Last week the House Energy & Power Subcommittee marked up H.R. 910, the Energy Tax Prevention Act. Today, the full House Energy & Commerce Committee will mark up the bill.
Opponents, especially Reps. Waxman, Markey, and Inslee, viciously attacked the bill last Thursday. Their arguments are reviewed in detail at the blog GlobalWarming.Org.
The post concludes with this summary of the Waxman-Markey-Inslee argument as follows:
We know what is good for America and the world. It’s a future without fossil fuels. We can’t persuade the people’s representatives to support our agenda and turn it into law. Therefore, it is necessary for EPA to implement our agenda regardless of the defeat of cap-and-trade, the November 2011 elections, and the separation of powers. Our agenda is more important than any constitutional principle that might interfere with it.
The question on limiting of the breadth of power of the EPA to have control over the future of the United States energy policy is one of the most important debates of our time.
h/t to Marlo Lewis
Translation: “Forget the facts. We know what we know. We are so desperate to control the smallest aspects of your private lives that we will completely circumvent democracy and implement our personal agendas through anonymous and unaccountable bureacracies.”
WUWT says, “…The post concludes with this summary of the Waxman-Markey-Inslee argument as follows: ”
http://www.globalwarming.org says, “I would summarize the core premise of Waxman, Markey, and Inslee’s opposition to H.R. 910 as follows: ”
(italics are mine)
Given all that we’ve seen the last couple of years does anyone really doubt that the summary is pretty close to what these guys really think? Especially since, IMO, these guys really honestly believe in the alarmist predictions of catastrophe?
I think this is more than adequate reason to work for the removal of these people from any public office. Perhaps they should retire to some nice, cushy, well-paying job in the climate lobbying industry or as talking heads on some MSM station.
@Robert E. Phelan says:
March 15, 2011 at 9:01 am
Folks, Waxman, Markey and Inslee did NOT make that statement. It was a “summary” by the blogger, his interpretation of what the Democrats meant by their arguments. It is a somewhat over-the-top statement and I think Representatives Waxman, Markey and Inslee would reject that formulation and be horrified at the sentiment…. even if it is not that far off the mark.
——-
REPLY I know, just havin’ fun with it! I love to invoke the “where’s my musket?” adage.
Realistically, it isn’t that hard to find attributable quotes nearly like that one from politicians & policy-makers. The Hockey Team spouted all sorts of that stuff in the Climategate emails, and that side is getting ever-more desperate.
Can’t wait to read the reaction to this one!
Committee ranking Democrat Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) offered an amendment Tuesday that called on Congress to agree that climate change is occurring. The amendment failed on a party-line vote of 20-31. No Republicans voted for the amendment.
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/149585-house-gop-rejects-amendment-that-says-climate-change-is-occurring
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/us-cool-on-global-warming/story-e6frg6so-1226021968678
What’s sad is that these morons continue to get re-elected. That doesn’t say much about their constituents. Maybe this stupidity should be tested on their constituents first. Then we’ll see how long they remain in office!
Mostly, these people are not scientists and simply do not have either the expertise or the time to investigate adequately ANY of the hundreds of bills they must vote on. Their staffs help–but not enough.
But I also believe that some of these people are consciously trying to destroy the United States.
When you think of all the American, Candian, British, Australian, NewZealand, Polish, Indian, French and other people who died during the last world war fighting for democracy its awful to see this ” well we know whats best for you approach “so we will suspend your democratic rights by essentially a legal move to implement what you wouldnt have voted for. Dont the people count any longer. SInce Hansen & Co we have seen very slight increases in global temperature— nothing like they predicted 20 yrs ago, so why should we suspend democracy now?
We have already seen the face of ‘noble cause corruption’ in scientists. This is the face of noble cause corruption in politicians. Where the scientist averts his gaze from evidence that invalidates his ‘science,’ the policy maker averts his gaze from the constitution. When the scientist can no longer avert his gaze, he hides the decline. When the politician can no longer ignore the constitution, he doesn’t merely hide it – he demolishes it comprehensively and totally.
It should not need pointing out, that as soon as you override the checks and balances in government on the basis that this time ‘we face an unprecendent threat,’ then you no longer have any checks and balances, and you have condoned dictatorship. I sincerely hope that these policy makers did not mean what Marlo Lewis has attributed to them, or that they will reflect soberly on what they have just said and pull back from the brink. If not, I still have faith in the American people to recognise the threat before it is too late.
Gotta love http://www.opensecrets.org Let’s you know who has the real power.
