Hill Heat

On Saturday, May 31st, Senator Boxer gave the Democratic Radio Address on this week’s upcoming debate on the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act (S. 3036).

Right now, many of our states, including my home state, are leading. They have the will. Our mayors are leading. They have the will. Religious leaders have urged us to act now as well. They reminded me of a wonderful quote that motivates me to work as hard as I can for as long as it takes to responsibly address global warming. These words stay with me: “When God created the first man, he took him around to all the trees in the Garden of Eden and said to him ‘see my handiwork, how beautiful and choice they are. Be careful not to ruin and destroy my world, for if you do ruin it, there is no one to repair it after you.’”

The full text of the address is below.

The conservative Club for Growth has launched a $250,000 radio and television campaign targeting several coal-state senators in opposition to the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act (S. 2191/3036). The Environmental Defense Action Fund, the C(4) side of the Environmental Defense Fund, has also begun a much larger $4 million campaign that comes on top of the estimated $8.5 million already spent this year in support of the cap-and-trade legislation.

The text of the Club for Growth ad running in Tennessee:

Congress is at it again. This time they’re pushing massive new taxes and regulation in the name of global warming. But let’s ask ourselves, are the unproven benefits of legislation worth the major job losses, new taxes and increased energy costs that could result?

Call Senator Lamar Alexander and tell him to vote “no” on the Lieberman-Warner climate bill. Tennesseans just can’t afford another huge, costly government program.

On Wednesday, Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) announced her support for S. 3036, saying it “mirrors closely” the Kerry-Snowe Global Reduction Act (S. 485), which calls for a 65 percent reduction from 2000 levels of greenhouse gases by 2050. Snowe also noted that language from the Feinstein-Snowe Emission Allowance Market Transparency Act (S. 2423) was included in the manager’s mark.

Unlike Lieberman-Warner, Kerry-Snowe also sets a goal of achieving a greenhouse gas stabilization target of 450 ppm, and calls for the establishment of vehicle emissions standards. In Snowe’s press release, she states that Lieberman-Warner “would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 66 percent by 2050,” although NRDC analysis of the bill finds that Lieberman-Warner would only achieve reductions between 60 to 65 percent from 2000 levels.

On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) introduced Sen. Barbara Boxer’s (D-Calif.) manager’s mark of the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act (S. 2191) as a new bill, numbered S. 3036. S. 3036 will be the vehicle for the floor debate of the cap-and-trade legislation. On Thursday, Reid filed for cloture on a motion to proceed onto the bill, setting the stage for a 5:30 p.m. vote on June 2, one week from Monday. According to E&E News, “Few expect the vote to be contentious.”

“It may even end up being 99-0,” said Andrew Wheeler, staff director for Senate Environment and Public Works Committee ranking member James Inhofe (R-Okla.). Inhofe plans to back this procedural step as a gateway to a bigger debate over the merits of the legislation, Wheeler said.

Reid, Boxer, and the bill’s co-sponsors, Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and John Warner (R-Va.), have not determined what terms they will seek for the debate and amendment process. Reid has the option of exerting privilege to block unwanted amendments by “filling the tree” with his own.