Waxman & Peterson have come to a deal on the climate change bill. According to CQ, "In general, the deal favors the farm industry over the wishes of environmental groups." I'm so shocked. Here's a quote from Bill Maher's last show that basically sums up how I feel about this:
Now, people talk a lot about a third political party in America. We don't need a third party, we need a first party. You go to the polls and your choices are the guy who voted for the first Wall Street bail out or the guy who voted for the next ten. This week we're hearing that a public option for health care is unlikely because it doesn't have the support of enough Democrats. Even Ted Kennedy's plan - Ted Kennedy, yeah - leaves 37 million uninsured. This is because we don't have a left and a right party in this country anymore - we have a center right party and a crazy party. And over the last thirty-odd years, Democrats have moved to the right, and the right has moved into a mental hospital.
So what we have is one perfectly good party for hedge fund managers, credit card companies, banks, defense contractors, big agriculture, and the pharmaceutical lobby - that's the Democrats. And they sit across the aisle from a small group of religious lunatics, flat earthers, and Civil War re-enacters who mostly communicate by AM radio and call themselves the Republicans - and who actually worry that Obama is a socialist. Socialist? He's not even a liberal! I know he's not, because he's on TV, and while I see Democrats on television, I don't see actual liberals. And if occasionally you get to hear Ralph Nader or Noam Chomsky or Dennis Kucinich, they are treated like buffoons. OK, these are not three of the world's most charismatic men, but then nobody's going to confuse Newt Gingrich for Zac Efron and I have to look at his fat face on TV more often than that free credit report song.
Shouldn't there be ONE party that unambiguously supports cutting the military budget, a party that is straight up in favor of gun control, gay marriage, higher taxes on the rich, universal health care, legalizing pot, and steep, direct, taxing of polluters. These aren't radical ideas. A majority of Americans are either already for them or would be if they were properly argued and defended. And what we need is an actual progressive party to represent the millions of Americans who aren't being served by the Democrats - because bottom line: Democrats are the new Republicans.
About the steep, direct taxing of polluters... wanna know why we are going for this cap and trade nonsense? Because of Wall Street. They see an opportunity to make money on this by creating a new market for carbon. And because you can easily water down a cap and trade system by giving out free credits to pollute or allowing easy ways to get allowances for sequestering carbon. You know, we aren't working towards fixing the problem if we're rewarding people for sequestering carbon that was going to be sequestered anyway.
Here's what CQ has to say about the Waxman-Peterson deal:
Their agreement would put the Department of Agriculture, rather than the EPA, in charge of special projects to reduce emissions in rural areas - for example, by planting trees on farmland.
"We will seek guidance from the administration to figure out the appropriate role for the EPA," Waxman said.
They will also add language to halt an EPA proposal, disliked by farm groups, to measure the greenhouse gas emissions that might indirectly result if more farmland is used for growing biofuel stock. They said the proposal would be on hold for five years pending a scientific study and consultation with federal agencies and Congress.
Both changes are likely to anger environmental groups, who say that EPA has superior expertise in these areas. But, Waxman said, "I think we will hold the environmentalists."
Bottom line: The American people are getting screwed on this one. And I need somebody smarter than me to analyze whether or not this lousy bill is actually better than the status quo and thus worth our support, or if it's just going to institutionalize legal polluting in the name of combating global warming. I think it's disgusting that this is the situation we're in and that the rich assholes who control our country are seriously more interested in short term profits over the longterm survival of the human race. |