Contributor Total Indivs PACs
———————————————————————————-
American Assn for Justice $90,500 $0 $90,500
American Fedn of St/Cnty/Munic Employees $87,500 $0 $87,500
National Assn of Letter Carriers $82,500 $0 $82,500
American Hospital Assn $81,000 $2,000 $79,000
American Medical Assn $74,000 $0 $74,000
Service Employees International Union $69,500 $0 $69,500
National Assn of Realtors $68,000 $0 $68,000
Time Warner $63,000 $17,000 $46,000
United Auto Workers $62,500 $0 $62,500
Walt Disney Co $62,500 $3,500 $59,000
American Society of Anesthesiologists $57,500 $0 $57,500
KidsPAC $55,000 $0 $55,000
AFLAC Inc $52,500 $0 $52,500
Teamsters Union $52,500 $0 $52,500
National Cable & Telecommunications Assn $52,000 $2,000 $50,000
American Postal Workers Union $51,500 $0 $51,500
United Food & Commercial Workers Union $51,000 $0 $51,000
News Corp $48,900 $28,900 $20,000
American Podiatric Medical Assn $45,500 $0 $45,500
AT&T Inc $44,000 $1,000 $43,000
and for Rep Markey (and why is Colorado State University using tuition funds to back a Mass Rep?)
Contributor Total Indivs PACs
ActBlue $197,416 $197,416 $0
EMILY’s List $187,623 $166,750 $20,873
Democratic Congressional Campaign Cmte $53,869 $53,869 $0
League of Conservation Voters $38,201 $28,723 $9,478
Brownstein, Hyatt et al $32,833 $31,833 $1,000
Colorado State University $25,529 $25,529 $0
JStreetPAC $21,500 $21,500 $0
American Assn for Justice $20,000 $0 $20,000
American Fedn of St/Cnty/Munic Employees $20,000 $0 $20,000
American Postal Workers Union $20,000 $0 $20,000
AmeriPAC: The Fund for a Greater America $20,000 $0 $20,000
BRIDGE PAC $20,000 $0 $20,000
Carpenters & Joiners Union $20,000 $0 $20,000
Communications Workers of America $20,000 $0 $20,000
International Assn of Fire Fighters $20,000 $0 $20,000
Intl Brotherhood of Electrical Workers $20,000 $0 $20,000
National Air Traffic Controllers Assn $20,000 $0 $20,000
National Assn of Letter Carriers $20,000 $0 $20,000
National Education Assn $20,000 $0 $20,000
Plumbers/Pipefitters Union $20,000 $0 $20,000
Service Employees International Union $20,000 $0 $20,000
Teamsters Union $20,000 $0 $20,000
United Food & Commercial Workers Union $20,000 $0 $20,000
United Steelworkers $20,000 $0 $20,000
sorry – post above was for Betsy Markey of Colorado, so CSU makes sense
Here’s for Ed Markey
Enernoc $25,900 $25,900 $0
Thermo Fisher Scientific $18,100 $8,100 $10,000
Feeley & Driscoll $15,500 $15,500 $0
DLA Piper $14,900 $12,150 $2,750
Holcim Ltd $14,500 $12,000 $2,500
Patton Boggs LLP $14,500 $9,500 $5,000
National Grid plc $13,000 $7,000 $6,000
Time Warner $13,000 $0 $13,000
Raytheon Co $11,250 $1,250 $10,000
Qualcomm Inc $11,000 $4,000 $7,000
Comcast Corp $10,250 $250 $10,000
Mintz, Levin et al $10,100 $10,100 $0
American Assn for Justice $10,000 $0 $10,000
American College of Emergency Physicians $10,000 $0 $10,000
Honeywell International $10,000 $0 $10,000
Major League Baseball Commissioner’s Ofc $10,000 $0 $10,000
National Beer Wholesalers Assn $10,000 $0 $10,000
National Cable & Telecommunications Assn $10,000 $0 $10,000
Operating Engineers Union $10,000 $0 $10,000
Suffolk Construction $10,000 $10,000
tom in indy says:
March 15, 2011 at 8:24 am
Let me frame this for you. Special interests control American politics. On the left, we have unions and on the right we have big oil. The right is trying to gain control of the debate by reducing union membership, dues and hence union campaign contributions. The left is trying to gut the oil industry for the same reason.
When we were young and naive, we believed that government served the people. Now that we are older and wiser, and the curtain has been pulled back, we see that government serves special interests.
Agree in general, but there is a (huge) difference. “Big Oil” produces something of value that everyone needs (energy, raw materials for various products, value for their stockholders), whereas unions, especially public unions, don’t produce anything (see public education) and are becoming a huge burden on the taxpayer. No matter how loud they scream and what childish antics they pull, you could “reduce union membership” with little lasting effect. If you “gut the oil industry,” well, let’s just say I’d rather be beholden to “Big Oil.”
