Politics
Conservatives Point Astroturf Campaign at Climate-Energy Reform
Published August 12, 2009 @ 01:31PM PT
Above: President Barack Obama arrives at a town hall meeting at Portsmouth High School in Portsmouth, N.H., to speak about health care reform, Tuesday, Aug. 11, 2009. Official White House photo by Pete Souza.
FreedomWorks is the conservative campaign consultancy that's been inciting people to violence with distortions about the Obama administration's health-care reform effort.
Apparently it's going to bring the same shrewd astroturfing and flexibile definition of accuracy to blocking climate and energy legislation. And the American Petroleum Institute, the American Farm Bureau, the American Highway Users Alliance, and other very interested business-and-industry groups will be footing the bill.
Reporting today for Greenwire, Alex Kaplun writes that this industry coalition is employing conservative advocacy firms, including FreedomWorks, to kick off a faux-grassroots campaign next week called "Energy Citizens." The effort will target Democratic senators who are on the fence about enacting climate legislation. "A list of planned events obtained by E&E shows rallies in the Midwest and the South," writes Kaplun. 'Two rallies are set for New Mexico, home of Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D). Others are schedule Id for Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania and several Southern and Plains states."
Ian Talley of Dow Jones Newswires reports that rallies will be organized in about 20 states, targeting Blue Dog Democrats including Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Mark Begich, D-Alaska. Other states include Texas, New Mexico, South Carolina, South Dakota and Georgia.
To get people out to the events, the campaign is distributing materials that claim the Waxman-Markey climate and enegy bill, which passed the House this past spring, will eliminate 1.2 to 2.3 million jobs in America; raise gas prices to $4 a gallon; and demonize a cap-and-trade market for greenhouse gas emissions as an "energy tax" that will cost ratepayers $800-1,300 a year.
While all these figures are off base, that last is particularly disingenuous (a polite way of saying it's a flat-out lie, I suppose), since it's based on an MIT economic study whose own author has asked Republicans to stop misusing his work to make their case against cap-and-trade.
"What do you think of President Obama's campaign to raise taxes on oil companies?" someone off-camera asks "Bruce, a Colorado resident," on the Energy Citizens YouTube Channel. Bruce is almost aggressively a regular guy, from the earth-toned crocheted afghan draped over a chair in his living room, to the amateur-quality video lighting that turns his face into a giant, peachy golden-pink orb, to his apparently unscripted willingness to shill for fossil energy companies:
If you want to inhibit our nation's ability to develop its own natural resources, then tax away. If you want to incent the process, then you'll remove tax burdens and access burdens, and let the oil companies produce and generate additional revenues for the government, just on the basis of their increased productivity.
The campaign is even supplying adherents with a pre-packaged tweet: Congress: Don't raise energy taxes. Higher taxes = fewer jobs & diminished #energy security. http://sn.im/fg4m1
How can climate action advocates counter this oncoming wave of misinformation?
One good start: The White House can learn a lesson from health care reform about the depths reactionaries will go to incite fear, uncertainty, doubt and borderline violence about change. Start busting the myths, setting up town halls, and doing prime time press conferences right now about climate and energy policy reform, before the astroturf campaign sinks its roots too deeply into the national debate.
