Climate spin turns to hyper-mode with dem wins

Wed, 2006-11-08 11:52Kevin Grandia
Kevin Grandia's picture

Climate spin turns to hyper-mode with dem wins

Rep. John DingellWith the Democrats owning the balance of power in Congress, and possibly even the Senate, there is already talk of real US action on climate change. According to E&E daily, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) is poised to chair the Energy and Commerce committee. Darren Samuelson of E&E reports that Dingell "is expected to hold a series of hearings on global warming specifically, as well as direct oversight of U.S. EPA's most controversial air emission regulations."

On the other side of the coin, the spin on climate change has all the signs of escalating to hyper-mode with articles like this one issued today from the oil industry darlings, the Business and Media Institute.


Tags: 
business and media institute

Comments

Wed, 2006-11-08 14:59 — PeteJ

On the other side of the coin, the critics are missing the point when they critisize that the costs of emmissions reductions to nations will ruin their economies.  Wouldn't the effects of global warming ruin or severely damage their economies?  What about the costs to nations from disaster relief for third world and poor nations? 

Fri, 2006-11-10 14:18 — Kevin Grandia
You're dead on. I have always loved the backwards notions of government - short term gain, long term pain. I think it has a lot to do with the short political cycles and the fact that climate change is not in your face (and the electorates) like issues like health care, crime, war and taxes. Not only are there the costs incurred by developed nations assisting in developing nations, there are bigger micro-economic and geopolitical considerations - i.e. if China's coastal region ends up under water, how will that effect the US trade deficit with China. Big issues down the road, unfortunately many politicians can look past their noses.

Wed, 2006-11-08 15:12 — Ian Forrester

Any word what happened to Barton and Inhofe? Were they up for re-election? Ian Forrester

Wed, 2006-11-08 15:41 — Stephen Berg

Barton won back his congressional seat, sadly.  Inhofe was not up for election.

If Webb (hopefully) holds on in Virginia, Inhofe's days running his senate committee are over.  The Democrats would install a much better and more rational senator to chair the committee.

Inhofe would lose any extra powers he held and wouldn't be able to make a joke or a mockery over the committee by calling science fiction writers and people with short peer-reviewed publication histories and wingnuts like Steve Milloy to testify.

The time to make progress on this most urgent matter is now!

Wed, 2006-11-08 16:44 — RougePierre

Sadly it takes the racist comments of a Virginia senator to see inhofe get the boot as chair:
http://www.desmogblog.com/thank-the-macaca-for-inhofes-undoing