As if we could forget.
Posted on 11/03/2009 8:09:01 AM PST by La Lydia
Republicans followed through this morning on their threat to boycott a Senate committee's work this week on a sweeping climate change bill. The only one to show up, AP reports, was George Voinovich of Ohio, the ranking Republican on the environment committee, and he only attended to explain why the GOP is staying away. He said the tactic "is not a ruse" to block the bill, but reflects concern that the full economic impact of the bill has not been studied or made clear.
Many Republicans deride the cap-and-trade system at the heart of the legislation's heart as a job killer and energy tax hike. And a high-profile Republicans whom Democrats had hoped would cross the aisle -- Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who co-authored an op-ed on climate change with Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, a lead sponsor of the bill -- are now vocally opposed.
That dims the prospects of the Senate passing a bill. The Democratic-controlled House passed its version in June. President Obama's grassroots group sent an email to supporters whose senators sit on the environment committee urging them to contact their lawmakers...
Kerry on Monday called for Republicans to stay engaged...
In a statement, Kerry said, "We should remember that the GOP’s 2008 presidential nominee called for strong, mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions as part of his campaign, and Sen. Lindsey Graham has joined us in this year’s fight. Chairman Boxer is determined to see this Congress pass a strong climate bill for the President to sign. I’d urge everyone to come back to the table, reengage, and work together to move the process forward. ”
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
This is good by the GOP. The Dems want some Repubs to sign on for cover because people are against this crap.
Those are some of the most insidious words someone from Washington can utter.
“Many Republicans deride the cap-and-trade...”
CAP AND TAX
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Could be they are hearing the roar in the background. We need to roar louder!
Only female Republicans “have a set” (Lindsay Graham excluded).
This is GOP posturing for its base. One by one I expect the usual suspects to capitulate as this bill proceeds.
Any Republican who goes along with this huge tax increase and deeply flawed policy initiative is nuts. Every time people buy gasoline or pay their utility bills, they will be cursing the bastards who enacted this bill. I think it might even provide a boost to the lagging bumper sticker industry. The Republicans have their finger to the wind and know this is not going to end well. Blame will be assigned. I think, cynically, they are more in butt-covering mode than standing on principle mode, but at this point I don’t care. “You don’t need a weather man to tell which way the wind blows.”
See post 8.
Quick send the EPA to test the Republicans water some testosterone must have gotten into it, because they seem to be growing a pair!
What a bunch of RINOs!!!!!!
So far, there is no evidence of this.
It is pretty pitiful when people insist on attacking Republicans even when they do the right thing? Tell me, how do these unwarranted attacks help our side?
The bill cannot proceed unless 2 Republicans show up for the mark-up. They did not. Good for them. We need to support them 100% so they stand tough.
Sadly, in the Potomac watershed, it is the male fish who are growing ovaries. And I am not making that up.
They may be RINOs, but in this case they are going the right thing.
What good would it do to have the cleanest air in the world, if China and India are still super polluters? Cap and Crap is CRAZY
So you are saying if Beltway insiders did what I’ve been telling them to do all these years they many start self replicating? OH THE HORROR!!!!!!
“...Sen. Lindsey Graham has joined us in this year’s fight”
This is the damage Republican collaborators do by making opposition seem unreasonable.
Republicans are smart to let democrats own whatever 100% of the damage they do.
Wow, they are not totally deaf. I’m surprised.
The GOP should very loudly remind the democrats that they were on vacation when republicans stood in a darkened house of representatives calling for democrats to return and deal with energy legislation when gas prices were over $4 a gallon.
Kinda funny that the democrats refused to show up to try to bring energy prices down and now are angry that the GOP won’t help drive them up.
Washingtonian Republicans don't want to be "23 skidoo-ed." They don't want to end up like Dede.
See AlGore’s bank account for the results.
Gore’s Dual Role in Spotlight: Advocate and Investor
By JOHN M. BRODER
Published: November 2, 2009
WASHINGTON — Former Vice President Al Gore thought he had spotted a winner last year when a small California firm sought financing for an energy-saving technology from the venture capital firm where Mr. Gore is a partner.
The company, Silver Spring Networks, produces hardware and software to make the electricity grid more efficient. It came to Mr. Gore’s firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, one of Silicon Valley’s top venture capital providers, looking for $75 million to expand its partnerships with utilities seeking to install millions of so-called smart meters in homes and businesses.
Mr. Gore and his partners decided to back the company, and in gratitude Silver Spring retained him and John Doerr, another Kleiner Perkins partner, as unpaid corporate advisers.