Fatalistic Friday: Glaciers shrink, coal lobby spends, more
Published August 07, 2009 @ 06:03PM PT
Retreat of South Cascade Glacier, Washington, during the 20th Century and the beginning of the 21st Century. Source: U.S. Geological Survey
Scientists See Alaska, Washington Glaciers Shrinking Fast: Three major glaciers in Alaska and Washington state have thinned and shrunk dramatically, clear signs of a warming climate and signaling lower stream flows in summer months, according to a study released Thursday by the U.S. Geological Survey. (Associated Press)
Coal's biggest lobbying group is launching a $1 million campaign to win support from Senate Democrats, an effort that employs the same public relations firm ensnared by a scandal over forged letters to Congress. (Greenwire)
Climate Action May Stall in Fall: With the fight over health care reform absorbing all attention on Capitol Hill, Democrats fear climate change legislation may lose momentum. (Politico)
Realtors Get Labels Cut From Climate Bill for Older Houses: Real estate industry gets older homes exempted from energy labeling provision of energy and climate legislation, saying it threatened a lucrative corner of their industry. (Climatewire)
The Trouble With Nuclear Fuel: Nukes represent a promising bridge from fossil fuels to truly clean energy technologies. But it's really hard to prevent it from being used to make bombs. (The Economist)
Some California Amphibians May Need a Lift to Survive Climate Change:
As amphibian habitat shifts with global warming, some species will be trapped in shrinking territories, and need human interventions to survive. (Scientific American)
"Serious" Climate Talks Hinge On U.S. Bill: The success or failure of international climate treaty talks depends upon the U.S. passing a strong bill to slash carbon pollution, says American Clean Energy and Security Act co-sponsor Edward Markey (D-Mass.) (Reuters)
Tiny Prairie Grouse Native To Wind-Rich Swath Of America: If the lesser prairie chicken is listed as threatened or endangered – the species' numbers have dropped 80 percent nationally since 1963 – significant restrictions would be placed on companies hoping to plant towering turbines across a five-state region believed to have some of the nation's best wind energy potential. (The Dallas Morning News)
Climate Bill Demands Pile Up for Boxer, Kerry Headed Into Summer Break: "Liberal Democrats, for example, want stronger emission targets compared with the House-passed bill. Coal-state senators are pressing for changes to a delicately crafted House deal that would send their electric utilities a larger share of free allocations. And expanded energy production sits atop the wish list for oil patch Democrats." (Climatewire)
Nobel Halo Fades Fast for Climate Change Panel: As the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change gears up for its next climate review, many specialists in climate science and policy, both inside and out of the network, are warning that it could quickly lose relevance unless it adjusts its methods and focus. (The New York Times)
World Powers Play Politics While Island Nations Drown
Published August 07, 2009 @ 08:09AM PT
Portraits of climate refugees from the cyclone that hit Sunderbans are testimony to the unpredictability and dangers of global warming, which are already being felt in coastal India. They were intended to urge visiting U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, along with U.S. President Barack Obama, to take bold steps to stop global warming. © Greenpeace
UPDATE, Aug. 7: The 16-nation Pacific Islands Forum this week called for international help to protect vulnerable island states from rising sea levels and warmer temperatures.
The industrialized nations of the world are largely responsible for creating the climate crisis. But so far they're playing politics instead of making real commitments to cut their greenhouse gas pollution. So it's not surprising that small island states, which are facing almost certain doom, are discussing some drastic options for survival.
As reported on this blog in the past, these "drowning nations" are trying to cope with the looming climate crisis:
- Mohamed Nasheed, president of the lowlying archipelago nation of Maldives, has announced that he intends his homeland to become the world's first carbon-neutral nation. But given how small the country is, that will do very little to mitigate the problem. So Mr. Nasheed is also apparently prepared to move all of his countrymen to a new home – one that won’t be easily inundated by rising sea levels.
- Indonesia sought and received a dismissal of some $30 million in debt that it owed to the US. In return, the government of the Southeast Asian archipelago nation has agreed to spend the money on protecting the rainforests of Sumatra, the sixth largest island in the world. Indonesia is the world’s third largest greenhouse gas emitter thanks to the incredible amount of deforestation that occurs there.
- Tuvalu, the fourth smallest nation in the world, is already feeling the effects of global warming: the tiny archipelago nation has experienced much worse periodic high tides (called king tides) than normal in the past decade, causing increasingly destructive flooding. Tuvalu has vowed to totally remove fossil fuels from its energy mix by 2020, hoping to set an example that the world's major greenhouse polluters will follow.
