As we all know by now, the Democrats rammed-through a radical tax increase and big government power-grab under the guise of a "climate change" bill in the House of Representatives this week in a very close vote, 219-212... with little debate, without legislators even reading it... and while quarantining the GOP from any meaningful input whatsoever. Any foolhardy individuals who still believe Obama's threadbare "bipartisanship" spiel ought to have their head examined.
The complex bill, which totaled about 1,200 pages, would require the U.S. to reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions by 17% from 2005 levels by 2020, and by 83% by 2050. To add insult to injury, sponsor Henry Waxman (D-Cal) snuck-in a 300-page "ammendment" at 3am the night before the vote.
As reported by The Hill, GOP Congressional Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) had a few choice words about Pelosi and Obama's climate-change bill after its passage. Boehner truly rose to the occasion on Friday, doing his level best to bring some legislators to their senses... whilst shedding some sorely-needed light upon just what Obama and Pelosi are foisting on us. Later, when asked why he read portions of the cap-and-trade bill on the floor Friday night in an innovative mini-filibuster, Boehner told The Hill, "Hey, people deserve to know what's in this pile of shit."
When fish-faced sponsor Waxman attempted to put a stop to the exposure of this mystery legislation -then on the verge of being voted upon- he got smacked-down hard by Boehner, to much Republican applause:
And while the margin was indeed narrow, the Democrats likely could have passed it without the eight RINO votes they garnered in the event. The problem is that for every GOP sellout, Pelosi was able to free one 2010-vulnerable Democrat to vote against the bill. These Republicans should have at least forced her to get it passed on her own- it will be interesting to see what earmarks they received in return.
Michelle Malkin has an excellent summary today on those who broke Republican ranks and hurt the nation, GOP, and themselves with this shameful act of political opportunism. And Stacy McCain's Not One Red Cent is focused laser-like on ensuring that none of these traitors receive any RNC help in getting re-elected... they made their bed, and now they can lie in it.
But as-far as the Republican Party is concerned, the war is far from over: GOP Conference Chairman Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) said "we have only just begun to fight” as he left the Capitol Friday night.
Surely success for the Democrats will be far more difficult in the Senate. Majority Leader Harry Reid says he wants to take up the legislation by the fall, but 60 votes will be needed to overcome any Republican filibuster. The "razor-thin vote in the House spells doom in the Senate," proclaimed Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla).
Obama subsequently addressed the nation (and especially the Senate) in his weekly radio address on Saturday with his typical specious strawman arguments and blatantly false assumptions; instead of stating "in my opinion", or "evidence points to"... Obama tells us that those with well-founded concerns regarding the economic impact of this monstrous tax increase in the midst of a recession are spreading "misinformation":
“My call to every senator, as well as to every American, is this,” he said. “We cannot be afraid of the future. And we must not be prisoners of the past. Don’t believe the misinformation out there that suggests there is somehow a contradiction between investing in clean energy and economic growth.”
Just when you think that Obama couldn't insult your intelligence any more, he added -while sounding like a Sham-Wow commercial- that the measure would cost the average American about the "price of a postage stamp per day". Many experts and business leaders, naturally, disagree with Obama's proclamations, including already-regretful Obama supporter Warren Buffet- who called the tax hikes "massive" and "regressive".
The habitually dishonest Obama also claimed that the average American would not bear the brunt of this historic tax-increase: he claimed instead "It is paid for by the polluters who currently emit dangerous carbon emissions."
Just compare this patent falsehood to Ronald Reagan's timeless quote:
The most dangerous myth is the demagoguery that business can be made to pay a larger share, thus relieving the individual. Politicians preaching this are either deliberately dishonest, or economically illiterate, and either one should scare us.
... Only people pay taxes, and people pay as consumers every tax that is assessed against a business.
Like Obama's outdated embrace of socialist statism -as it's traditional practicioners in Europe quietly walk away from it- the behind-the-curve assumptions of his global-warming argument have now come under heavy scrutiny in Australia and New Zealand, as well as in numerous other countries worldwide- where doubts regarding the scientific evidence and the stifling effect of cap-and-trade legislation have them applying the brakes to their own climate-change legislation.
The collapse of the "consensus" has been driven by reality. The inconvenient truth is that the earth's temperatures have flat-lined since 2001, despite growing concentrations of C02. Peer-reviewed research has debunked doomsday scenarios about the polar ice caps, hurricanes, malaria, extinctions, rising oceans.
But Obama team won't even discuss the science with critics, at home or abroad... what does that tell you? Clearly the true agenda is the massive incremental tax base and centralized industrial control that Team Obama longs for, while being unhelpful to the economy, unwise... and unfair.
Now there is yet another scandalous development attached to this story, in that the Obama Administration has now even gone so far as to suppress our own EPA's latest report... one that casts significant doubt on the assumptions behind the global-warming argument. As reported in Investors' Business Daily:
On Friday, the day of the vote, the Competitive Enterprise Institute said it was releasing "an internal study on climate science which was suppressed by the Environmental Protection Agency."
In the release, the institute's Richard Morrison said "internal EPA e-mail messages, released by CEI earlier in the week, indicate that the report was kept under wraps and its author silenced because of pressure to support the administration's agenda of regulating carbon dioxide."If there was any trace of doubt as to Obama's true intentions, this looming Carbongate scandal ought to erase that for good... and they'll be plenty of time to explore what went on there before the Senate debates this misguided legislation in the fall. It's clearly the tax revenue that interests Obama, in addition to his own political security- not saving the earth, creating green jobs, or whatever other jive he's frantically laying on us to get this passed. This “amounts to the largest tax increase in American history under the guise of climate change,” declared Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind).
Is global climate-change truly a reason for concern... or a comprehensive scam promoted by the left? I sure have no way of knowing, and the theory of it is entirely possible... no doubt. But the promotion of man-made global warming as a Gore-esque forgone conclusion is certainly a complete hoax; it simply has not been proven in the sort of conclusive manner that would necessitate such sweeping changes and unparalleled tax increases in the midst of a major recession. But many conservatives are willing to talk about it... a lot more than can be said for the president. And of course, our industrial rivals the Chinese and Indians couldn't be less interested.
"Never let a good crisis go to waste" said the ever-calculating serial-opportunist Rahm Emanuel... and even a false one will do, apparently, if well orchestrated.
Obama and Pelosi have not made a convincing argument, to say the least- apparently didn't see it as necessary, and never even tried... exactly the same as with their profligate "stimulus" legislation that seems to have done nothing but spike the unemployment rate. Small wonder then that the Democrats have chosen to employ identical underhanded, bad-faith legislative tactics with this bill: present a large portion on it in the middle of the night, steamroll right-over GOP concerns, attack critics aggressively, suppress all conflicting evidence... and above all don't let anyone read it until it is already chiseled in stone.
If they somehow scrape-up the votes for this bill -or anything resembling it- in the Senate later this year, I look for brave GOP legislators -those who want to lead us into 2010 and beyond- to filibuster this pig right into the ground.