The deal appeared to pay off in a big way last week, when the Energy Department announced $3.4 billion in smart grid grants. Of the total, more than $560 million went to utilities with which Silver Spring has contracts. Kleiner Perkins and its partners, including Mr. Gore, could recoup their investment many times over in coming years.
Silver Spring Networks is a foot soldier in the global green energy revolution Mr. Gore hopes to lead. Few people have been as vocal about the urgency of global warming and the need to reinvent the way the world produces and consumes energy. And few have put as much money behind their advocacy as Mr. Gore and are as well positioned to profit from this green transformation, if and when it comes.
Critics, mostly on the political right and among global warming skeptics, say Mr. Gore is poised to become the world’s first “carbon billionaire,” profiteering from government policies he supports that would direct billions of dollars to the business ventures he has invested in.
Representative Marsha Blackburn, Republican of Tennessee, asserted at a hearing this year that Mr. Gore stood to benefit personally from the energy and climate policies he was urging Congress to adopt.
Mr. Gore says that he is simply putting his money where his mouth is.
“Do you think there is something wrong with being active in business in this country?” Mr. Gore said. “I am proud of it. I am proud of it.”
In an e-mail message this week, he said his investment activities were consistent with his public advocacy over decades.
“I have advocated policies to promote renewable energy and accelerate reductions in global warming pollution for decades, including all of the time I was in public service,” Mr. Gore wrote. “As a private citizen, I have continued to advocate the same policies. Even though the vast majority of my business career has been in areas that do not involve renewable energy or global warming pollution reductions, I absolutely believe in investing in ways that are consistent with my values and beliefs. I encourage others to invest in the same way.”
Mr. Gore has invested a significant portion of the tens of millions of dollars he has earned since leaving government in 2001 in a broad array of environmentally friendly energy and technology business ventures, like carbon trading markets, solar cells and waterless urinals.
He has also given away millions more to finance the nonprofit he founded, the Alliance for Climate Protection, and to another group, the Climate Project, which trains people to present the slide show that was the basis of his documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” Royalties from his new book on climate change, “Our Choice,” printed on 100 percent recycled paper, will go to the alliance, an aide said.
*****Other public figures, like Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who have vocally supported government financing of energy-saving technologies, have investments in alternative energy ventures. Some scientists and policy advocates also promote energy policies that personally enrich them.*****
As a private citizen, Mr. Gore does not have to disclose his income or assets, as he did in his years in Congress and the White House. When he left government in early 2001, he listed assets of less than $2 million, including homes in suburban Washington and in Tennessee.
Since then, his net worth has skyrocketed, helped by timely investments in Apple and Google, profits from books and his movie, and scores of speeches for which he can be paid more than $100,000, although he often speaks at no charge.
He is a founder of Generation Investment Management, based in London and run by David Blood, a former head of Goldman Sachs Asset Management (the firm was quickly dubbed Blood and Gore). Mr. Gore earns a partner’s salary at Kleiner Perkins. He has substantial personal finances invested at both firms, officials of the companies said.
He also serves as an adviser to high-profile technology companies including Apple and Google, relationships that have paid him handsome dividends over the last eight years.
Mr. Gore’s spokeswoman would not give a figure for his current net worth, but the scale of his wealth is evident in a single investment of $35 million in Capricorn Investment Group, a private equity fund started by his friend Jeffrey Skoll, the first president of eBay.
Ion Yadigaroglu, a co-founder of Capricorn, said that Mr. Gore does not sit on the fund’s investment committee, but obviously agrees with the partners’ strategy of putting long-term money into promising ventures in energy, technology and health care around the globe.
“Aspirationally,” said Mr. Yadigaroglu, who holds a doctorate from Stanford in astrophysics, “we’re trying to make more money than others doing the same thing and do it in a way that is superior in ethics and impacts.”
Mr. Gore has said he invested in partnerships and funds that try to identify and support companies that are advancing cutting-edge green technologies and are paving the way toward a low-carbon economy.
He has a stake in the world’s pre-eminent carbon credit trading market and in an array of companies in bio-fuels, sustainable fish farming, electric vehicles and solar power.
Capricorn holds a major stake in Falcon Waterfree Technologies, the world’s leading maker of waterless urinals. Generation has holdings in Ausra, a solar energy company based in California, and Camco, a British firm that develops carbon dioxide emissions reduction projects. Kleiner Perkins has a green ventures fund with nearly $1 billion invested in renewable energy and efficiency concerns.
Mr. Gore also has substantial interests in technology, media and biotechnology ventures that have no direct tie to his environmental advocacy, an aide said.
