Climate Progress: An insider's view of climate science, politics, and solutions

The great environmental writer and founder of 350.org, Bill McKibben, is the guest blogger.

We’re sitting here in our temporary offices in lower Manhattan hunched over laptops drowning in images—15,000 photos and thousands of minutes of video have arrived from what turned out to be 5,200 rallies, protests, and demonstrations in 181 countries around the world.

It was, according to any number of journalistic accounts, “the most widespread day of political action in the planet’s history.” But here’s the thing that impresses us. There wasn’t a rock star or a movie star or a charismatic politician in sight.  It was ordinary citizens and scientists coming together around a scientific data point.

The coverage, except for a somewhat sour piece by Andy Revkin in the NYT, was incredible. And it was also massive. We owned the top of Google News for 18 hours, and were all over the front pages of newspapers across the globe. Here’s a link that will give you the tiniest taste.

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A recent poll by the National Wildlife Federation, which counts more than 420,000 members across 42 states, found that 66 percent of hunters and anglers surveyed believed that global warming was already occurring.

A Gallup poll in March 2009 found that only 53 percent of the general population shared the same view.

People who spend a lot of their time outdoors are more likely to see the obvious — the climate is changing and invasive species like the bark beetle are ravaging the West.  That’s a key point of this piece in the NYT blog, Green Inc:

More than 13,000 hunters and anglers from across the country joined a “virtual town hall” teleconference on Tuesday to hear a discussion of the impact of climate change on fish and wildlife populations, and to voice their support for federal action to limit carbon emissions.

The call was hosted by the National Wildlife Federation Action Fund, American Hunters and Shooters, and the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership.

“It’s very important in my opinion that we do pass the climate change bill,” said Ted Roosevelt IV, a prominent conservationist and the great-grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt, during the phone call.

The virtual meeting is part of a recent wave of climate activism by national hunting and fishing groups, whose conservative-leaning membership has expressed growing concern with the impacts of climate change on wildlife.

It’s great to see a broader group of the population starting to engage in what will be the central issue of our time.  But then, for outdoorsmen and -women, the changes driven by human emissions are all-but-impossible to miss:

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From Think Progress

Last month, Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) announced that he would travel to Copenhagen in December to act as a climate skeptic “truth squad” during international climate change treaty negotiations. “I think somebody has to be there — a one-man truth squad,” Inhofe said on CSPAN. Today, on Bill Bennett’s radio show, Inhofe revealed that his delegation has expanded to “a truth squad of three”:

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Okay, it may not exactly be a stampede of elephants crossing over, but there is real movement by key swing Senators, as E&E Daily makes clear in an excellent new analysis, “On road to 60, Senate swells with fence sitters,” (subs. req’d).  They count 31 “yes” votes, 11 “probably yes,” and

24 senators now belong in the “fence sitter” category that leaves them up for grabs headed into the winter push for 60 votes that sponsors will need to overcome an expected Republican filibuster.

That should read “expected (and immoral) conservative filibuster” — since it now seems clear, the bill will get a number of GOP votes (see “Murkowski praises Kerry-Graham climate plan. The Washington Times writes, “Her remarks signal the potential for a major turn in the climate change debate in Congress”).

I’ll list the Senators in each category below, but first it is worth noting continued movement by one key swing Senator, Lisa Murkowski (R-AK).  As Reuters and the NY Times reported over the weekend:

A senior Republican in the United States Senate, conservative Senator Lisa Murkowski, said she would consider voting for a “cap and trade” climate change bill Democrats are pushing if it also contains a vigorous expansion of nuclear energy and domestic oil drilling.

