Last night, Hillary Clinton called the 2005 energy bill that Barack Obama voted for the "Dick Cheney lobbyist energy bill" citing its "enormous giveaways to oil and gas industry." Washington Post fact-checker Michael Dobbs says she's wrong, but in the real world she's right. I assume Obama was more swayed by giveaways to coal interests -- Illinois is a coal-producing state and before his presidential campaign geared up he was trying to grope his way toward a coal-friendly environmentalism before eventually, and rightly, giving up -- than to the oil and gas industry, but it was still a bad bill and a fair tag.
« But He Talks So Straight | Main | More and More Table »
The 2005 Energy Bill
16 Jan 2008 04:27 pm
Comments (20)
The difference appears to come from whether one counts the oil and gas industry as being the same industry as the nuclear energy and coal industry. So Dobbs seems to be taking a very narrow reading of the gas and oil industry to make his objection.
It was just one of those bills where there's plenty of things wrong with it, but it also would do plenty of good for his state. That's why Durbin voted for it as well. For the most part, I'm willing to excuse Senators when they vote in the interest of their state.
Ken Silverstein's piece for Harper's covers this in depth. The conclusion is sobering:
All of this has forged a political culture that is intrinsically hostile to reform. On condition of anonymity, one Washington lobbyist I spoke with was willing to point out the obvious: that big donors would not be helping out Obama if they didn’t see him as a “player.” The lobbyist added: “What’s the dollar value of a starry-eyed idealist?”
This is a problem that Democrats face: whether it's Biden for the credit card companies, Schumer for private equity firms, the rural senators for farm subsidies or Obama for Big Energy, state interests mean that Senators enter the presidential race with votes that support their home state and help them win elecitons, but can be used to antagonise the national electorate. Ex-governors, strangely, don't face the same problem.
But it also provides fuel for those who think that Obama's 'all interests get to sit at the table' rhetoric opens the door for more of the same old lobby politics. Silverstein makes the point that Obama walks a tightrope on this, but he also notes that some of his arguments essentially promote state interests in more palatable national contexts.
An addendum: this also makes it nigh-on impossible for the Democratic Senate caucus to unite around any legislation that is antagonistic to the home-state interests of a few members, or block shitty legislation as the minority when it serves the home-state interests of a few members.
From Silverstein's piece.
As Carl Wagner, a Democratic political strategist who first came to Washington in 1970, remarked to me, the Senate today is a fundamentally different institution than it was then. “Senators were creatures of their states and reflected the cultures of their states,” he said. “Today they are creatures of the people who pay for their multimillion-dollar advertising campaigns. Representative democracy has largely been taken off the table. It’s reminiscent of the 1880s and 1890s, when senators were chosen by state legislatures who were owned by the railroads and the banks.”
I'd take issue with that somewhat, in that 'reflecting the culture of their states' and 'owned by the railroads and the banks' aren't contradictory. To be a Senator for the state of Illinois, you need, at very least, for the money at Big Ethanol's disposal not to be spent on your opponent's campaign.
For anyone interested, here is the take on the bill by the Union of Concerned Scientists:
http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/clean_energy_policies/energy-bill-2005.html
They see it as a mixed bag, but are generally disappointed.
I think views may differ depending on whether one is supportive of nuclear energy. Since I think nuclear energy will necessarily be a part of any solution to global climate change, I am not bothered by subsidies to the nuclear industry any more than I am by subsidies for wind, solar, and other renewables.
"Illinois is a coal-producing state and before his presidential campaign geared up he was trying to grope his way toward a coal-friendly environmentalism before eventually, and rightly, giving up "
LOL. Matt you are nothing if not transparent.
If this were any other candidate, Matt would describe him as an opportunist flip-flopper who held this position solely to get elected to the senate from Illinois and to please those who got him there and then abandoned it as soon as he began running for president for which this view harmed him in a national election.
Since I think nuclear energy will necessarily be a part of any solution to global climate change, I am not bothered by subsidies to the nuclear industry any more than I am by subsidies for wind, solar, and other renewables.
It means subsidising a 1950s technology run by a group of people who are very good at bullshitting about the costs and risks of building large facilities with incredibly high precision.
It's a pain in the butt to pull together Dobbs' various fact-checker pieces, so I won't. But his track record as fact-checker is, IMHO, pretty damn weak.
Re "I assume Obama was more swayed by giveaways to coal interests -- Illinois is a coal-producing state and before his presidential campaign geared up he was trying to grope his way toward a coal-friendly environmentalism before eventually, and rightly, giving up "
------------
This is bullshit.