Prospects for a strong successor to the Kyoto Protocol emissions reductions agreement, set to expire in 2012, are looking grim. Opportunities for the world’s richest nations to make some preliminary agreements, like the Obama administration-sponsored Major Economies Forum, or the preliminary UN climate talks in Bonn, Germany, have so far been squandered.
In July, the G8 group of industrialized nations failed to make real progress on agreements to slash greenhouse gas emissions. While proudly trumpeting their commitment to limiting global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius, they laid out absolutely no roadmap for how they plan to get there. (Afterwards, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, as well as the chairman of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Rajendra Pachauri, did not hesitate to criticize the G8 for their failure. )
In response, the leaders of seven tiny Pacific island nations recently renewed their call for the developed world to commit to greenhouse gas emissions reductions of 45 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, and 85 percent by 2050. These are the targets many climate scientists say we must meet, if we're to avert the worst effects of global warming.
While the leaders of developed nations seem to feel they have the luxury of ignoring the reality of the crisis and the best recommendations on how to avert its worst effects, developing nations are not so lucky.
Another round of UN talks in Bonn are about to begin. There’s little reason to think the developed world will get as serious about climate change as the developing world, but here’s hoping...
Live Senate Hearing: Climate Change and Ensuring that America Leads the Clean Energy Transformation
Published August 06, 2009 @ 08:09AM PT
The full Senate Environment and Public Works Committee is meeting today to discuss how to implement successful, and largely market-driven, clean energy policies.
12:30: Hearing adjourned!
12:15: Sen. Whitehouse, to Krupp: You've said in your testimony that CCS is ready to roll? Can you elaborate on that?
Krupp: I was quoting an official at British Petroleum, noting that in Norway there are enormous amts of CCS going on. Because there's a price on carbon in Norway, so they're avoiding that cost by keeping it out of the atmosphere.
Until there's a driver, there's no reason to capture carbon.
Our nation does burn a lot of coal -- half our electricity generated from burning coal. We should leave a path open to cleaning up the carbon dioxide from that, the same as we have a path to cleaning out the sulfur dioxide.
12:12: Sen. Whitehouse: Saying technologies aren't ready is a self-fulfilling prophesy.
12:00 noon: Sen. Boxer: Specuation issue. As former stockbroker, I understand what happens with speculation, there's cause for concern. In ACES, there's a floor of $11 on price. Some utilities have said to me, what about a collar?
Fehrman: Collar would help protect ratepayers, would still impose a second cost on customers however.
Sen Boxer: Some utilities, like Duke, which is heavily dependent on coal, support ACES. Supreme Court says carbon emissions are covered by the Clean Air Act. So it's unusual that a business person would rather choose a hard cap, with no ability to get allocations, offsets. Won't that put costs thru roof?
Krupp: Mid-America is in unique position. Made some decisions that were in retrospect bad: big new coal-fired plant online in 2007. Wholesale a lot of their energy. Under Waxman-Markey, the allocations follow the electrons.
Certainly the proposition, a cap but no trade, would be extraordinarily expensive to consumers. Trading promotes lowest-cost options, allows utilities and customers to switch energy generation sources.
Price collar: Just another world for a safety valve, which busts the integrity of the cap. Wont' guarantee emissions reductions, we won't be able to say to other nations, we're reducing emissions, we want you to as well.
Many things in ACES control costs -- cap and trade mechanism; allocation directly to consumers. In terms of market manipulation, whatever comes out of this committee has to have jail time for those who game the maket.
Sen. Boxer: Look at a collar in slightly different way. If we know that $11 is the floor, and that's sending a price signal, not sure why we can't use this to create regulatory certainty.
Sen. Inhofe: I read a whole long list of House Democrats, as well as James Hansen, who oppose cap and trade, in my opening statement. Ralph Nader opposes it. You have stated that "make polluters pay" slogan is wrong; that consumers will pay.