“Count me as one of those who will keep my mind open as we move forward,” she said in a C-SPAN interview that aired Sunday.   In the interview she said she recently talked with Sen. Graham about is bipartisan proposals and “It was a good conversation.”  She acknowledged the state has been ravaged by climate change:

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Given intellectual leaders like Rush “Why don’t you just go kill yourself?” Limbaugh, it’s no surprise the state of the conservative-side of the debate is so very coarse, as these reposts from Think Progress underscore:

In a new interview with Rep. Gregg Harper (R-MS), Politico asks the congressman what the Congressional Sportsmen’s Caucus does. Harper’s response:

We hunt liberal, tree-hugging Democrats, although it does seem like a waste of good ammunition.

Harper represents Mississippi’s 3rd congressional district, which contains Neshoba County — the place of one of the most infamous race-related crimes in American history. In 1964, white supremacists lynched three civil rights workers. In recent months, sportsmen around the country have been joining up with “tree-hugging” liberals on climate legislation. In April, the Congressional Sportsmen’s Caucus and other sportsmen’s and environmental groups “called for Congress to pass global warming legislation that includes increased funding for natural resource protection.”

Last week I reported on the White House Clean Energy Economy Forum — see “Carol Browner says clean energy bill without carbon cap would be a ‘big mistake’; Nobelist Chu agrees, warning we otherwise face catastrophe, with St. Louis above 90°F for 1/3 the year.”  In this repost, Wonk Room has a video and transcript of some key remarks.

Last week, over a hundred CEOs of American companies broke with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to lobby Congress to “pass comprehensive climate change and energy policy legislation this year.” The U.S. Senate is now considering the Kerry-Boxer Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act, which would set a market-based limit on global warming pollution. Participants in a Clean Energy Economy Forum at the White House included J. Wayne Leonard, the Chairman and CEO of Entergy Corporation, the utility giant based in New Orleans, Louisiana. Speaking at the White House event, Leonard called for action on climate change and clean energy not just for economic reasons but starkly moral ones:

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The climate train is leaving the station.  It is becoming increasingly likely Congress will pass a comprehensive energy bill that includes a shrinking cap and a rising carbon price (with a price collar).   Key swing Senators are moving away from obstructionism toward a bipartisan deal.  Those who stand on the sidelines not only risk ending up on the wrong side of history for this momentous bill, but they risk the more tangible benefits of sitting at the negotiating table.

The Washington Times reported today:

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the ranking Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, praised the climate change legislation outlined Sunday by GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham and Democratic Sen. John Kerry…..

Her remarks signal the potential for a major turn in the climate change debate in Congress. She has been a leading opponent of the type of legislation that has been moving forward so far…..

“I’m hopeful their column will mark a shift in the climate debate,” Murkowski said at a hearing by the energy committee. “Instead of cutting emissions at any cost, we should be working on a policy that incorporates the best ideas of both parties, a policy that accounts for our near-term energy needs, limits costs and is flexible enough to work under different economic circumstances,” she said.

In the op-ed, the two Senators asserted they have developed “a framework for climate legislation to pass Congress and the blueprint for a clean-energy future that will revitalize our economy, protect current jobs and create new ones, safeguard our national security and reduce pollution.” The framework includes, among other things, more offshore drilling and incentives for nuclear power, neither of which should be deal breakers for progressives as I have explained.

Murkowski’s office has now put out a press release reiterating her statements:

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As predicted, far-right-wingers are going after Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for his breakthrough partnership with John Kerry (D-MA).  The two Senators asserted Sunday that they have developed “a framework for climate legislation to pass Congress and the blueprint for a clean-energy future that will revitalize our economy, protect current jobs and create new ones, safeguard our national security and reduce pollution.”

Some are even labeling Graham a RINO (Republican In Name Only), even though the American Conservative Union rates him an ACU “Senate Standout,” among the 20 most conservative U.S. Senators in 2008!  Think Progress and Wonk Room have the gory details, which I excerpt below.

After voting to confirm Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court and expressing a willingness to build a compromise approach to clean energy legislation, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) appears to be the new target of tea party activists. At a Graham town hall in Greenville yesterday, activist Harry Kimball of “RINO HUNT” protested by constructing a display that depicted Graham, as well as moderates like Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), being flushed down a toilet:

KIMBALL: This is for every RINO who has failed to represent us. [...] [the toilet represents] flushing them, flushing them.

