During the State of the Union address earlier this week, President Barack Obama spoke at length about clean energy, with nary a mention of climate change. This is the new environment in which America's energy policy is being made.
Just two years ago, Democrats were rallying to combat climate change, one of the most worrying challenges the country faces. But now, Obama has apparently given up his plan to openly fight climate changeduring his presidency. It's hard to imagine how, even in a second term, he would choose to re-fight the lost battle to create a cap-and-trade system.
The Obama Administration has instead resorted to a sort of insurgent strategy. Instead of waging an all-out battle against energy interests, the U.S. government will try to chip away at the edges of the industry's power and rally citizens' allegiances to a new flag, that of "clean energy."
Climate bill's absence is smothering clean energy
Since Washington hasn't succeeded at tackling climate change head on, Obama's new strategy is to attack the problem obliquely by promoting innovation in clean energy and setting goals for the use of technologies like electric cars. But can clean energy efforts and innovations thrive in the absence of a wholesale climate policy? When a climate bill was still a possibility, clean energy entrepreneurs were promising substantial investments in the sector, if only Congress could give them a framework. And as Monica Potts explains at The American Prospect, in the absence of a climate bill, clean energy has flagged:
What's been problematic about the president's approach up to now is that, despite his efforts to pump funding into the clean-energy sector, as he did with about $90 billion of the stimulus, renewable energy hasn't taken off. Obama had a line in his speech that summed up why this is so: "Now, clean-energy breakthroughs will only translate into clean-energy jobs if businesses know there will be a market for what they're selling."
Short on influence
It's possible that clean energy investors will take the President's new promise as incentive enough to push forward. But, they will also have to consider the influence of the newly empowered Republicans. Mother Jones' Kate Sheppard isn't convinced that the president's new tactic will stick:
"There are plenty of people-and most of them happen to be Republicans-who don't think that policies to support clean energy are worthwhile and who will oppose any attempt to move away from them," she wrote. "Meanwhile, this latest iteration of the Obama climate and energy plan includes few of the driving forces that would actually make renewables cost-competitive in the near future and allow renewables to compete (the big one being, of course, a price on carbon pollution)."
When "clean" energy includes coal
Another weak point in the President's new strategy is his reliance on the vague idea of clean energy, which becomes dirtier the more it is used. As Sheppard writes, "Environmental groups weren't all that excited about the inclusion of "clean coal" and nuclear in that mix, but that's pretty broadly expected as the price one must pay to draw broader support for a clean energy standard."
Another key source of clean energy is natural gas. In Washington, it's become a given that natural gas, which releases less carbon when burned than coal or oil, will help the country transition away from its high-carbon diet and be phased out as energy sources like solar and wind become more viable. (The natural gas industry, of course, doesn't see its role as transitional. It's playing for keeps.)
And while some places are rightly celebrating the freedom that natural gas gives them from coal-as Care2's Beth Buczynski reports, Penn State is investing $35 million to convert its coal-fired power plant to natural gas over the next three years-other places are bearing the environmental toll of this new, clean fuel. In North Carolina, for instance, hydrofracking, the controversial technique that natural gas companies have been using to extract the gas from shale, is not even legal, but already environmental groups are having to fight efforts from energy companies to buy up potentially gas-rich properties, Public News Service reports.
A poverty of political capital
The president's new strategy on clean energy will surely succeed at turning current energy economy slowly towards a new path. In the absence of any overarching strategy to fix the country's energy problems, it's going to have to be good enough. But ultimately, this sort of tactic, born out of a poverty of political capital, cannot move fast enough to keep energy companies from scouring the earth for more profits doing what they've been doing.
That means that there will be more scenes like the one in Kern County, California, where companies are dredging up the last resources of oils from the tar sands. In Orion Magazine, Jeremy Miller writes:
The land also reveals the Frankensteinian scars and machinery necessary to keep up that level of production. Gas flares glow on hillsides. Nodding donkeys lever over thousands of wells, some of which are spaced fewer than a hundred feet apart. Between the wells and imposing cogeneration power plants-which supply energy and steam to the senescent fields-run wild tangles of pipe. These are the conduits of an elaborate industrial life-support system, breathing in steam and carrying away oil.
