Wheres The Real Global Warming Debate for 2008?
by Steve There was a rustle of media coverage yesterday when Barack Obama made a speech about global warming, wherein he claimed once again that he was taking a bold leadership position on the issue as compared to his Democratic rivals, namely Hillary. What Obama didn’t bother to mention however is that he cosponsors the same two cap-and-trade bills in the Senate (Lieberman/McCain’s S. 280, and Sanders/Boxer’s S. 309) that Hillary does, and that both he and Hillary now support the more ambitious reduction targets called for in S. 309 to reduce emission levels 80% below 1990 levels by 2050. (And when he talks about the timidity of other politicians in dealing with our energy dependency problem, he neglects to mention that he voted for the last Bush energy bill.) The major differences between their positions are his commitment to specific CAFE standard increases, and his call for a $150 billion Apollo-style initiative to develop energy independence versus Hillary’s call for “only” a $50
