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Candidate Stories
Candidates Agree On Warming, Not Tactics
07/30/2008
Two things are certain about the next U.S. president: He will be a former senator, and he’ll push Congress to pass a cap-and-trade system to limit carbon emissions.
Both Sens. Barack Obama, D-Ill., and John McCain, R-Ariz., have declared global warming to be a serious issue that demands a bold new energy plan to move the nation away from fossil fuels.
They differ on details. Obama leans to big, far-off goals that would restructure the U.S. economy. McCain offers a more modest vision focused on producing more energy in the short term.
Still, both are ambitious.
Both candidates want cap-and-trade programs for carbon emissions. Obama wants emissions levels reduced to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050, while McCain wants them down to "just" 60%-65% below 1990 levels by that time.--Investor’s Business Daily, 7/29/08
Energy issues likely to be on voters’ minds
07/22/2008
Come Nov. 4, people who pay $4 a gallon or more for gas on the way to the polls will likely be thinking of energy issues while in the voting booth.
Many Arizonans will have paid costly bills for summer air-conditioning. Voters in cooler regions will be dreading their natural-gas or heating-oil bills for the winter.
Whoever inherits the White House can anticipate energy to be one of the defining issues of the presidency. The term will be marked by debates over nuclear, coal, natural-gas and solar power, offshore oil drilling, increasing fuel use from China, and the fact that some people don’t think global oil production can meet demand.
The nation, and presumably the president, will have to find a way to negotiate surging energy needs, environmental concerns and soaring prices.--The Arizona Republic, 7/21/08
McCain calls for tax credit to promote electric cars
07/21/2008
John McCain on Friday called for a tax credit to help American consumers buy electrically powered automobiles as part of an effort to decrease the U.S. dependence on foreign oil.
Speaking to General Motors workers after company officials gave him a tour of the design room for the prototype Chevy Volt, the Republican presidential candidate noted that a barrier to the widespread use of electric cars is their exorbitant cost.
"I don’t know if you remember, but the first cell phone cost $1,000," he told a crowd of several hundred workers in a showroom at the GM Technical Center .
"I would support tax credits for Americans who choose to buy the Volt and other automobiles that put us on the track to energy independence," McCain said. He later said the credit would be worth $5,000.--STLtoday.com, 7/19/08
Opeds & Editorials
Making it happen
07/29/2008
Gov. Jim Doyle’s global warming task force has provided lawmakers with a good starting point for meeting the challenge of climate change.
The hard work is done. Now, the harder work begins. Last week, the Governor’s Task Force on Global Warming completed 16 months of labor by voting on a series of measures aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 22% by 2022 and 75% by 2050. Now, it’s up to Gov. Jim Doyle and the Legislature to turn those recommendations into policy. They need to start that work soon.--Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 7/28/08
Gore has a point on addiction to oil
07/23/2008
Al Gore might have hit on something when he put out the call last week for Americans to break their addiction to oil and other fossil fuels within 10 years. That something was that he framed his by-now-familiar warning about global warming in terms of national security and economic survival.
Rising oil prices turned out to be the nexus that tied together three big threats to our way of life, climate change, increased national debt held over seas and petroleum-based foreign policy.
Or as Gore put it: "We’re borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the planet. Every bit of that’s got to change."--The Burlington Free Press, 7/22/08
Current generation must act on global warming
07/22/2008
President Bush, at the meeting in Japan of world leaders on July 9, agreed to a commitment by the world’s major industrialized nations to reduce fossil fuel emissions 50 percent by 2050. This is a welcome acknowledgment that major action is needed here in the United States to, as Bush had said earlier, "… wean ourselves off our dependency on oil."
Dealing with climate change is now no longer a partisan issue. A complete turnaround on climate change and appropriate action by the Bush administration cannot be expected within the few remaining months it will remain in office. It is now up to Congress to take stronger action to bring about reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
Election year politics are no longer a justification for delay.--Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, 7/20/08
Global Warming News
State’s global warming solutions should produce good jobs
08/01/2008
Today is the final day for public comments on the draft plan for implementing AB32, California’s global warming solutions plan, and one area that has still received far less attention than it should is the key role California’s workers must play in restructuring our economy to reduce our carbon footprint. Here are some ideas we should incorporate into the plan:
-- Invest in the California workforce. We need to make sure there is an adequate supply of workers trained in the new technologies of a greener economy. While some green jobs will be in new businesses and new occupations, most green economy jobs are actually variations of traditional occupations in the construction trades, utilities, manufacturing and transportation.--The San Francisco Chronicle, 8/1/08
Climate Change Likely to Cost U.S. Economy Billions
07/31/2008
Climate change will cost the U.S. economy billions every year, starting within a decade and increasing over time. The initial impact of likely new government regulations will be modest—perhaps cutting only a tenth of a percentage point from annual gross domestic growth (GDP) growth. But by 2030, efforts to control climate change will trim about one point per year from growth. That’s slightly more than the economic cost of all environmental regulations combined now. The result will be a price tag that is large but manageable.--Kiplinger Business Resource Center, 7/30/08
Mass. House approves bill to curb greenhouse gases
07/31/2008
House lawmakers raced to approve a pair of bills designed to help slow global warming and increase the number of so-called "green jobs" in Massachusetts.
Approval of the two bills came on the second to last day of the Legislature’s formal session and follows the recent passage of bills designed to increase the use of biofuels and require the state to boost its reliance on renewable energy sources.
The global warming bill would require the state by the year 2020 to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Massachusetts to 20 percent below 1990 levels. By 2050, the goal is to have emissions drop 80 percent below 1990 levels.--The Boston Herald, 7/30/08
Press Releases
Iowa’s Lutheran Churches Going Green
05/12/2008
Re: Climate Change Legislation – Urgent Plea for Enactment of Carbon Fees
05/09/2008
Dear Senators and Representatives:
We are writing to you about the urgent problem of climate change. Each of us has approximately two decades of public-sector experience in environmental enforcement.1 In addition, Allan has substantial experience with cap-and-trade programs. The purpose of this letter is to communicate the bases for our opinion that attempting to address climate change through a cap-and-trade approach alone (as is currently contemplated in most of the major bills before Congress) is an inefficient and ineffective strategy to address the most pressing problem of our time. We believe that failure by the United States to enact meaningful and escalating carbon fess in the near future will result in an unacceptable risk of devastating and irreversible global climate change. Even if you have doubts concerning the time-frame remaining for effective action, please join us in insisting on a strategy that will effectively address this unacceptable threat to our children’s future.--Laurie Williams & Allan Zabel
Iowa sportsmen want global warming leadership
11/01/2007
Newsletters
Debate Shifts On Global Warming
04/11/2007
A former presidential candidate and a potential presidential candidate from opposite ends of the political spectrum met to debate global warming this week, but unlike past events, this marked a noticeable shift in the debate on global warming.
New Hampshire Voters send strong message on Global Warming
03/27/2007
As the nation's warmest winter on record draws to a close, Granite State voters are demonstrating that global warming is a top priority for New Hampshire.
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