Thursday, May 13, 2010

Senate Completes Climate Tax and Corporatist Energy Bill

Senate Gets a Climate and Energy Bill, Modified by a Gulf Spill That Still Grows; The New York Times


Stephen Crowley/The New York Times



The long delayed and much amended Senate plan to deal with global warming and energy was unveiled on Wednesday to considerable fanfare but uncertain prospects. After nearly eight months of negotiations with lawmakers and interest groups, Senators John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut, produced a 987-page bill that tries to limit climate-altering emissions, reduce oil imports and create millions of new energy-related jobs.

Mr. Kerry said the United States was crippled by a broken energy policy and falling behind in the global race for leadership in clean-energy technology.

“We’re threatened by the impacts of a changing climate,” he said in a packed Senate hearing room. “And right now, as one of the worst oil spills in our nation’s history washes onto our shores, no one can doubt how urgently we need a new energy policy in this country. Now is the time to take action.”

It may be difficult, however, for him to persuade the Senate to act. The country is nervously watching efforts to halt the gulf spill, the Senate is torn by deep partisan hostility and the public is uncertain whether the benefits of combating global warming are worth the costs. There is also no assurance that the bill will break through the crowded Senate calendar to reach the floor this year.

No Republicans have stepped forward to support the two senators’ efforts. ...

Here's the truth behind the bill:

There is no economywide cap-and-trade system like that in the House measure, but electric utilities will face limits on their greenhouse-gas emissions and a market will be established to allow them to trade pollution permits. The leader of the main utility industry trade group, Thomas R. Kuhn of the Edison Electric Institute, stood with Mr. Kerry and Mr. Lieberman on Wednesday and endorsed their bill.

The oil industry will have to buy emissions permits, based loosely on the price set in the utility-trading markets. It is expected they will pass along added costs to consumers in the form of higher fuel prices. The American Petroleum Institute said it was withholding judgment until the measure’s effects on the oil and gas industry could be analyzed. Some oil companies, however, including BP and ConocoPhillips, have indicated their support.





Comment: Lieberman, Kerry and Graham have completed what will be a massive new tax on the American people, which will surely kill any economic viability we have remaining and opened the door for a corporatist/fascist consolidation of the energy industry.

When will the states and the American people wake up to this delirium fostered by these "mini" presidents at the behest of globalists?

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