One attendee of the event asked the senator, “when are you going to announce that you are switching parties?” The question drew loud applause from the crowd. Graham defended himself, and denounced the influence of Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) on the Republican party:

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Those quotes are from a recent op-ed, “The Congress, Not the EPA, Must Take the Lead to Address Climate Challenges,” by the Senator from the state that is the most ravaged by climate change today.  The piece is mainly a defense of her myopic amendment to stall EPA action:

Congress is currently engaged in one of the most complex policy debates of our time – how best to mitigate climate change without harming the economy….

Congressional action is almost unanimously preferred, but right now Congress is a long ways from completing legislation that can deliver meaningful greenhouse gas reductions without damaging the economy.

Understanding this, I recently sought to give Congress additional time to develop sensible legislation. I did this by offering an amendment to call a temporary, one-year “timeout” on the EPA’s imminent regulations….

We must reduce greenhouse gas emissions….

You can be assured that I will continue to work in good faith with all who want to address climate change….

We need an effective policy that will endure, and that’s why Congress, not the EPA, must take the lead.

Huh.  The breakthrough Graham-Kerry op-ed says we aren’t a “long ways” away from a bill:

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On Sunday, I discussed the breakthrough Senate climate partnership: Graham (R-SC) and John Kerry (D-MA) have joined forces, asserting they are “convinced that we have found both a framework for climate legislation to pass Congress and the blueprint for a clean-energy future that will revitalize our economy, protect current jobs and create new ones, safeguard our national security and reduce pollution.”

Their bipartisan partnership now makes a comprehensive climate and energy bill likely.  What’s fascinating politically is that while some might try to label him a maverick, like his friend John McCain (R-AZ), Graham has a lifetime American Conservative Union rating of 89.79.  Graham is an ACU “Senate Standout,” among the 20 most conservative U.S. Senators in 2008!

So how did a hardcore conservative like Graham come to his game-changing climate and energy views?  E&E News (subs. req’d) has a good profile, which I excerpt below:

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Email link for GOP Sen. Graham’s DC Office – Ph. 202-224-5972 – Graham’s SC office 864-250-1417 — SC GOP HQ Ph. 803-988-8440

Yes, sometimes I visit the website of the Swift boat smearer to see the latest in denier talking points and to be amused by his latest self-acknowledged version of performance art and to save you all the trouble!

I tend to ignore what Morano writes because:

1. He just makes stuff up (see Scientist: “Our conclusions were misinterpreted” by Morano and Inhofe, CO2 — but not the sun — “is significantly correlated” with temperature since 1850).
2. The latest web analysis suggests right-wing denial websites like his are only talking to themselves.

But this time I found two tidbits that need responding too.  First, he published an outright lie about me (with my photo!) that I will address shortly.  Second, he attacked Linsday Graham who, as I reported, has reached across the aisle to John Kerry (D-MA) to achieve a bipartisan solution to our climate and energy problems, as I blogged on this morning here.

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Yes We Can (Pass Climate Change Legislation)

That is the stunning banner headline from a must-read op-ed in today’s NY Times by two unlikely legislative partners — Lindsey Graham, Republican senator from South Carolina, an ally of Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), and John Kerry, Democratic senator from Massachusetts, lead author of the recently introduced Kerry-Boxer bill aka the “Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act.”

The two Senators have a powerful message to the naysayers — and the status quo media which has prematurely written the obituary for both domestic and international climate action:

The message to those who have stalled for years is clear: killing a Senate bill is not success….

We are confident that a legitimate bipartisan effort can put America back in the lead again and can empower our negotiators to sit down at the table in Copenhagen in December and insist that the rest of the world join us in producing a new international agreement on global warming. That way, we will pass on to future generations a strong economy, a clean environment and an energy-independent nation.

The odds of a Senate climate bill just jumped through the roof. Now the Senate needs to get off its butt and get this done.