Mr. Gore is not a lobbyist, and he has never asked Congress or the administration for an earmark or policy decision that would directly benefit one of his investments. But he has been a tireless advocate for policies that would move the country away from the use of coal and oil, and he has begun a $300 million campaign to end the use of fossil fuels in electricity production in 10 years.
But Marc Morano, a climate change skeptic who until recently was a top aide to Senator James M. Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, said that what he saw as Mr. Gore’s alarmism and occasional exaggerations distorted the debate and also served his personal financial interests.
Mr. Gore has testified numerous times in support of legislation to address climate change and to revamp the nation’s energy policies.
He appeared before the House Energy and Commerce Committee in April to support an energy and climate change bill that was intended to reduce global warming emissions through a cap-and-trade program for major polluting industries.
Mr. Gore, who shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his climate advocacy, is generally received on Capitol Hill as something of an oracle, at least by Democrats.
But at the hearing in April, he was challenged by Ms. Blackburn, who echoed some of the criticism of Mr. Gore that has swirled in conservative blogs and radio talk shows. She noted that Mr. Gore is a partner at Kleiner Perkins, which has hundreds of millions of dollars invested in firms that could benefit from any legislation that limits carbon dioxide emissions.
“I believe that the transition to a green economy is good for our economy and good for all of us, and I have invested in it,” Mr. Gore said, adding that he had put “every penny” he has made from his investments into the Alliance for Climate Protection.
“And, Congresswoman,” he added, “if you believe that the reason I have been working on this issue for 30 years is because of greed, you don’t know me.”
I hate it, but I agree with you. That’s how it usually winds up.
A good reason to stoke up the flames by attending Thursday on the Capital Steps with Michele Bachman! High Noon!
I did not attack them. I just gave an opinion based on previous experience. I hope you are right but the GOP has made me cynical and suspicious of almost anything they do.
I can understand why, but we need to support them when they are fighting for our side. When they are wrong, we should call them out on it LOUDLY!
Lindsay Graham need to go.
Absolutely right.
As if we could forget.
Yup.
“The only one to show up, AP reports, was George Voinovich of Ohio,
the ranking Republican on the environment committee, and he only attended
to explain why the GOP is staying away. He said the tactic
“is not a ruse” to block the bill, but reflects concern that
the full economic impact of the bill has not been studied or made clear.”
Weird.
A momentary lapse of RINO mentality by Voinovich.
Maybe some blood clots in his brain have started to dissolve.
(but I’ll reserve judgement until I see more of the same from
the Senator)
LOL! Someone should write a ditty about Dede the DIABLO.
I need to see if there is any old songs about Diablo.
So, it really doesn’t matter what they do, they get no credit from you.
Don’t forget how the Texas Democrats actually got on planes and left the state in ‘03 to keep the Republicans from taking a vote.
The RATs know clearly what the impact will be.
It's time the Republicans stand with the Conservatives! We've already tried it their way
and look at the results.
“Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who co-authored an op-ed on climate change with Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, a lead sponsor of the bill — are NOW vocally opposed. Gimmie a break. These clowns have to go.
Growing a pair, or not. HA! NOT.
Repub senators have been against cap and trade for some time now.
In the middle of things. Did you attend any of the Senate hearings in July, in which the Republicans made snuffling noises, issued “statements,” asked questions — but participated as if the Dems were going to listen to anything they said? Of course Republicans have been “against” cap and tax for some time now. Today, they began to do something about it. They dropped all the BS “collegiality” stuff and began playing ball.
Now that Ozero is lower in the polls it's getting easier to "play ball" as you put it. But those who pay attention know they have been almost lock-step against cap and trade the whole time.
Repubs are making headway. McConnell et al are working behind the scenes to block things like the closing of Guantanamo with nary a thank you from the haters on the right. And he/they will continue to make progress. Thank God for the good guys.
I’m SURE there is a special corner in he77 reserved for spammers.
“I’m SURE there is a special corner in he77 reserved for spammers.”
Hopefully it will be right next to the dimwits who keep calling CAP and TAX Cap and Trade - the Dimocrats’ perverse description of an economy killing bill istead of what it is CAP AND TAX ...CAP AND TAX, not Cap and Trade...that’s like calling abortion clinics Family Planning Centers...
You are really dense. Buy a brain cell so you have two.
“You are really dense. Buy a brain cell so you have two.”
Can’t afford it...spent it all on precious bandwidth...
Thankfully, we will not have a Scozzafava in Congress to switch parties next year after the republicans spend millions to elect her. When will the stupid party leaders in DC learn that when they support people like Jeffords, Spector, Chafee and others too numerous to mention in the more distant past, they are merely played for fools. Of course, they are fools.
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