Morning Bell: An Offer We Can Refuse
Posted October 20th, 2008 at 9.24am in Energy and Environment.
Barack Obama’s energy adviser Jason Grumet told Bloomberg last week that an Obama administration would not “insert political judgments to interrupt the recommendations of the scientific efforts.” His promise was made in reference to the Environmental Protection Agency’s impending decision on whether or not to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act. Later in that same interview Grumet also said: “The EPA is obligated to move forward in the absence of congressional action. If there’s no action by Congress in those 18 months, I think any responsible president would want to have the regulatory approach.”
Apparently, Grumet either doesn’t understand the regulatory process or he has a peculiar definition of what “insert political judgments” means. Either the science dictates EPA must regulate carbon under the Clean Air Act or it does not. Nowhere in the Clean Air Act does it say that the EPA can choose not to regulate a dangerous pollutant if Congress passes some other measure to regulate carbon.
As the Wall Street Journal summarizes: “Well, well. For years, Democrats — including Senator Obama — have been howling about the ‘politicization’ of the EPA, which has nominally been part of the Bush Administration. … Now it turns out that a President Obama would himself wield such a finding as a political bludgeon. He plans to issue an ultimatum to Congress: Either impose new taxes and limits on carbon that he finds amenable, or the EPA carbon police will be let loose to ravage the countryside.” Or as Don Corleone might say: “I’ll make them an offer they can’t refuse.”
The American people ought to refuse both the Obama-EPA carbon regulations and a congressional-enacted cap-and-trade program. The European Union’s cap-and-trade program has been a complete failure. Not only has it failed to actually reduce carbon emissions, but even if they were met it would have no impact on world temperatures. Worse, cap-and-trade programs are job killers. Don’t believe us? Just ask the Europeans. Italian Environment Minister Stefania Prestigiacomo said last week, “Does it make sense to ask companies for such a large sacrifice, and risk hitting citizens’ pockets at such a delicate moment, all for environmental policy whose efficacy is questionable?” Prestigiacomo’s skepticism was joined by both Germany’s largest trade bodies and the German Mittelstand — the small and medium-sized businesses that form the backbone of the economy. Or just ask the United Nations’ top climate official, Yvo de Boer, who explained international rejection of carbon capping to the AP last week: “You can’t pick an empty pocket.”
Obama’s EPA approach would be just as disastrous for the U.S. economy. Heritage’s Center for Data Analysis will soon release a study based Global Insight’s U.S. Macroeconomic Model of the American economy that shows EPA’s plans to regulate carbon under the Clean Air Act would: reduce aggregate gross domestic product by $6.9 trillion by 2029 and reduce employment in the manufacturing sector by 2.9 million jobs by 2029, including machinery manufacturing by 57% and durable manufacturing by 28%. The EPA plan would touch every aspect of Americans’ lives. Once carbon is classified as a pollutant, EPA can regulate lawnmowers, hotels, restaurants, churches, and even set speed limits.
Obama’s 18-month window for congressional action is a completely fabricated 100% political timeline. The EPA has already begun the regulatory process. You can tell them what you think at Stop the EPA.
Quick Hits:
- Anticipating protectionist Obama policies, Canada is already looking to improve trade relations with Europe.
- Taliban fighters stopped a bus traveling on Afghanistan’s main highway, seized about 50 people on board and killed about 30 of them.
- Even the Washington Post admits the U.S. market currently in financial turmoil “was not exactly free.”
- Anticipating Democrat gains in Washington, deficits appear to be cool again.
- Three years ago, Freddie Mac secretly paid a Republican consulting firm $2 million to kill legislation that would have regulated and trimmed the mortgage finance giant and its sister company, Fannie Mae.
- Author: Conn Carroll
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October 20, 2008 Michael J O'Brien --New York writes:
We all should be preparing for a U.S under an Obama presidency, with the House and the Senate deeply left, Pelosi and Reid in charge, Barney Frank in charge of Finance, Dodd in charge of Housing. It will be a very bleak 4 years and the effects of these cold and gray 4 long years will take many more years to undo. Carbon capping is also being proposed by the McCain group as well. However, under Obama things will be much worst: active pro unionism, higher taxes, socialism [tax refunds to those that pay or have no tax liability], free abortions, lack of military strength and foreign policies, less talk radio, more money to a failed education system, etc, etc. The liberals will be in charge, and they are taking every step necessary to assure a victory. Just consider the following that appeared this a.m. on the front page of the New York Post and also reported by Fox News:
“The New Yorkers and nine other members from across the country are accused of packing themselves into a modest three-bedroom house in Columbus, waiting 30 days - and then registering, even though the Buckeye State is not their permanent residence.
Under Ohio law, a person who comes to the state for “temporary purposes only,” without the intention of making it the “permanent place of abode” is not considered a resident. New permanent residents must live in Ohio 30 days before registering.
Four group members, including two of the New Yorkers, have already cast ballots, and six others requested absentee ballots from the county elections board.
Franklin County, Ohio, prosecutor Ron O’Brien launched the investigation after student reporters at palestra.net, a Fox News affiliate, discovered the mass registration effort at the home in a working-class neighborhood on Brownlee Avenue.
“Our board of elections referred 13 suspicious registrations to us, all from people with out-of-state addresses, all of whom claim to be living in a three-bedroom house in Columbus,” O’Brien said Friday.
Vote From Home is registered to the East 82nd Street brownstone of Heather Halstead, daughter of Halstead Properties founder Clark Halstead Jr. She and her husband, NYU grad Marc Gustafson, are among those under scrutiny.
A subsequent Post review of election-board and other records found the New Yorkers involved are:
* Joel Speyer, 39, a New York CPA who lives in Brooklyn and works for Mellon bank here. He owns the Brownlee Avenue house and rented it to Vote From Home in June for an undisclosed period for $2,500, Federal Election Commission papers show. Speyer is a registered New York voter and cast a ballot in February’s primary. He re-registered in Ohio Sept. 1, and last week voted absentee.
* Halstead, 34, and Gustafson, 31, both longtime New York voters. Halstead last cast a ballot in the state’s February primary. Gustafson voted in Manhattan in 2007. Both requested Ohio absentee ballots.
* Daniel Hemel, 23, a Harvard grad and former Sun reporter from Scarsdale, Westchester County. He registered to vote in Ohio Oct. 1, casting a ballot the same day. Hemel later returned to Oxford University in England, where he and other Vote From Home workers attend as Marshall Scholars.
* Also under investigation are three daughters - Jennifer, 20, Tania, 21, and Michael Anne, 24 - of Brooklyn resident David R. Kyle. He is CEO of a firm that raises money for schools in India and is one of two major financial backers of the PAC. The three women, whom records show most recently lived in the Washington, DC, area and Connecticut, have requested absentee ballots.
This is probably the tip of the iceberg, also consider ACORN. We are doomed.