There is a LONG history of the African-American movement trying to make common cause with the white coal-mining community of Southern Appalachia. I know -- I grew up there. The reason is that both communities fight this country's wars and work hard to create this country's wealth --but get screwed like dogs by our national elites. Jesse Jackson campaigned in the area in his 1984 and 1988 campaigns -- and won the Virginia Democratic primary.
Most US electricity is still generated from Coal -- and our cities would quickly become death traps if the electricity failed. But when Matthew enjoys the heat and light in his Washington DC house, he doesn't realize that it results from some blue collar white guy risking his life in a coal mine in southwest Virginia. Day after day, decade after decade --until black lung sets in or the roof falls. I know -- I worked in those mines for over a year.
I went to college and got out of Appalachia --but many of my schoolmates did not. During the Clinton administration , the coal industry fell through the floor --due in part to Al Gore's environmental agenda -- and had massive layoffs. In my home county, unemployment was around 35 percent -- and only dropped because people packed up and left. The fucking federal government did nothing to help the local economy.
Appalachia suffers from deep poverty for the same reason that Black neighborhoods in Baltimore, Philly and else do -- intentional policy choices in Washington DC.
The belief that people can enjoy $Billions in superwealth but have no obligation to their fellow citizens. That Congress can draft poor citizens to die on the battlefield, but can not ask a rich man to pay taxes or to invest in America rather than China.
Matthew can sneer at tax incentives for domestic energy production, but seems indifferent to the $1 Trillion and 3900 lives we've spent to protect Big Oil's investments in the Middle East.
One of the reasons why I know Steve Sailor is full of shit is that he doesn't look at the data.
You have high rates of illegitimate births among whites in parts of the rural South and Appalachia as well as in inner city black ghettos.
Violence is endemic in poor areas everywhere -- it is just not as visible in lower population densities -- but the homicides PER CAPITA in Gary Indiana, Birmingham Alabama and parts of Appalachia far exceed the homicide rate in Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City.
The problems are not racial -- it is the result of hopeless POVERTY and the mental depression and indifference it spawns. No one who has not been in that environment can understand.
My hometown in the coal mining region of Southwest Virginia is currently suffering from a massive epidemic of Oxycontin addiction -- born during the deep poverty of the CLinton Administration. See the recent Washington Post article at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/12/AR2008011201181.html?sub=AR
Before you sneer at "white trash" --just as you secretly sneer at poor blacks -- know that that town has provided more than its share of soldiers in US wars. When President Eisenhower was scared shitless of the Soviet nuclear threat, it was a man from Grundy, VA --Francis Gary Powers -- who risked his life in multiple U2 missions over the Soviet Union to identify and target hostile nuclear facilities and assets.
Anyone ever hear of the "Poor People's Campaign" of 1968? http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/journals/EH/EH40/chase40.html
The Democratic elite responded the same way they responded back in the 1850s when they were defending the property rights of rich Southern aristocrats.
Don, I don't disagree that poor people in America have historically been, and continue to be, screwed, regardless of color.
But I really doubt that Obama's apparent fealty to the coal interests has its roots in "the African-American movement trying to make common cause with the white coal-mining community of Southern Appalachia." I think green--rather than black or white--is the relevant color here.
That's green as in "what's (not) in my wallet," not green as in "enviro-friendly," by the way.
Re "I think green--rather than black or white--is the relevant color here. "
------------
At least it is green which employs Americans --vs the green which rammed through NAFTA and sucks up to La Raza.
Aside from the obvious difference in industries, why is this any different from Biden voting for the Bankruptcy Bill? Lord knows how Biden was tarred and feathered for that vote. Why nothing here? Is such looting of the Treasury just not as reprehensible as allowing non-rich people to relieve their debt?
WTF, Don Williams ? I know I should learn to read comments on blogs in the spirit of watching Jerry Springer reruns, but sometimes the crazy talk just ups and ambushes me.
Since I think nuclear energy will necessarily be a part of any solution to global climate change, I am not bothered by subsidies to the nuclear industry any more than I am by subsidies for wind, solar, and other renewables. Blah
It means subsidising a 1950s technology run by a group of people who are very good at bullshitting about the costs and risks of building large facilities with incredibly high precision.
