Home » Congressional Watch

Congressional Watch, July 2010 Edition

Help Montana Conservation Voters Education Fund meet its match!  The Cinnabar Foundation has given MCVEF a generous matching grant and we need your help to meet it.  Support MCVEF’s efforts to protect our clean air, clear water and outdoor traditions – and to move our nation towards a clean energy economy.  Give a generous gift to MCVEF today and it will be doubled.  Don’t want to give online?  Mail a gift to MCVEF at Box 853, Billings, MT 59103. All contributions are tax deductible.

 

TAKE ACTION

This is it – we’re down to the wire on whether the U.S. Senate will consider clean energy and climate change legislation this year.  If it doesn’t happen this year, it may not be considered for years to come, thanks in no small measure to the Senate rule effectively requiring a supermajority of 60 votes in the Senate to pass legislation, a rule that even now seems to be smothering the will to move. 

Senators Baucus and Tester need to hear from you that we need their leadership to make this happen, and we will continue to call for passage of climate change legislation because curbing climate change is too important to our state, to our communities, to the health of our natural resources, and to our economy.

Please contact them, today, and let them know that you want strong, comprehensive climate change legislation this year. 

But then do one more thing – write a letter to the editor – today – so that before the next three weeks are up, our senators will have heard from many Montanans that they want action now on climate change. 

 

The message is simple:

  • The ongoing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is a call to action for our nation's leaders to implement comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation that will greatly improve our energy independence, create jobs and harness American technology and know-how, and conserve our planet for future generations.  Now is the time for the Senate to act and pass comprehensive energy and climate policy.
  • Montana households would benefit from investments in clean energy with expanded job opportunities, rising wages, and reduced home heating and utility costs.
  • Carbon pollution is costing more each year in damage from droughts, spread of insect-borne diseases, and more intense weather events like fires, hurricanes and storms.

Here are some tips to help you write an effective letter and help get it published.

 


COMING UP

Will a carbon cap be considered in a bill before the U.S. Senate this month?

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is expected to craft an energy and climate bill from various options presented in past proposals, including measures to address the Gulf spill response, clean energy by increasing the use of renewable energy, and climate change with a carbon cap all on the table, for introduction in the Senate this month. At the center of the debate: electric utilities which will face a “fundamental change in the way they do business.”  And needed at the forefront: President Obama with a ‘full-court press’ to pass climate change legislation.

Politico: Last shot for energy bill-Reid's scaled-down options -Gulf spill hearings rev up (July 12, 2010)

Politico: Moment of truth for energy bill (July 12, 2010)

“The next three weeks represent Democrats’ last, best shot at getting an energy and climate change bill passed this year. In the White House and the office of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, it’s moment-of-truth time. People on every side of the energy debate say that Reid must unveil a concrete plan backed by a full-court press from the president this week, or the entire effort will fall apart in the run-up to the midterm elections…”  More…

 

HOW THEY VOTED

  • Vote on Sen. Murkowski’s ‘Dirty Air’ provision
    Senator Baucus and Senator Tester voted against Senator Murkowski’s oil industry bailout and instead sided with Montana consumers, businesses, ag producers and many others in Montana who want to protect the Clean Air Act and curb the pollution that is contributing to climate change.  Your calls and emails to Sens. Baucus and Tester made a difference!  Sen. Murkowski’s ‘Dirty Air’ proposal, which failed on a 47-53 vote, would have stripped the EPA of its authority to regulate the greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change.  Supporters claimed they would rather have Congress regulate greenhouse gases but have failed to support any meaningful Congressional regulation of such pollutants.  Their position would cost Americans much more in the future. The vote against the resolution affirms the scientific finding that carbon pollution is a threat to public health.  See Politico, Senate rejects EPA carbon challenge.      PLEASE TAKE A MOMENT TO THANK SENS. BAUCUS AND TESTER FOR THEIR VOTES! 
  • Vote to eliminate oil and gas tax loopholes
    Senators Baucus and Tester both voted against an amendment to the American Workers, State and Business Relief Act of 2010 to eliminate $35 billion in oil and gas company loopholes and use the revenues to reduce the deficit and invest in energy efficiency and conservation.  Opponents had argued that eliminating the tax break for oil and gas drilling would hurt small producers, and that a discussion of closing such tax breaks should be part of a larger energy bill.  The amendment, which required 60 votes to pass, failed to achieve even a simple majority in garnering only 35 votes. 

    Reuters: Effort to repeal oil tax breaks fails in U.S. Senate (June 15, 2010)
    WASHINGTON, June 15 (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Tuesday rejected a measure that would have repealed some $35 billion in oil and gas industry tax breaks as it continued work on a bill that would raise taxes on investment fund managers.  More…

 

OTHER VOTES AND CONGRESSIONAL ACTIONS

  • BAUCUS: Senate Panel Approves Baucus Move to Protect North Fork (June 30, 2010)
    “Senator Introduces Two Measures in Senate Environment and Public Works Committee     Baucus’ measures, to clean up toxic pollution in the Columbia River Basin and protect the North Fork of the Flathead Valley on both sides of the Canada and U.S. border, were passed by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee…”      More…
  • TESTER: BLM to ramp up efforts to create renewable energy jobs in Montana  
    Sen. Tester asked Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to fully staff BLM’s new Renewable Energy Coordinating Team in Montana.  Salazar promised the Montana team would have its five staff within the next month.  The Renewable Energy Coordinating Team is part of an effort to streamline the process for renewable energy developers to get the federal permits needed for renewable energy projects and transmission lines.

  • REHBERG’s YouTube videos – in his own words:   
    Video: Denny's Desk 001 – Energy     – his four point energy plan, the first plank of which is fossil fuels, including the need to streamline permitting for refineries, followed by conservation and alternatives, then more money for grants, loans and investments for inventions
    Video: Denny's Desk 002 – Off-Shore Exploration     – reiterating that offshore drilling is one part of a comprehenesive plan he supports, and noting the ‘natural leakage from the earth”

 

ACTIONS AND OPINIONS

 A new Scorecard:  National Wildlife Federation introduced its “American Power All Stars” – “…where Senators come out to bat by giving floor speeches and offering amendments, filibustering motions and casting votes that determine which team (Big Oil or Clean Energy) in the American Power All-Star Game they are playing for.”  The guide includes a scorecard to track 24 key senators’ votes, including those of Sen. Max Baucus, Chairman of the Finance Committee, such as votes on caps on global warming pollution, preserving EPA’s authority to reduce global warming pollution, safeguarding wildlife and natural resources from global warming, and facilitating a global solution to the climate change crisis. 

See NWF “American Power All Stars” summary on Sen. Baucus.

Selected Op Eds, LTEs and Columns on clean energy
Opinion pieces:

Montana columnists:

Letters to the Editor: