[Vision2020] Radio Interview This Morning: G. Gordon Liddy & Senator Inhofe on EPA Regulation of CO2

Ted Moffett starbliss at gmail.com
Tue Mar 29 11:11:54 PDT 2011


Listening to G. Gordon Liddy's radio show this morning (950 AM KOZE
Lewiston), he interviewed Senator James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma) on US
Congressional votes regarding EPA regulation of greenhouse gases.
Listeners were informned by Liddy that CO2 is too heavy to be a cause
of global warming (I am paraphrasing), as it will sink to the lower
levels of the atmosphere.  Grand Senator Inhofe chimed in with
agreement!

Liddy asked Inhofe what people can do to address US Congressional
action on this issue.  Senator Inhofe recommended making a list of who
voted to not delay or block the EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse
gases, as a reference to take action against these politicians.

Maybe Liddy will interview NASA's climate scientist James Hansen
regarding the following peer reviewed paper from "Science" journal,
2005: "Earth's Energy Imbalance: Confirmation and Implications"
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2005/2005_Hansen_etal_1.pdf

Forget about it!

It's one thing to discuss in the abstract the anti-science propaganda
promoted in mainstream media regarding anthropogenic climate change,
but to listen to it live as voters are misled with scientific nonsense
to influence government policy, is a chilling revelation.

Article below from "Cimate Science Watch," March 28, 2011, regarding
votes in the US Congress on EPA regulation of greenhouse gases, and
Senator Inhofe's prominant role in attempting to block the EPA on this
issue.  If Obama sees a bill on his desk to delay or block the EPA on
this issue, will he veto?

http://www.climatesciencewatch.org/2011/03/28/will-senate-democrats-stand-up-for-epa-regulation-of-greenhouse-gases-%E2%80%93-or-vote-to-block-it/

Will Senate Democrats stand up for EPA regulation of greenhouse
gases--- or vote to block it?

March 28, 2011 by Rick Piltz

Returning from a week long recess, the Senate confronts voting on amendments
that would halt EPA rulemaking to limit emissions from stationary
sources, including power plants and refineries. There appears to be an
excellent chance that such a ban, for two years at least, will get
enough Democratic votes to pass.

The Environmental Protection Agency is moving toward putting new
requirements for major stationary sources in place, starting later in
2011 and in 2012 with New Source Performance Standards for electric
utilities and oil refineries.

Senate Majority Leader Reid (D-Nevada) apparently agreed before the
recess last week to allow floor votes to prohibit or delay this
action, as amendments to an unrelated small business bill.  Enactment
of either a permanent ban (via an amendment sponsored by Majority
Leader Grant McConnell (R-Kentucky), or a two-year ban, sponsored by
Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-West Virginia), would prevent EPA from
carrying out its responsibility under the Clean Air Act to promulgate
emissions-limiting rules pursuant to the agency’s scientifically based
Endangerment Finding.  Floor action on the proposed amendments,
originally expected before the recess, was delayed as party leaders
counted votes and jockeyed for position.

The McConnell amendment is essentially the same as legislation to kill
EPA climate-related rulemaking introduced earlier as stand-alone
legislation (S. 482) by Sen. James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma), a leader in
the global warming denial machine. The Inhofe bill, commonly referred
to as Upton-Inhofe (or is it Inhofe-Upton?), is the same as
legislation (H.R. 910) approved by the House Energy and Commerce
Committee on March 15. The House version of the bill (titled the
“Energy Tax Prevention Act of 2011”, though it does not deal with tax
policy) is expected to reach the House floor for debate and final vote
shortly after mid-April.

All but four of the 48 Republican Senators are officially signed on to
Inhofe’s S. 482 as co-sponsors (excepting only Snowe and Collins of
Maine, Brown of Massachusetts, and Kirk of Illinois). These 44 can be
expected to support the McConnell-Inhofe amendment to the small
business bill.  But since, as a practical procedural matter, 60 votes
will be needed for passage, they would need to peel off at least 12
and potentially as many as 16 Democrats to join them.

It appears that the votes of numerous Democratic Senators are
potentially in play on legislation to kill or delay EPA
climate-related rulemaking. Some of them, at least, can raise
legitimate questions and voice legitimate concerns about how
regulation might affect manufacturing jobs directly and other jobs
indirectly in their states. But I would be a bit surprised if so many
of them associated themselves with the right-wing approach of the
Inhofe bill.

Probably much more likely is that, having disposed of the
McConnell-Inhofe amendment, a fair number of Democrats will join with
Republicans to pass the proposed Rockefeller amendment to delay
further action by EPA for the next two years. The ostensible rationale
for such a delay is to give Congress time to enact new legislation to
deal with climate and energy in some alternative way.

Of course, Congress is highly unlikely to enact meaningful climate
legislation in the next two years, and perhaps for a good deal longer
than that, after the Obama Administration and Senate Democrats screwed
up their opportunity to get something done during 2009-2010. That kind
of opportunity, which requires the alignment of multiple forces and
effective execution, doesn’t come around very often.

But “let Congress do this, it’s a Congressional responsibility that
shouldn’t be left to unelected bureaucrats” can serve as a convenient
rationale (cover story? fig leaf?) for not doing anything – at least,
not doing anything until sometime after the next national election –
while undercutting a federal agency charged with carrying out
responsibilities given to it by the Congressionally enacted Clean Air
Act, with its authority to regulate carbon emissions upheld by a U.S.
Supreme Court decision.

Rockefeller presumably will argue that a two-year delay would give
Congress time to enact meaningful energy legislation that would lead
to reduced emissions of greenhouse gases and promote alternatives to
current coal technology.  So: how likely is it that the current
Congress will agree on a substantial, coherent, and environmentally
sound energy bill?  Why would doing so require blocking action by EPA
for years, except as a political payoff to fossil fuel interests that
are unlikely to support good energy legislation?  One can be
skeptical.

On March 17, E&E News PM (subscription required) quoted Rockefeller thus:

The West Virginian has said he would not support Inhofe's permanent
pre-emption bill, because it would "emasculate the EPA."

Still, he has said a temporary stay on EPA rules is necessary to allow
coal-fired power plants to transition to low-carbon technologies.

"We don't have an energy policy," Rockefeller continued. "We don't
have the technology properly developed. We do in West Virginia, but
others aren't investing in that technology because they feel the EPA
is going to change the rules on them. And so two years is just
perfect. And people understand that. I mean, there's a reason that we
have a lot of votes."

EPA rulemaking on greenhouse gases will/would be phased in over a
period of years, with steps (albeit far short of what is truly needed)
in the right direction on climate change and promotion of more
efficient energy use. There is much to be debated on climate and
energy policy.  Does Rockefeller have a good argument?  At this point
it seems to me that for Senators to keep EPA from doing its job would
be a major cop-out.

And Democrats, in supporting the Rockefeller two-year delay, would be
in conflict with the position that has been held steadily (so far) by
the President.  If anything like this comes out of Congress when the
dust settles, it would put Obama in the position of having either to
veto a “bipartisan” decision or abandon a principled position on
climate policy.
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Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett



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