I’m somewhere in between a “truster “and a “cynic” as defined by Robert Reich:
People who voted for Barack Obama tend to fall into one of two camps: Trusters, who believe he’s a good man with the right values and he’s doing everything he can; and cynics, who have become disillusioned with his bailouts of Wall Street, flimsy proposals for taming the Street, willingness to give away 85 percent of cap-and-trade pollution permits, seeming reversals on eavesdropping and torture, and squishiness on a public option for health care.
Let’s look at energy reform in particular.
Obama and Congressional Democrats are fighting hard for the current bill, even though it accomplishes little:
Calling the bill “extraordinarily important”, Barack Obama on Thursday said its enactment would “finally spark a clear energy transformation that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil and confront the carbon pollution that threatens our planet…”
“In order to get the votes, the bill’s managers have taken off most of its environmental edge,” said Rob Shapiro, chairman of the US Climate Task Force, which backs a carbon tax. “If we were to pass a toothless bill like this, we would probably have to wait five or 10 years for another chance to do it right.”
For example, in contrast to Mr Obama’s campaign promise that 100 per cent of the permits would be auctioned off, the bill gives away 85 per cent for free and only moves to a full auction in 2030.
Likewise, an EPA study this week said the large volume of foreign “offsets” – projects such as tree planting that count towards domestic emissions credits – meant US emissions could actually increase between now and 2025.
In addition, in a recent compromise with Collin Peterson, the centrist chairman of the House agriculture committee, Democratic leaders allowed the definition of an offset to be set in some cases by the US agriculture department – a much softer challenge than the EPA.
Finally, lawmakers have diluted the “20 by 2020” clause, which mandates power generators to produce a fifth of output from renewable energy by 2020.
Not even mentioned is the give-away on the EPA regulating CO2 emissions.
Republicans are fighting hard against the bill, even though they seem to have won every battle in writing it.
The questions is why. The answer is posturing. The Democrats want to look like they have accomplished something, even if it really is nothing. And the Republicans don’t want the Democrats to look like the can accomplish anything at all.