Fehrman: At Mid-American, we haven't had a base rate increase since 1975, and are a leader in renewable energy generation. This bill creates unreasonable costs for our customers, fees for allowances. We'd be better off taking those dollars and investing in renewables and nuclear, actually reducing our emissions to meet those caps.
Inhofe: How will purchasing allowances not reduce GHGs?
Fehrman: Waxman-Markey takes 2005 emissions and applies sliding cap to that level. There's cost of compliance -- driving emissions down -- and there's buying allowances from first emission of CO2 up to the cap. That latter cost doesn't reduce CO2 emissions.
Sen Inhofe: Your view on carbon capture and storage? When would be be commercially scalable?
Fehrman: We find that there is execptional work going on in industry, pilot projects, in a number of years, be it five or ten years, there will be CCS tech available. We will say that sequestration of carbon hasn't been studied, don't know all the issues involved. Need more study to fully understand the impacts.
Inhofe: "Majority of people believe" that tech isn't here on renewables and all sorts of these things. If we have these resources, and are only country that doesn't develop them, we need to use them as a bridge to the future.
11:50 ET: Second panel is introduced: Fred Krupp, President, Environmental Defense Fund; and Bill Fehrman, President and CEO, MidAmerican Energy Company.
Krupp: My message is simple: We can achieve strong emissions targets by 2020, at low cost, and create millions of new jobs in the process. Begins to cite a number of non-partisan studies on both costs and technologies -- see his formal statement to the committee for the details.
Fehrman: We oppose trade part of cap and trade: Customers will pay for emissions, plus the structures to reduce those emissions. Free allowances based on retail sales will favor utilities that rely largely on hydro and nuclear power, not allow coal-dependent utilities to receive enough allowances. Shortfall of 11 million allowances in just the first compliance year; and ratepayers will foot the bill.
Under acid rain program, allowances went to emitters who needed them to comply with new regs. Under Waxman-Markey as currently written, will be huge windfall to utilities that don't need them; also, penalizes utilities that have already made big investments in renewables.
11:49: Sen. Whitehouse to Sandalow: Over time, a lot of objection has risen to nuclear power, primarily around safety. But US Navy and European power agencies have demonstrated that it can be used safely. Around cost -- it appears that as we move toward modular systems, can better control costs. And disposal: we don't have a means for getting rid of horribly dangeous waste.
Traveling wave technologies: Create power off current stocks of waste. Are you following that?
Sandalow: I'm not personally following that; we'll get back to you, Senator.
11: 43: Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse: Wildlife adapation amendments related to climate legislation are gathering broad, bipartisan and multi-regional support. Is that true?
Strickland: True. Adaptation challenges with public lands, protecting wildlife, and dealing with real world impacts of climate change are vitally important.
11:39: Sen. Benjamin Cardin: Where are we at on using public lands to develop renewables?
Strickland: We're at the very early stages. Regulations are being put in place to develop offshore wind. We're moving quickly to put infrastructure in place with solar also; now we have a huge backlog of private sector interest in dev. solar on public lands. We've used some of Recovery Act dollars to create four offices in the West to deal with that backlog. We're in early stages, but there's huge potential.
Wants Boxer to organize committee letter to get documentation on how much public land is available to use for generation of renewable energy vs. extraction of mineral resources.
Sen. John Barasso says that 138,000 acres of land would be needed to build a wind farm with capacity to replace one coal-fired power plant. That's three times the size of the District of Colombia. Are we willing to set aside enough land to replace hundreds of coal-fired power plants?
Wellinghoff: Starts by countering some misquotes on his positions that Barasso has just read into the record, to the overall point that he does not believe that renewables will completely replace fossil energy sources, but that there is enormous capacity for different kinds of renewables, combined with energy efficiency and nat'l gas. Spurred by a market-based carbon control system, says all this could allow nation to transition successfully (and implication is with minimal pain and gnashing of teeth) to low-carbon energy economy. "There's plenty of land out there in the ocean" to create millions of gigawatts of wind power.
11:24: Sen. George Voinovich brings up energy security. Concerned we have not harmonized energy, environment, economic, national security policies. "If nation knew how vulnerable we were today in terms of oil, they'd be shaking in their boots." Cites billions of dollars sent overseas for oil, with no idea of environmental impacts that it's having.
Tells Strickland we should take advantage of all resources we have, including domestic oil, but be the most aggressive in reducing use of oil as well (such as upgrading the energy grid to enable growth of EV use.) Wishes the president would talk about using less oil and also going after more domestic oil production.
11:21: Sandalow says the $2.4 billion being allocated to next-gen electric vehicle battery development, announced yesterday by President Obama, has the potential to be transformational in cutting the nation's dependency on foreign oil.
Coal Lobby Group Faked Grassroots Opposition to Climate Bill
Published August 04, 2009 @ 11:52AM PT
Last week news broke that one of the most prominent coal lobby groups, the cheerfully named "American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity," was responsible for forged grassroots letters to Congress in opposition to the American Clean Energy and Security Act, the clean energy and climate action bill sponsored by Reps. Henry Waxman and Edward Markey.
Now, as Politico reports, Rep. Markey (D-Mass.) is calling for an investigation into ACCCE's fraud, part of its $45 million media and lobbying campaign to support coal-based electricity.
Mr. Markey, whose House Subcommittee on Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming has subpoena power, has sent an investigative letter to Bonner & Associates, which contracted with ACCCE with Hawthorn Group, a "grassroots contractor" hired by ACCCE to do campaign work, listing 12 detailed questions about the fraudulent letters.
At least 3 Representatives received 12 forged letters prior to the ACES vote in June, purporting to come from 8 grassroots groups, including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which in fact is calling for strong action by Congress on stopping global warming and promoting green economy jobs.
"The letters, replete with letterhead and made-up identities, purported to be from Virginian minority organizations including the NAACP," writes ThinkProgress, which has put copies of the letters online.
"My organization Creciendo Juntos represents minorities in your district. You are about to vote on important environmental legislation (the Waxman-Markey bill)," reads one to Rep. Tom Perrielo. "We ask you to help protect minorities and other consumers in your district from higher electricity bills." It's signed by "Marisse K. Acevado, Asst Member Coordinator."
"Perriello was not the only congressman to receive forged letters urging him to oppose the so-called cap-and-trade legislation," reports The Daily Progress of Charlottesville, Va. "Reps. Kathy Dahlkemper and Christopher Carney, both of Pennsylvania, also received falsified letters that originated at Bonner & Associates, the clean coal advocacy group said."
ACCCE's put responsiblity on Bonner & Associates, which has used underhanded tactics before to undermine health policy reforms that threatened corporate profits. "This incident demonstrates the incredible lengths that the vested interests of health care and energy are willing to go through to undermine reform. With Congress going on recess soon, more of these astroturf tactics will undoubtedly occur as corporate backed anti-reform groups gather in Congressional districts throughout the country to obstruct health care and clean energy reform," writes Think Progress, which lists several of B&A's past astroturf frauds.
The Institute for Southern Studies' Facing South blog notes that ACCCE has itself been pretty hands-on with the misleading lobby techniques:
Last year, we reported that the group was behind phone calls urging recipients to oppose an earlier version of the climate legislation -- and that at least one of the calls misrepresented the organization.
Last May, Pete MacDowell with the N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network reported receiving a call from a woman who identified herself as being from Americans for Balanced Energy Choices, which a month previously had merged with the Center for Energy and Economic Development to form ACCCE. MacDowell said the caller asked to add his name to a fax to Sens. Lieberman and Warner, the legislation's sponsors:
When I asked who ABEC was, I was told that they were individuals concerned about utility rates. When I asked if they were an environmental group, the answer was "yes." When I asked whether they were related to the utilities, the answer was "No."
