Climate Politics
All Stories
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Tennessee rep accuses Gore of trying to profit from climate bill
One of the more, uh, interesting moments from Friday’s climate hearings in the House was this exchange between Al Gore and Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), who suggested that Gore would profit from a cap-and-trade bill. Here’s the video, via TPM, and a transcription follows: Blackburn: I think it’s really important that no suspicion or shadow […]
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Interest groups pile on with suggested changes to House climate bill
The third day of climate hearings in the House made it clear that even representatives and interest groups that nominally support the principles of the Markey-Waxman bill have a laundry list of changes they’d like to see made to the bill before they’ll back it. Thursday’s hearings brought 26 new witnesses before the Energy and […]
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Finding consensus on climate policy
Originally posted at the Breakthrough Institute. For advocates of immediate and strong climate and clean energy legislation, there’s one man we should all be paying close attention to: Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio). Senator Brown is one of several Democratic Senators from America’s “Heartland” states that form the critical swing block of legislators that will need […]
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Progressive coalition spends $250,000 on ads for a green energy bill
A coalition of labor, environmental, and progressive groups is putting up a quarter of a million dollars for a TV ad campaign promoting national clean-energy and climate legislation. The ad (watch it below), which will air on national cable and prime-time network TV for at least the next week, calls on Congress to pass an […]
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Obama’s Clean Energy Service Corps will train people for green jobs–eventually
He’s ready — put him to work.President Barack Obama created a new Clean Energy Service Corps on Tuesday as part of a landmark national service bill he signed into law. That could be good news for young Americans wanting to get a foot in the door of the clean energy industry — but they’ll have […]
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Rep. Shimkus says climate bill is worse than two wars and terrorist attack
Via ThinkProgress, here’s video of Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) claiming at Wednesday’s House hearing that the Waxman-Markey climate bill is “largest assault on democracy and freedom in this country that I’ve ever experienced. I’ve lived through some tough times in Congress — impeachment, two wars, terrorist attacks. I fear this more than all of the […]
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Joe Barton tries to stump Steven Chu with question about where oil comes from
Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), a climate skeptic with some wacky theories of his own, tried to stump Energy Secretary Steven Chu at Wednesday’s climate-bill hearing by asking, “How did all the oil and gas get to Alaska and under the Arctic Ocean?” Later, Barton bragged via Twitter, “I seemed [sic] to have baffled the Energy […]
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Energy boss Steven Chu misses his bike
I’m a fierce carbon tax advocate, as Grist readers know. But what most upset me about the interview with Stephen Chu in last Sunday’s New York Times magazine wasn’t the energy secretary’s disavowal of an Obama carbon tax: Q: Many environmentalists believe that a permanent carbon tax would be the most efficient means of spurring […]
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The Goldman Prize: True tales of bravery
The 2009 winners of the Goldman Environmental Prize. Standing, L-R: Yuyun Ismawati, Olga Speranskaya, Wanze Eduards, and Maria Gunnoe. Front row, L-R: Rizwana Hasan, Marc Ona Essangui, and Hugo Jabini By rights it should be a daunting moment. Every fall a courier turns up at my door with a package containing a thick, densely typed […]
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McCain rails against Obama cap-and-trade plan
Sen. John McCain says he’s still a proud proponent of using a cap-and-trade system to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, but he’s not going to back President Barack Obama’s climate agenda any time soon. McCain, coauthor of multiple cap-and-trade bills in the past, addressed an energy symposium sponsored by the Reform Institute on Tuesday. In his remarks, […]