Will the president's new strategy prevent the creation of more landscapes like this one? It seems overly optimistic to hope so.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the environment by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Mulch for a complete list of articles on environmental issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Pulse, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.
It looks like MoveOn.org members are just as excited about Elaine Marshall as DFA and the rest of North Carolina. Over 70% of MoveOn.org's NC members supported Elaine in for the runoff on June 22. The vote will determine which candidate will run against incumbent Sen. Richard Burr (R).
Elaine Marshall's popularity in North Carolina reflects her deep roots in the community. Marshall was also endorsed by Durham mayor Bill Bell and Asheville mayor Terry Bellam.
Marshall's opponent, supported by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, has raised $1.2 million against Marshall's $775,003, but is still behind in the polls. It's not over yet though, and when they start spending that money on ads to attack Marshall, she will need your help.
Not as high profile as the AR race, but equally important to getting another Progressive in the Senate -- the NC runoff is June 22. DFA endorsed candidate, Elaine Marshall, just got the endorsement of the largest Progressive paper in the state: The Independent Weekly.
They reiterate what DFA members on the ground have been saying since the beginning:
. . . If nominated, Marshall would have a better chance of winning the fall election against Republican Sen. Richard Burr. The second: If elected, Marshall would be the stronger senator.
It is fascinating to observe the difference between the in-state analysis of this race vs. the calculation of the DC insider establishment who are supporting Cunningham.
More from The Indy:
The difference may be as simple as the fact that Marshall, in her bones and in her roots, is working-class. So she's not confused about what the rights of working men and women should be in a world economy dominated by giant corporations and banks. Nor is she in doubt about where the federal government should stand. It should stand, she believes, with the working class for their jobs, and against labor and trade policies that privilege capital at the expense of people and the environment-at home or abroad. No more outsourcing of America's future.
As a lawyer, a state senator and for the last 14 years as secretary of state, Marshall has been a consistent voice and vote for the interests of regular folks and equal rights for all. She was a forceful exponent of women's equality early in her career, and as a legislator she helped enact a series of laws improving women's health care in North Carolina. She has also stood for equal rights for gays and lesbians, and in this campaign came out early and strongly for the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," the anti-gay military policy, and of the federal DOMA, the discriminatory law misnamed the Defense of Marriage Act.
Elaine Marshall has a record of winning and North Carolinians really like her. She beat a NASCAR driver, for pete's sake.
From her Charlotte Observer endorsement:
Marshall became the first woman elected statewide to executive office in North Carolina in 1996, when she defeated NASCAR legend Richard Petty in a race for secretary of state. She has won re-election three times since and is the only one of this bunch to have won statewide. In 2008, she won more votes in a contested race than anyone but Attorney General Roy Cooper.
It looks like NC has decided who they think is the best Progressive to beat Burr. I hope DC catches up. To chip in to Elaine's campaign, give here.
Apparently inspired by certain Democrats voting against the health insurance reform, the Service Employees International Union - a union representing over 2 million workers - is surprisingly planning to work against Democrats this election season.
Perhaps the strongest challenge to Democrats, if not the Democratic establishment itself, will be in North Carolina. The national SEIU is working with the State Employees Association of North Carolina, its state affiliate, to form the North Carolina First Party.
After seventeen years, Gregory Taylor was finally freed on February 17th when the three judge panel of the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission unanimously ruled to exonerate him. North Carolina created the commission to investigate and evaluate post-conviction claims of innocence in 2006 and is the first of its kind in the United States. Taylor, wrongfully convicted of first degree murder in 1993, is the first person to be exonerated by the commission.
It is a popular today to say that the South has switched from voting Democratic to Republican. Many people are fond of looking at previous electoral maps. Hey, isn't that funny - the states have completely switched parties. It's like the Republicans have recreated the Solid South.
That statement is unequivocally false. Most people have no idea how unbelievably Democratic the Solid South was. For half a century, Democrats in the Deep South did about as well as the Communist Party did in Soviet Union elections.
Here is a map of a typical Solid South state, filled with blue counties. It is the 1940 presidential election. I invite you to guess - what do these blue counties represent? Counties in which Roosevelt won over 70% of the vote? 80%? 90%? Remember, Roosevelt was quite a popular guy. He must have done pretty well in Alabama, part of the Solid South.