Posted by pseudonymous in nc
Credit to Obama for having a little commons sense about coal and nuclear, though he does the usual expectations game of brushing that all away while becomeing Dem-Orgasmic about the boundless possibilities of "exciting new alternative energy sources". Basically, 9,000 BC ethanol brewing, Roman-era geothermal energy applications plus electricity, 13th century windmill substitution for other energy sources, and 1930's photovoltaics.
Like with ACLU civil liberties for terrorists, energy policy is another area where Democrats are spectacularly wrong and determined not to let facts get in the way of their ideology.
1. Most Dems support illegal immigration and family reunification which will drive US population to 340 million by 2030, 363 million in 2050 while the world goes from 6.5 billion to 9.
Which negates all conservation savings that Global Warming activists say will help reduce coal use. Instead, existing growth is driving building a new coal-fired plant every 5 days. And Dems and the Davos crowd and environmentalists have refused for the most part to discuss the population growth that drives CO2 addition - not greedy Americans and their SUVs - but 8 times the number of Americans that existed 150 years ago and SUVs that contribute less than 0.5% of the global warming problem.
2. The only reliable 24/7 CO2-free power is nuclear. Physics says that the most economical and efficient fusion plants, if the bugs are ever worked out, will be fusion plants that use the tritium-deuterium reaction's fast neutron to make fuel - plutonium and U-233 from thorium, plus tritium. So even if we transition to fusion, fission will come along with it. As is, nuclear is the only power industry where environmentalists and democrats oppose any recycling and reuse of wastes (98% of high level nuke waste is reusable in a reactor) and treatment of remaining nuke waste (burned out in fast flux reactors) with near-hysterical opposition.
3. Even in the most Green-delerious countries with most of their free energy sector investment resources going to subsidize and develop "exciting alternates" like wind and solar, no country deep into it is finding that alternates are performing anywhere near as advertised, will not amount to more than 15% of net energy use. They proceed on the theory that every little bit helps and by keeping birthrate down and 3rd Worlders immigrants out more and more - they may reach their Kyoto goals and feel virtuous for it - even as global CO2 generation continues to ramp up.
( But all Democrats oppose oil exploration off the coasts, in many Federal lands, and in Alaska on grounds that it ALONE can't solve our oil crisis and for that reason must be opposed. Edwards used that logic opposing all nuclear power - "Whah, even if we double our nuclear plants tomorrow it will only cut America's CO2 generation by 1/7th, so it isn't THE Answer." And what would his poor mill worker Daddy do?
The only reliable 24/7 CO2-free power is nuclear.
Because uranium miners use nuclear-powered drills, uranium is transported on nuclear submarines, and the waste storage facilities are built with nuclear diggers and lined with nuclear lead.
No?
Like I said, there's a lot of bullshit talked about nukepower. People have short memories, and I don't mean Three Mile Island: I mean the sales pitch, and the reality after the plants go online.
The more important question is why "Chris Ford" became "chris ford". All else is window dressing.
Physics says that the most economical and efficient fusion plants, if the bugs are ever worked out, will be fusion plants that use the tritium-deuterium reaction's fast neutron to make fuel - plutonium and U-233 from thorium, plus tritium. So even if we transition to fusion, fission will come along with it. As is, nuclear is the only power industry where environmentalists and democrats oppose any recycling and reuse of wastes (98% of high level nuke waste is reusable in a reactor) and treatment of remaining nuke waste (burned out in fast flux reactors) with near-hysterical opposition.
"Physics says". Hmmm. Wow. You mean that there are some simple equations about which power plants are more efficient? There aren't all sorts of planning and efficiency estimates done by human experts? I had no idea "physics" had become so irreducibly banal, and spoke for itself.
The rest of the statement is a bad play on the word "recycling", the purpose of which is to lead to another mention of liberals being "hysterical". Once again the fantasy that all real and working scientists are on the side of vengeful nincompoops and only fringe extremist fifth columnist pro-overpopulation liberals are recommending we go back to stupid 9000BC technologies.
Fortunately we were spared the typical repetition of "Jewish intellectuals" and "Copperheads", the latter of which came into Chris Ford's / chris ford's use as his pro-Confederacy leanings became too ridiculous.
Comments closed January 30, 2008.
| 
Heads in the Sand
Hillary knocked Obama for this vote in a previous debate, NH, I believe. I'm somewhat in Obama's camp but I agree, it was a bad vote and a "fair tag". As we saw last night, all three of the major candidates have votes that they regret or should. In the case of Hillary and Edwards, votes for the bankruptcy bill and something or other in the fall of 2002 come to mind.
Posted by Jeff S. | January 16, 2008 4:42 PM