After publishing our story about the deceptive call, we heard from Steve Gates, ACCCE's communication director. He blamed a new staff member who decided to "wing it" when asked some off-the-script questions and said the person was "no longer working on this project," as we reported in a follow-up story."
History repeats: Bonner is trying to shunt culpability for the more recent fradulent letters onto a temp employee gone rogue.
Believe it if you like. But just as a counterpoint, watch as Jon Stewart and The Daily Show nail the workings of the "outrage-generating ecosystem," when it comes to blocking health care reform:
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Master Rebators - The Crank Cycle | ||||
|
||||
If these reforms are so awful on the merits, why do industry lobby groups spend tens of millions and invent popular opposition to try and defeat them?
Enviroknow has a good timeline of developments in this story, with lots of links.
Pat Buchanan Confuses Global Warming Science w/Birther Religion
Published August 03, 2009 @ 04:38PM PT
Pat Buchanan, the conservative political pundit, one-time advisor to Presidents Nixon, Ford and Reagan, and sometimes-presidential-candidate, this evening compared the reality of human-propelled global warming with believing in a conspiracy theory.
But on tonight's broadcast of Hardball With Chris Matthews on MSNBC (where both Matthews and Buchanan are employed as political commentators), Buchanan's the one who comes off as paranoid, by comparing a human-caused phenomenon to the "birthers" who are deluding themselves that Barack Obama is not the legal president:
PAT BUCHANAN: Global Warming is now a hoax--
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Do you think Global Warming is a hoax?
BUCHANAN: I do think it's a hoax.
MATTHEWS: It's a hoax?BUCHANAN: I think it goes up and down. The idea this is grave--
MATTHEWS: -- CO2 emissions, greenhouse gases, doesn't exist?
BUCHANAN: No, it does, of course it exists. The idea we're all gonna die of this is utter nonsense. It's a power transfer to governments here, and governments abroad.
MATTHEWS: And the motivation is what?
BUCHANAN: And the motivation is power. It always is in government.
MATTHEWS: So people like Al Gore have cooked this up to get what?
BUCHANAN: No, I think he believes it, Chris, like the Birthers believe it. He's just like they are. It's a religious belief with them.
Buchanan (currently a commentator on MSNBC) can often come across with the astute political analysis that more center and progressive pundits might miss. Still, the network would do the viewing audience a service by bringing on board someone whose grasp of science is as good as her or his insights into right-of-center politics, rather than offering up a mini-mirror image of Fox News.
Being politically conservative doesn't have to mean losing one's grip on the truth. The common trait that birthers and global warming denialists share? Fear of change.
(Hat tip to Media Matters for America)
One Video to Watch This Week: "Obama and Environmentalists"
Published July 29, 2009 @ 10:06PM PT
In this segment from the PBS show Bill Moyers Journal, veteran newsman Moyers speaks with two young environmentalists who are growing dismayed at President Obama's compromises on climate and environmental policies.
(Click through to watch it; PBS doesn't set up videos to be embeddable on other sites.)
Mary Sweeters, organizing manager of Greenpeace USA, was one of the activists who scaled Mount Rushmore earlier this month to urge Obama to lead more strongly on climate. Also at the table is Erich Pica, Director of Domestic Programs for Friends of the Earth. FoE was among the first to endorse Barack Obama in the Democratic primaries last year, and was one of the first to break from endorsing the Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill, saying it had become too weakened to support:
Pica: I think that there's a lot of moneyed interest in Washington DC that don't want to see a strong climate bill passed. I think, his administration's essentially been kind of convinced that they can't do anything aggressive. That will help solve the problem. Because of the moneyed interest, and I think some of the political appointees he has are not as strong as we'd like them to be. And I think he's been convinced that Congress just isn't willing to go as far as he wants to go.