Cross-posted to Project Vote's Voting Matters Blog
The California Legislature approved a bill last week to extend voter registration privileges to 17-year-old citizens. If signed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, the bill would help put California youth on the road to a lifetime of democratic participation.
(This is one of the key battlegrounds moving forward into future elections. Right now, it's a still-fragmented multi-front battle, but that only makes the need for national attention and federal action all the more apparent. - promoted by Paul Rosenberg)
Following an historic turnout in the 2008 election comes a flurry of election reform agendas from both sides of the battle over voting rights. Since November 4, some state lawmakers have seized on the success of early voting and Election Day Registration (EDR) as models for facilitating voter registration, while others appear to have been threatened by the heightened turnout and inspired to introduce restrictive voter ID and proof-of-citizenship bills for the 2009 legislative session.
Following what appears to be significant progress this year in closing participation gaps among historically underrepresented young and minority voters, we review Election Day stories in states with voter ID and EDR laws, and preview next year's legislative battle for election reform.
Well, she's not in North Carolina. In recent years, she has only spent a few weeks in the state. All the while, she's voting with President Bush 92% of the time. This has resulted in a very low effectiveness ranking.
Elizabeth Dole has been busy in Washington DC representing the failed policies of the Bush administration. We need someone to represent North Carolina.
After 6 years on the Senate banking committee she managed to not ask a single question, about anything!
And now, our economy is in trouble, banks are failing, and the stock market is dropping.
Elizabeth Dole's lack of action on the committee is an appalling level of oversight. Adding to that, she voted against legislation to help people stay in their homes, and has been labeled as ineffective by North Carolina newspapers.
While Dole sat in silence, she did manage to collect donations from Wall Street to the tune of $850,000. Was it all just "hush-money?"
It's time for Dole to leave the Senate, and clear the way for someone who will speak up for North Carolina.
Survey USA is starting to report crosstabs for early voters in many of their recent state polls. In every state where they have such crosstabs, Obama is ahead by shocking margins. First, Georgia:
Early and absentee voting began in Georgia on 09/22/08. Among the 18% of Georgia voters who tell SurveyUSA they have already voted, Obama leads by 6 points; among those who have not yet voted, McCain leads by 11.
With 18% of the vote in, this crosstab is effectively an "exit poll" showing that Obama is literally winning in Georgia right now. Similarly surprising pro-Obama margins can be seen in several other states, like Iowa:
Among the 14% of Iowa voters who say they have already cast their ballot, Obama leads by a 2:1 margin.
Of the 12% of respondents who tell SurveyUSA they have already voted, Obama leads by 18.
None of the other Survey USA polls released this month included early voting subsets. Still, these numbers are enough to indicate that Obama is clearly over-performing among early voters compared to his standing among all voters. This means that the Obama field campaign is obviously superior to McCain's, and that even if McCain tightens the campaign later on, Obama will already have banked a substantial lead. Early voting is also an excellent protection against the voter suppression tactics Republicans regularly employ.
Obama is winning big across the board right now. Best of all, this lead is not just in polls, but in actual votes.
Update: Survey USA also reports that Jim Martin leads by 4% in the Georgia Senate campaign, among early voters.
Update 2: Also, I should note that I share skepticism of those who think this all sounds like 2004, and as such is too good to be true. However, keep in mind that during the early voting phase in 2004, Kerry never actually led Bush. During early voting in 2008, we all know that Obama is well ahead right now. That, combined with a less than effective McCain ground game (Bush's was excellent, McCain's isn't) makes things very different from 2004.
Update 3: It should be noted that these subsets have very high margins of error. However, that Obama is outperforming his overall numbers in every single one of these subsets makes it highly unlikely that this is just "statistical noise." If it were truly random, than the early voting numbers would be pro-McCain in at least one of the five states listed here. Instead, Obama outperforms in all five.
Update 4: If Obama is ahead by 30% in Iowa with 14% reporting, should we already call the state for Obama? I'm tempted.
As history has shown, there is a difference between submitting a voter registration application and finding your name on the rolls when you go to vote. With registration coming to a close, Project Vote is conducting emergency efforts to ensure that no one who wants to vote is left out on Election Day.
Project Vote's Registration Repair Program is an intensive and urgent effort to collect and rectify large numbers of registrations that have been rejected by boards of election. We have been working all over the country to obtain disqualified applications and to contact would-be voters to repair applications with missing or erroneous information.
I have spent much of this week lobbying my representatives in Congress to vote against the proposed bailout legislation. If this issue is of importance to you, then please call your Congressional representative this morning and weigh in.
The blogosphere is game-changing medium for our democracy and its impact will only grow. However, on the eve of an unprecedented Congressional vote on a $700 billion bailout bill, our Congressional representatives were not reading blogs. A day after the Senate loaded a revised bill with $150 billion of enticements to change the votes of House members, our Congressional representatives were not reading blogs. And regardless of whether one blogged about a sky which is falling or a ground which is shaking, our Congressional representatives were not reading blogs.
They are counting however. In the cloakroom, votes; in their offices, phone calls. So call. They work for you. Tell them what you want, not what you think you can get.
I watched the VP debate earlier and was put off by the sense of alarm expressed by Governor Palin and Senator Biden as they bandied their respective ticket's budgetary excesses back-and-forth: "$10 billion per month.." or "$1.5 billion on.." or "a $1 trillion increase over four years.." Put off by their avoiding any debate on the merits of the Senate's record-breaking passage a $700 billion bailout to shareholders of private sector corporations and a $150 billion bribe to swing votes in the House today.
To hell with talk of a pig with lipstick; there was an 850 billion dollar pink elephant in that auditorium in St. Louis which neither Gov. Palin nor Sen. Biden had any interest in discussing before the American public. An 850 billion dollar pink elephant which was crafted over the span of eight days. In just eight days Senators Biden, McCain and Obama have voted to spend more on a bailout than has been spent on the "war" in Iraq over the past seven years. Anyone remember the certainty and resolve with which the Congress rushed to judgment about Iraq? Over eight days, Congress has made a risk assessment which necessitates a $700 billion subsidy plus a $150 billion tip. In the context of what happened in the Senate, I'm not particularly fired up by fist-pounding over, what, a trifling $40 billion in tax break to oil companies over the past eight years?
I have called and emailed my Representative in NC, David Price, twice (Monday and Thursday.) He voted in favor of the bill last Monday. I called and emailed NC's US Senators, Elizabeth Dole and Richard Burr on Wednesday. Senator Dole voted against the bailout; Senator Burr voted for its passage. Wednesday evening, Sen. Dole's challenger, Democrat State Senator Kay Hagan (who defeated me in the May primary)announced that she would have voted against passage.
At the end of the day, however, what really matters is how you feel, what do you want? Your voice counts as much as anyone's. "The highest office in America", said Harry Truman, "is that of citizen."
Call your Representative and tell them. Trust me: they're counting those calls.
Below is the email which I sent to Representative Price echoing my opposition to the bailout bill.
John Robinson, editor of the Greensboro News and Record writes: One thing has bothered me about the discussion of the distribution of the "Radical Islam" DVD. Some of those papers explaining their decisions to distribute the DVD to readers suggest that not doing so is censorship. And that they are erring on the side of free speech.
Of course, it's not free speech. It's a paid advertisement making the case for one side of a complicated, controversial issue. The papers will distribute the other sides, presumably, if they can come up with the money to pay for it. But most likely, the papers will not publish their information because the other sides won't take out ads.
As for censorship, not distributing a paid advertisement is not censorship. Newspapers decide not to publish information every day. Most of the time we call it news judgment. Other times we call it lack of space. We never call it censorship...particularly when the information is readily available elsewhere, as it is in this case (on YouTube).
Elizabeth Dole's absence from North Carolina has long been fodder for discussion among Democrats. We're prone to refer to her as a carpetbagger and talk about her 40+ year absence from the state, her voting history in Kansas, her run for president as a Kansan and her residence at the Watergate where she and husband Bob have lived since they were married in 1975. What we don't talk about is her long history of service in North Carolina because there is no history to speak of.
You would think that after a rushed residency period and her election to the U.S. Senate as a "North Carolinian" in 2002 that Dole would start spending a little more time in this state. Time she could use to get to know the people and our goals, dreams and hopes for the wonderful state we live in. Time she could use to gain understanding of the challenges and obstacles we face in North Carolina. If you honestly thought Dole was going to spend any substantive time here, you're wrong. Dead wrong.
STATE BLOGS
Powered by: SoapBlox