At Netroots Nation, the annual liberal blogger conference, organizations, candidates, and of course bloggers get together to talk. It's informal. North Carolina's Rep. Brad Miller, among several electeds at the conference, was sporting jeans by Friday.
The focus among the environmental folks, not surprisingly, is climate change. The enviros here have qualms with the Waxman-Markey bill, but most are in the mindset of trying to get a Senate bill passed.
Speaking on a panel Friday, Rep. Jay Inslee, of Washington, expressed some optimism. He said that he, along with fellow Energy and Commerce Committee members Markey and Boucher, had met with a group of 14 "moderate" Senators, and: "I've never seen this happen before ... There were members of the U.S. Senate actually listening to members of the U.S. House." He said these Senators were, as the saying goes, looking for ways to get to "yes." Rep. Inslee implored attendees to help build the political space for senators to feel comfortable saying "yes."
On the same panel, Adam Siegel lamented how the political dialogue is still about the "costs" of addressing climate change; rarely is the discussion of the savings of addressing climate change, which are, of course, far greater. He criticized Democrats and others who had adopted the talking point that climate change legislation would "cost only a postage stamp per day" for each person, because that implied that there was a net cost.
The enviros here are looking for ways to be effective -- in the face of an opposition onslaught. On Thursday, the news broke (courtesy of Greenpeace) that the American Petroleum Institute would be sponsoring rallies against the climate bill. And when I picked up the local conservative newspaper today to see what they were up to, I ran smack into a friendly Q&A with Marc Morano. Oy.
So what can the enviros of the netroots do? There were perhaps more questions than answers. One initiative is on DailyKos, where a group of users are setting up an "adopt a senator" system, in which individual bloggers will track news about key senators on the climate change bill. And there's already talk about how to counter API's rallies, and document their astroturfy-ness.
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Ben Somberg | August 15, 2009
At Netroots Nation, the annual liberal blogger conference, organizations, candidates, and of course bloggers get together to talk. It’s informal. North Carolina’s Rep. Brad Miller, among several electeds at the conference, was sporting jeans by Friday. The focus among the environmental folks, not surprisingly, is climate change. The enviros here have qualms with the Waxman-Markey […]
Rena Steinzor | August 14, 2009
By now, followers of the controversy over the appointment of Cass Sunstein to serve as Obama Administration “regulatory czar” can do little but shake their heads in astonishment. The controversy over the Harvard professor’s nomination to OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs has taken on a picaresque quality, as one bizarre delay follows another. […]
Sidney A. Shapiro | August 13, 2009
This is one of two posts today by CPR member scholars evaluating NY Gov. David Paterson’s recent executive order on regulations; see also Rebecca Bratspies’ post, “Paterson’s Executive Order: Win for Industry, Loss for Public Health and Safety.” Who knew? With his newly announced plan to require New York departments and agencies to look back […]
Rebecca Bratspies | August 13, 2009
This is one of two posts today by CPR member scholars evaluating NY Gov. David Paterson's recent executive order on regulations; see also Sid Shapiro's post, "New York Governor Channels Ronald Reagan: Governor Paterson’s Flawed Plan to Review Regulations." It is open season on environmental, health, and safety regulations in New York. Last Friday, August […]
Shana Campbell Jones | August 11, 2009
One of the ongoing tensions in environmental law is the conflict between uniformity and flexibility, constancy and change. Many of the environmental successes over the past thirty years derive from uniform standards that are straightforward to administer and enforce. The Clean Water Act’s requirement, for example, that all industrial polluters are obligated to utilize the […]
Holly Doremus | August 11, 2009
This item cross-posted by permission from Legal Planet. When it comes to climate change, lawyers and policymakers (and scientists too) have been guilty of emphasizing greenhouse gas emission reduction, almost to the exclusion of everything else. Adapting to climate change has taken a distant back seat, even as it has become increasingly clear that the […]
Wendy Wagner | August 10, 2009
On Wednesday, the Bipartisan Policy Center’s Science for Policy Project released its report (press release, full report) on the use of science in regulation-making. I was on the panel and thus am a bit biased, but I think the report makes a terrific contribution. It significantly narrows the range of positions that can be credibly […]
Matthew Freeman | August 10, 2009
CPR's Sid Shapiro is interviewed in this week's edition of Living On Earth, the environment-focused public radio show heard in 300 markets around the nation. The subject is David Michaels's nomination to head the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Says Shapiro: "David Michaels has his job cut out for him. I think it's fair […]
Alexandra Klass | August 6, 2009
One of many approaches to combating climate change is “Carbon Capture and Geologic Sequestration” (CCS). It’s a pretty straightforward idea: capture climate-change-causing carbon emissions and lock them up underground, rather than letting them float up into the atmosphere where they would contribute to global warming. The concept may be simple, but the actual engineering of […]