Cap and Trade is dead
Posted by Bill Dupray
on Sep 22 2009 Filed under Politics.
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Yep. We are calling the ballgame. Way too many Senate Democrats have irreconcilable concerns about the bill, and after the bête noire of this summer’s townhalls, and the attendant beatings their House colleagues took over their votes for it, along with the looming midterm elections next year, the Democrats have no stomach for this fight.
Just for openers, Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown said there aren’t even 50 votes yet, let alone 60.
Climate change legislation won’t even get 50 votes in the Senate if possible harms to manufacturers in the bill aren’t addressed, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said Tuesday.
Temporary assistance will be needed to prevent American manufacturing jobs from relocating to India and China in order to address Rust Belt lawmakers’ concerns about the climate bill, Brown said in a conference call organized by the liberal Campaign for America’s Future.
“I don’t think there’s any way we get to even 50 votes if we don’t deal with manufacturing in the climate change bill,” Brown told reporters. “I do know for sure that there are a number of us who understand that manufacturing is so important to this country that if we don’t do manufacturing right, our standard of living will continue to decline. . . .
Among lawmakers’ concerns is a sense that climate legislation in the U.S. would provide manufacturers with an incentive to relocate production overseas, where not only would they enjoy lower labor costs, they would also face far less stringent environmental regulations.
That last concern, about jobs going overseas, is called the law supply and demand, which, like the law of gravity, cannot be changed by liberal wishful thinking. So how many Democrats want to sign on to that job-killer in this recession? Also, the unions and the liberal base were not all that thrilled with NAFTA, which at least had the upside of benefitting American companies. This monstrosity will costs jobs and hurt companies.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.Nev), suggested last week that the whole thing will probably have to wait until 2010, which, of course is a euphemism for “the thing is dead.” After all, do the Democrats think it will be easier to pass a huge, job-killing tax in an election year, especially when Reid, Dodd, and a slew of other endangered Democrats will be fighting for their political lives?
Then there were those 10 Senate Democrats who wrote a letter to Obama last month explaining to him what he already knows; that the Cap and Trade bill would dramatically increase energy costs (I think the president himself would say ‘increase’ is too mild – ‘skyrocket‘ is his preferred term) and damage U.S. manufacturing.
Therefore it is essential that any clean energy legislation not only address the crisis of climate change, but include strong provisions to ensure the strength and viability of domestic manufacturing. Further, any climate change legislation must prevent the export of jobs and related greenhouse gas emissions to countries that fail to take actions to combat the threat of global warming comparable to those taken by the United States.
Of course China and India have no intentions of ‘taking steps to combat the threat of global warming’ especially steps ‘comparable to those taken by the United States.’ The Senate Democrats have therefore informed Obama that his next big project just went up in smoke.
The thing is dead. It won’t be missed.
Related Posts
- Exclusive: House sources say “very good” chance Cap and Trade dead
- Inhofe: Dems Should Celebrate Now Because Cap and Trade is Dead in the Senate
- Maybe we can fool people if we just don’t call it ‘Cap and Trade’ anymore
- DISCLOSE dead in the Senate?
- Wow: Treasury says Cap and Trade to cost $100-200 Billion in new taxes
Short URL: http://libertypundits.net/?p=6784
A job killer and a company killer – that fits in with Czar Holdren plan to lower the GDP of America and redisttributing wealth to other countries.
Federal Cap and Trade legislation should have died long ago for the following reason. Given that the federal Constitution is silent about things like Cap and Trade, the 10th A. automatically reserves government power to regulate and lay taxes for such things to the states, not the Oval Office and Congress. So federal Cap and Trade is illegal under the Constitution.
Sadly, just because a federal bill isn’t authorized by the Constitution doesn’t stop the corrupt Congress from making such legislation these days. Obama’s Stimulus Package, for example, is based on constitutionally nonexistent federal government powers.
Note that when the federal Congress wants to regulate and tax something not listed in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, Article V of the Constitution requires Congress to request that the states grant such power to the federal government via amendment of the federal Constitution by the states. And the states can always refuse the federal Congress’s request for a given power.
So consider that not only is Obama’s Stimulus Package unconstitutional, but the corrupt federal Congress never even asked the states to be granted such power in compliance with Article V.
But the real problem isn’t the corrupt, state sovereignty-ignoring Congress, IMO. The real problem is that constitutionally ignorant voters are keeping federal congressional seats filled with “leaders” who as ignorant of state sovereignty as the voters are. So nobody inside or outside the Congress is protecting state sovereignty from the power-hungry, tax hungry federal government anymore. And the crook “leaders” now running Congress probably wouldn’t respect state sovereignty even if they knew about it.
In fact, the following links show two representatives and a senator, all Democrats, who evidently either don’t understand constitutional limits on federal government powers or have no respect for state sovereignty.
http://www.tenthamendmentcenter.com/2009/09/17/pelosis-misleading-statement-on-the-constitutionality-of-government-health-care/
http://www.freedomslighthouse.com/2009/08/democrat-congresswoman-justifies-obama.html
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/53580
Finally, the following link should help people get up to speed as to how voters have shot themselves in the foot with big, corrupt federal government as a consequence of the ill-conceived, anti-state sovereignty 16th and 17th Amendments.
http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=199792
Lord I hope so, but want to see it stabbed some more – just to be sure.
Bill, I trust you know of what you speak, but it’s hard to be as optimistic as you. You do make is easier to hope with this post. Thanks.
No surprise. Clinton’s BTU tax met the same fate. This will kill healthcare “reform” as the money from Cap and Trade was to be used to fund this program.
Hey darlin’, the word ‘Republican’ doesn’t appear in the post. This is blue on blue (or red on red, if you prefer). The Dems are going to kill this thing. This doesn’t mean that some energy tax or B.S. ‘green’ legislation isn’t going to pass. But this huge takeover of American business, as it is currently written, is going nowhere. I firmly believe that.
If it makes you feel better, this piece from Congressional Quarterly says that the chances that Cap and Trade will pass are “hovering around zero.” As Ed Morrissey says, it’s a nice palate cleanser.
Thank you, Bill.