House Likely To Vote On Key Climate Change Bill This Week
After seeing it through a number of inter- and intraparty obstacles, House leaders will soon bring the Waxman-Markey climate change bill up for a vote--perhaps as early as Friday.
"There are some issues still under discussion, but we are confident we can resolve them by the time the bill goes to the floor on Friday," Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill told Bloomberg's Simon Lomax.
If it passes, the bill--which would create a cap and trade system to price and reduce carbon emissions--may have to wait quite a while before further action as lawmakers scramble to pass major health care legislation before taking a month-long recess in August.
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I guess they think they have the votes. This is a pretty big deal and one of Obama's big campaign pledges.
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Regardless, if I remember correctly from the early discussions. This wouldn't really start to take affect fully for a few more years.
June 23, 2009 10:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
It would still have to pass the Senate, but nonetheless, it's a big step.
June 23, 2009 12:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
The climate bill even in the House -- which I just heard Al Gore on a "conference call" (ie pep talk to sign up as a local volunteer, w/no listener questions) praise to the heavens -- is so watered down and hitched to a deeply flawed cap-and-trade system that at least the cap-and-trade part (many parts of the bill are ameliorative) may be worse than nothing at all. What is most essential is that the bill have provisions to make the standards stricter if need be, and otherwise not lock the system into an inadequate approach.
In the Senate, where there is a filibuster by the GOP (and allies) looming, the bill (if it passes at all) is going to be watered down even further.
At this point, I would rather see the positive and not deeply controversial parts of the bill passed through both houses this year, and then next year use the reconciliation process (for this year on health care) to pass a stronger bill, AFTER THERE HAVE BEEN EXTENSIVE PUBLIC AND TELEVISED HEARINGS IN CONGRESS W/PUBLICITY ON THE ORDER OF MAGNITUDE AS WAS DEVOTED TO THE HATE-FEST "GAYS IN THE MILITARY" CIRCUS OF 1993
June 23, 2009 11:25 PM | Reply | Permalink