Full disclosure. I have no ties with “Big Oil” and “Big Oil” did not fund me to write this. 🙂
A few points from the ‘article’
Waxman said: “Some Republicans on the committee will argue today that this bill is not a rejection of science,but if they believed in the serious threat posed by climate change, they would have accepted our offer to work together without preconditions to develop a responsible plan for promoting clean energy and reducing carbon emissions.”
Have they seen the recent UAH or RSS temperature charts, with temperatures the same as 1989?
Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) made the same point, claiming that the sponsors had a “truth in advertising” problem, because EPA is not collecting revenues from taxpayers.
I believe the current business tax rate is 35%, although it is generally passed on to the consumer.
Rep. Inslee denounced H.R. 910 as the “dirty air act” (not very original), asserting it would prevent EPA from fighting childhood asthma. If Inslee really believes that, then I have a bridge I’d like to sell him. To restate the obvious, carbon dioxide is not an asthma-triggering or -exacerbating air pollutant.
From the article, they did say this.
Noelle;
About the EPA’s science: they did none, and didn’t even cite any. They just took the IPCC’s word for it. Fools quoting each other.
Seems like just about everyone got conned by this the same as I did until I checked out that quote on the actual blog post, not the misleading excerpt here.
This outrageous statement did not come from Waxman et al , it was globalwarming.org’s own “summary” of their position.
“I would summarize the core premise of Waxman, Markey, and Inslee’s opposition to H.R. 910 as follows: …. blah… ”
So when Anthony says “The post concludes with this summary of the Waxman-Markey-Inslee argument as follows:” we should be very clear that what follows is NOT Waxman’s own summary of their position but someone who is trying to shoot them down.
I doubt I’d agree with whatever they DO actually say but don’t have time to study the 10 pages or so of quotes to see if it is fair.
However , I’d suggest A.W makes that intro a bit clearer than it currently is because most readers seem to be taking it as Waxman’s own words.
“Our agenda is more important than any constitutional principle that might interfere with it.”
Would that be Agenda 21?
These guys have the temerity to state that the US Constitution should be ignored (obviously because they in their arrogance “know that they are right”).
If that’s not sedition then what is? Prosecuting, that lot, and pronto.
RE: We know what is good for America and the world. It’s a future ….
Wow, if you replace the word “America” with “Germany”, it sounds like something Hitler would say!!!!
Noelle, if you really believe that EPA based its decision on science, then perhaps our worst fears about our education system have been realized. I have read the supporting document for EPA finding, and I doubt that my science students would have received a passing grade if they had submitted such work. The document contains page after page of misleading graphs and deceptive presentations. I do not know which upsets me more — the fact that they expect the public to accept the propaganda or the fact that we taxpayers are paying for the propaganda.
BradProp1 says:
What’s sad is that these morons continue to get re-elected. That doesn’t say much about their constituents. Maybe this stupidity should be tested on their constituents first. Then we’ll see how long they remain in office!
“Rep Henry Waxman (D-Calif.)” – That should explain it all.
I find this intolerable,even in the UK no peoples representative could survive saying “we know what is best and will do it even if it is outside the law”. America you are a lost Democracy, soon to be an autocracy. Good luck.
Let’s see if we can have the various power and fuel and gasoline companies refuse to sell their products to Waxman, Markey, Inslee, and the upper echelon of the EPA for a about six months so that they can reduce their carbon footprint to the level they want us to. Then we can revisit this and see what their attitude is.
Brian H says:
Well, the EPA is not supposed to do original scientific research. What it is supposed to do is synthesize the research that has been done to produce a scientific finding. That the EPA scientists did quite admirably, including responding very patiently to lots of the usual nonsense…see here: http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/endangerment/petitions.html
Anthony
Not an example of your usual rigour, I’m afraid.
Although you did note that the italicised conclusion is a summary, too many of the replies seem to assume that the words were those of the three stooges (Waxman, Markey, and Inslee). That’s sad, for it gives ammunition to the trolls, who will claim distortion.
Ah, but it’s a very appropriate summary of what their position really means. Heh heh…
These are profoundly dangerous people (Markey, Waxman, Inslee). They and Our Dear Leader Barack Obama are using regulatory agencies and ‘czars’ to usurp the authority of legislature, judiciary, and the expressed will of the informed American citizen voters.
The paraphrase summary that leads this post is not wide of the mark, just stated without the embellishment of usual politician dissembling.