If the deal they describe can be done, and I’m confident it can be, that would probably mean at least four GOP votes in the Senate — Graham, McCain, and Maine’s Snowe and Collins.  But I suspect this deal brings within reach other gettable “Rs,” like Lugar of Indiana and Voinovich of Ohio and maybe even Lisa “the fiddler” Murkowski (R-AK), if she understands, as Graham and Kerry do, that the best way to avoid the problems inherent in EPA regulation is to pass this bill:

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Republican Rep. Michael Castle announced at a press conference today in Wilmington, Del., that he will seek the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Vice President Biden last year — instantly boosting the GOP’s chances of capturing a Democratic seat.

The nonpartisan Cook Political Report, which handicaps congressional races, called Castle’s candidacy a “major recruiting victory” for the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC). Cook moved the race from the “solid Democratic” column to the “toss up” column.

This breaking news from USA Today raises two interesting questions:  First, will RNC Chair Michael Steele denounce him, too?  Second, will Castle continue to advocate for clean energy jobs and climate legislation, or will he try to walk away from his vote like Mark Kirk has in Illinois?

After all, the climate vote is increasingly becoming a litmus test for conservatives (see “Honey, I shrunk the GOP, Part 3: RNC Chair Steele withdraws support for Rep. Kirk over his vote on climate and clean energy bill“).

Some hypocrisy on the issue is already clear:

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Since failing to vote gets more attention than wanting to suspend California’s climate and clean energy laws, a lot of people probably know this story:

Meg Whitman, the fourth richest woman in California, thinks she should be governor, presumably because the three richer women are busy. She freely admits that this idea just popped into her head about 18 months ago. Before then she wasn’t a member of any party and hadn’t even voted very often. That’s the kind of delightful English-style eccentric she is. She might as well have decided she was Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.

Then a funny thing happened to another part of her brain, the area where memories are stored: It became less and less clear if she had voted before 2002 — she claimed she had — or if she had ever registered as a Republican in another state — another claim she’d made and frequently repeated.

No one had seen any evidence to support either assertion. A reporter asked Multipersonality Meg if she could help.

“Go find it,” Meg snapped.

For what happened next, read the rest of the HuffPost piece, “An Open Letter from Meg Whitman About Voting.”

Less well known is her lack of civic responsibility when it comes to all Californians — and their children and grandchildren. As fellow candidate for Governor, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, explained in a September 24th piece:

strong>Meg Whitman penned an op-ed last week stating she’d suspend California’s landmark climate-change legislation, AB32, on her first day if elected governor. This is backwards thinking, and I disagree.

Fellow Californian and Nobel Prize winner Energy Secretary Steven Chu has already explained what could happens to the state if we fail to adopt aggressive emissions reduction strategies (many of which have been pioneered by the state):  “Wake up,” America, “we’re looking at a scenario where there’s no more agriculture in California.”
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The brain waves of the American right continue to be erratic, when they are not flat-lining.

What’s more surprising — that a leading conservative scholar would admit that his entire movement may be brain dead or that he thinks the movement’s best hope is … wait for it … Glenn Beck.

Steven F. Hayward is “the F.K. Weyerhaeuser fellow at the American Enterprise Institute” who has, his bio notes, “written biographies of Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan and of Winston Churchill.”

I think it has been obvious for a while that the conservative movement should be renamed the conservative stagnation:

• Gingrich sums up conservative ethos: “I am not a citizen of the world! I think the entire concept is intellectual nonsense and stunningly dangerous”
• Joe Klein on the GOP: “How can you sustain a democracy if one of the two major political parties has been overrun by nihilists?”
• House GOP leader Boehner on ABC: “The idea that carbon dioxide is a carcinogen that is harmful to our environment is almost comical.”

