At Least Somebody's Reading The Bills In The Senate

So Mitch McConnell cleanedHarry Reid's clock again yesterday, forcing the Senate clerk to read the entire text of the 500-page Boxer amendment to the Liberman-Warner climate change bill aloud. The ostensible reason was judicial nominees but it was purely a stalling tactic, to hold up the climate bill.

Of course, when Reid was in the minority, he routinely cleaned Bill Frist's clock, whether on the nuclear option or the Rule V session he demanded or whatever else. It's easier to work from the minority leadership position in the Senate. The fact that Reid's caucus is more likely to break away from him is really the only difference.

More and more, I'm thinking it's best to just end any effort on this bill altogether. There is no messaging and no strategy around it. The "We can solve it" campaign is supposed to be the newest big organization on the block with respect to climate change and they're silent in this debate. All the ground has been ceded to the conservative vision, which talks about costs instead of consequences of inaction. This morning on one of the chat shows I saw a long piece about how long it'll take to pay off the higher sticker price of a Prius with the lower gas prices. As if that's the only consideration, and not social responsibility.

They've hijacked the debate because progressive environmentalists can't get behind this bill. It rewards polluters and gives revenues from carbon trading to industry. The carbon market must be tightly regulated or it can be wasteful and useless. This market would absolutely fall into that category. The entire process has been a disaster from a public relations, political, and social standpoint. Barbara Boxer should be ashamed of herself.