Earth to White House: Plan to Help Pass a Climate Bill?
May 26, 2010
On June 4, 2008, having
clinched the Democratic nomination for president, Barack Obama declared
that history would record the event as the "moment when the rise of the
oceans began to slow and the planet began to heal."
Well, Mr. President, it is two years later and we are still waiting.
To
be fair, President Obama has used his executive authority to jump-start
progress on automobile fuel efficiency, but when it comes to passing
much-needed legislation to limit greenhouse gas pollution, the
president has thus far been reluctant to roll up his sleeves.
He
largely sat on the sidelines last year while the House climate bill,
weighed down with political favors and sapped of momentum, barely
passed.
Now, there is a more promising climate bill on the table
in the Senate that would finally put a price on carbon pollution and
begin tamping down the emissions that trap heat and push those ocean
levels up. With some executive leadership, it has a fighting chance of
passing.
What has President Obama had to say about it? Not much.
Earth
to White House: Is the president going to lift a finger to help pass
this bill and live up to his lofty rhetoric, or is the fate of the
climate going to take a backseat to election year politics? Key
senators, both Democrat and Republican, would like to know.
Senator George Lemieux (R-FL) told Energy & Environment Daily:
"If they want to do something, it's going to have to come from him. His
leadership is going to be required on any of these issues that are
left. He's not going to just be able to leave it to Congress. He's
going to have to articulate what his views are, and press for them."
A
more damning statement came from an unnamed Democratic operative from
the Clinton years: "The silence from the White House is deafening."
Here's
a history lesson for the Obama White House. Big pieces of legislation
that aim to change America's course don’t pass without presidential
leadership. The only way to herd the 535 cats on Capitol Hill is for
the president to tell them exactly what he wants.
That's how Richard Nixon got the Clean Air Act passed. It's how Ronald Reagan won Senate ratification of the Montreal Protocol.
So,
Mr. President, what's it going to be? A push to put a lid on carbon
pollution and start moving America away from overdependence on fossil
fuels—like the oil that is currently lapping up on our Southern
shores—or passing the buck onto a future Congress or administration,
when it would be orders of magnitude worse and more difficult to solve.
There
has been enough lofty, detached rhetoric from the president. What the
planet (and the Senate) need now is something more akin to Larry the
Cable Guy's trademark quote:
