Sen. Boxer, Back Away From Lieberman-Warner

Starting today, the Senate is debating a standalone global warming bill for the first time in three years. This is a significant achievement in and of itself, and it's worth praising Barbara Boxer for putting the issue front and center. However, the bill she is promoting, the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act, is not only insufficient to the challenge (which I could live with), but represents a trillion-dollar giveaway to polluters who would not have to pay for the right to spew greenhouse gases into the air, a position completely at odds with the positions of all of our top Presidential candidates.

Boxer has co-authored a bill with Bernie Sanders that is superior, and Ed Markey's bill is a great improvement as well and would slap a license on major polluters that they would have to purchase at auction. This money would be invested in technological research and alternative energy sources, as well as offset price increases for consumers. Lieberman-Warner does none of this, and Sen. Boxer has shrugged her shoulders and said "this is the best we can do."

Though Boxer has worked to strengthen the bill, she says it's still not as strong as she'd like. "This represents a consensus document," she said at a recent press conference. "It's not everything that Sens. Lieberman, Warner, and Boxer want. It's the best we could do." During floor debate, she plans to push for stricter emission targets and a greater percentage of auctioned emission permits, and she has threatened to pull the bill if it's weakened, as has Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).

Many senators will be offering amendments, so attempts to water down the bill are sure to come, along with efforts to toughen it. Meanwhile, James Inhofe (R-Okla.), the Senate's most notorious global-warming denier, will be trying to scuttle the bill altogether.

The sausage-making in the Senate is always painful, and surely the global warming deniers on the right and their corporate lobbyist buddies have in mind only the total stoppage of this bill. I'm open to concessions where necessary, but giving away pollution credits without an auction is to me non-negotiable. If you allow polluters to continue doing so for free it's going to be next to impossible to get them to pay in the future. And this is completely out of line with what is sure to be the stated Democratic platform at the convention. There's enough of a left-right split on climate change not to open up this other front on the left.

There are many dangers for this bill. A proposed amendment that would subsidize the nuclear power industry could be a deal-breaker on all sides. I understand the contention that the hour is getting late to make meaningful progress in reducing the effects of global climate change. The latest scientific assessment from the U.S. Climate Change Science Program notes, we are already seeing rising temperatures, more heat waves and droughts, and a global rise in sea level due to man-made contributions. But fixing the climate means fixing the climate, not a half-measure that rewards corporate America.

Climate Progress is live-blogging the hearings.

UPDATE: The motion to proceed passed 74-14. Most observers are saying that this is unlikely to become law, and considering that the Bush Administration opposes it and 67 votes just aren't there, that seems accurate. I don't mind it as a get-the-ball-moving approach.