But who would have imagined a leading conservative intellectual like Hayward would make the following damning admission in his concluding paragraph:

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In a bizarre pop-culture flip-flop, Kenneth Green of the American Enterprise Institute has compared the mild-mannered EPA administrator to Dirty Harry:

You can just see Jackson standing there with a .44 magnum in her hand, and a steely glint in her eye, telling industry “You’ve got to ask yourself one question, ‘do I feel lucky?’ Well, do ya, punk?”

Seriously!

Let me get this straight, the right-wing is now saying it’s bad to be like Clint, the quintessential tough guy hero lionized by conservatives because he’ll do whatever is needed to save human life?  That means Green is directly equating U.S. industry with the psychopathic serial killer and criminals that Clint fights in the iconic 1971 movie.

Well, logic was never a priority of Denier-Industrial-Complex Kooks (DICKs) like Green, who regularly spouts nonsense like, “We’re back to the average temperatures that prevailed in 1978….  No matter what you’ve been told, the technology to significantly reduce emissions is decades away and extremely costly” — from a 2008 speech AEI later removed from their website (excerpts here).

In fact, Green’s analogy makes no sense whatsoever since Jackson is simply obeying the command of the highest court in the land to regulate carbon pollution (see here).  Green entirely omits the fact that in 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases were pollutants and that the EPA would have to regulate them if they were found to endanger public health and welfare.

So the only part of the analogy that makes sense is that deniers and delayers like Green oppose the rule of law — while Jackson is trying to enforce it.

Ironically, in its zealous quest to kill climate action, AEI has done another flip-flop.  Jackson proposes to start regulating only  “large industrial facilities that emit at least 25,000 tons of GHGs a year.”  Jackson explained, “This is a common sense rule that is carefully tailored to apply to only the largest sources – those from sectors responsible for nearly 70 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions sources.”  She told the Governors Climate Summit in Los Angeles, “we can begin reducing emissions from the nation’s largest greenhouse gas emitting facilities without placing an undue burden on the businesses that make up the vast majority of our economy,” adding, “The corner coffee shop is not a meaningful place to look for carbon reductions.”

But Green doesn’t believe in common sense — he urges big polluters to sue to make sure small businesses and farmers are regulated also:

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Yesterday, EPA announced a new rule to require use of best technologies to reduce greenhouse gases from large facilities when “constructed or significantly modified.”

Today, Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), chair of the Senate Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations subcommittee, released a statement:

“The Environmental Protection Agency has determined that greenhouse gas emissions pose a real threat to public health and safety, and has proposed a carefully targeted plan to regulate large industrial and commercial facilities under the Clean Air Act.

I fully support EPA’s actions to require that the nation’s largest stationary emitters, responsible for roughly 70 percent of America’s carbon footprint, take appropriate steps to contain these harmful emissions and improve energy efficiency.

Those who recognize that the Earth is in jeopardy, that global warming is real and that the climate is warming more quickly than anticipated, understand the urgent need to take action. We cannot lose time.

Hopefully, this will encourage the Senate to pass a comprehensive climate change bill quickly. If it does not, the Obama Administration should be commended for having the courage to protect our environment and our Earth.”

Hear!  Hear!

When we last left GOP quitter-in-chief Sarah Palin she had written a falsehood-filled piece attacking climate action and clean energy for, who else, the Washington Post.  Then Senators Boxer and Kerry debunked her piece, pointing out “The governor’s new refrain against global warming action reminds us of every naysayer who has spoken out against progress in cleaning up pollution.”

At the same time, Newt Gingrich called her a conservative leader on energy issues, asserting “Her knowledge of the energy issue is very real.”  In fact, Palin is so ignorant of energy, so practiced at repeating falsehoods, that during last year’s presidential campaign, the Washington Post itself gave her its highest (which is to say lowest) rating of “Four Pinocchios” for continuing to “to peddle bogus [energy] statistics three days after the original error was pointed out by independent fact-checkers.”

Now Think Progress reports Palin “has signed on with the Washington Speakers Bureau, hoping to cash in on her fame. While Palin did do one speech — to mixed reviews — in Asia recently, she is reportedly having trouble getting booked for more“:

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