beside themselves in anger for the way the cap-and-trade bill was presented.
"We have no strategy, no message and no plan," said one senior Senate Democrat aide. "Everyone knows this bill is going nowhere. The president is opposed to it. The House is not inclined toward action on this, and now we're going to spend valuable floor time on a bill that's going nowhere ... while Republicans are champing at the bit to accuse Democrats of raising gas prices," the aide added. “Boxer is walking us off a cliff,” another senior Senate Democratic aide said, according to the paper. (LINK) & (LINK)
What We Learned This Week:
1) Raise Gas Prices Higher: "Government studies confirm this will only raise gas prices." The EPA estimates that the Lieberman-Warner bill will increase fuel costs an additional 53 cents per gallon by 2030 and by $1.40 by 2050. The Energy Information Agency (EIA) estimates gas prices will increase anywhere from 41 cents per gallon to $1.01 per gallon by 2030.
2) Largest Tax Increase Ever: The Climate Tax Bill was the largest tax increase in American history. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says Lieberman-Warner would effectively raise taxes on Americans by over a trillion dollars just during the next 10 years. The bill would have created $6.7 Trillion in the form of higher gasoline and electricity bills, and with no climate benefit. The Lieberman-Warner bill did not have a tax cut provision in it. Boxer’s claim of "tax relief" in the bill is based on a non-binding Sense of the Senate resolution that says some funds "should be" used to protect consumers from the coming "increases in energy and other costs" caused by the bill (Section 585, page 204 of substitute version, Sense of the Senate on Tax Initiative to Protect Consumers).
3) Nuclear Energy Lacking: Nuclear power is by far the world’s largest sources of non-emitting energy. Any credible attempt to reduce carbon emissions must include significant development of new nuclear plants. Merely passing a climate bill will not be enough to support the nuclear construction needed to satisfy the bill’s mandates. Additional incentives will be indispensable in the near-term to revitalize the industry to a level that encourages massive development.
4) Job Killer: The independent Energy Information Administration says the bill would result in a 9.5% drop in manufacturing output and higher energy costs, and that it will be worse unless we can build 268 new nuclear plants by 2030. This country has already lost 3 million manufacturing jobs since 2000. An analysis of this bill by the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Council for Capital Formation states that up to 1.8 million jobs could be forfeited by 2020 and 4 million jobs could be by 2030. Midwestern states alone could lose close to a million jobs alone in this time frame. Without international participation, which this bill fails to adequately address, global concentrations of greenhouse gases will continue to increase, even if America were to nearly eliminate its emissions.
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Related..
I love the sound of that phrase!
The ultimate scam of the left...designed for one purpose. Take wealth from industry and individuals. Socialism 101.
Don’t be complacent - this is only the first round. Like many left-wing ideas, the first try is rejected soundly. After a few more years of MSM propoganda, the idea becomes more “mainstream” for the 2nd attempt.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
What scares me is with some tweaking and compromises a majority in the Senate would be onboard.
Jim Inhofe is about the only legitimate reason for this senate. Inhofe is an experienced pilot who managed to land a plane a few years ago after the prop mysteriously fell off.
“The 48-36 vote fell short of a majority, but Democrats produced letters from six senators — including both presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain — saying they would have voted for the measure had they been there.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2027105/posts
“Boxer is walking us off a cliff,” another senior Senate Democratic aide said,”
Heh heh I knew she was in trouble when she said that global warming was like leaving kids in a hot car..-) Sick.
Why empty your wallet, which is a one-time event, when they can trick you into thinking you're free (when you're actually their slave)?
I’m with those who say this represented the high-water mark of the Global Warming Confederacy.
This forced the senators of both parties to get a good long look at the devastating economic consequences, as well as the all-around absurdities of trying to legislate CO2.
More to the point: it made it clear that the political consequences to THEM, personally would be catastrophic. That brought the point home. Other articles posted here showed them half-heartedly trying to have weaselly exceptions written into the bill to try and spare their own states industries. But trying to administer such an economic body-blow while americans are already hopping mad about energy and food prices is career suicide for a legislator.
“As I suspected, reality hit the U.S. Senate when the economic facts of this bill were exposed. When faced with the inconvenient truth of the bill’s impact on skyrocketing gas prices, very few Senators were willing to even debate this bill.”
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Leave it to Inhofe to state the case pithily.
Of course they are. Why should they not be, when they were convinced that it is no longer necessary to prove conclusively that a problem exists, before creating a blizzard of laws creating penalties, limiting freedoms, creating new taxes (the "progressive" solution to everything), ruining people's lives and driving the country towards bankruptcy?
It worked with tobacco.
Second hand smoke has created more mindless restrictions on the freedoms of tens of millions, based on a "feeling" that a public health problem exists.
There has been zero debate on the dangers of smoking because, well, the (limited) dangers have been proven and the obvious solution would cut off a huge revenue stream which finances all their pollyanna dingbat schemes.
No such cause and effect were ever proven before the "more taxes' solution were put in place.
"Global warming" is in the same position today. Why should onerous restrictions and taxes be postponed if there might be huge negative consequences if the hysterics are "right"?
“I’m with those who say this represented the high-water mark of the Global Warming Confederacy.”
Dunno. I would bet they go incremental with little outrages.
Pubbies should submit a drilling bill every week until election.
DRILL and REFINE our OWN OIL!!!!
THANK GOD, THANK GOD!!!!!!!
IT’S A HAPPY DAY, A HAPPY DAY INDEED!!!!!!!!!!!
I live in Seattle, and we may be nuts, but not for the reason you offer.
Anyone that trys to light and enjoy a beach fire in a persistent drizzle interspersed with periods of heavy rain in 50 deg weather is truly mentally deficient.
read later
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