Progressive Opinion

salon.com — In February 2007, in his very first presidential campaign visit to New Hampshire, Mitt Romney toured a solar power plant. Unsurprisingly for a politician in such a location, he found some nice things to say about renewable energy. Romney promised he would soon “lay out a full energy program” featuring government incentives for developing alternative energy — including solar and wind power. Romney anticipated such “incentives will foster technological breakthroughs that can speed up” the development of alternative energy. Today, Mitt Romney isn’t quite such a fan of changing the world with solar power, if we are confident enough to believe his campaign website. Of course, back in 2007, Romney also believed that climate change was man-made and supported a global cap-and-trade system to limit greenhouse gas emissions. So it shouldn’t be all that much of a shock that Romney is giving the cold shoulder to solar power. If there’s one thing we know about Mitt, he never allows his past positions on an issue to weigh him down.

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nytimes.com — Two years after a series of gambles and ill-advised decisions on a BP drilling project led to the largest accidental oil spill in United States history and the death of 11 workers on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, no one has been held accountable. Sure, there have been about $8 billion in payouts and the outlines of a civil agreement that will cost BP an additional $7.8 billion in restitution to businesses and residents along the Gulf of Mexico. It’s also true that the company has paid at least $14 billion more in cleanup and other costs since April 20, 2010, bringing the expense of this fiasco to about $30 billion for BP. These are huge numbers. But this is a huge and profitable corporation. What is missing is the accountability that comes from real consequences: a criminal prosecution that holds responsible the individuals who gambled with the lives of BP’s contractors and the ecosystem of the Gulf of Mexico.

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huffingtonpost.com — The relatively unknown American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) got a black eye recently when news stories revealed it was a prime mover behind "Stand Your Ground" laws in Florida and 24 other states that temporarily shielded the man who shot 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. But the secretive group's influence in statehouses goes a lot further than deadly force, self-defense laws. Since its founding in 1973, ALEC has ghostwritten state legislation across the country on a wide range of issues, from voter ID laws to prison policy to worker protections, as a number of press accounts have pointed out. What has gone unmentioned, however, is ALEC's longtime stealth campaign to scuttle state — and federal — climate change initiatives, despite the fact that a number of its corporate members publicly acknowledge that global warming is a serious problem.

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tomdispatch.com — The "curse" of oil wealth is a well-known phenomenon in Third World petro-states where millions of lives are wasted in poverty and the environment is ravaged, while tiny elites rake in the energy dollars and corruption rules the land.  Recently, North America has been repeatedly hailed as the planet's twenty-first-century "new Saudi Arabia" for "tough energy" -- deep-sea oil, Canadian tar sands, and fracked oil and natural gas.  But here's a question no one considers: Will the oil curse become as familiar on this continent in the wake of a new American energy rush as it is in Africa and elsewhere?  Will North America, that is, become not just the next boom continent for energy bonanzas, but a new energy Third World? Knowledgeable observers are already noting the first telltale signs of the oil industry's "Third-Worldification" of the United States.

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slate.com — In December, the Obama administration approved long-overdue environmental regulations requiring U.S. power plants to reduce emissions of mercury, arsenic, and other toxic metals. The Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, or air toxics rule, is expected to prevent up to 11,000 premature deaths a year and have many other health benefits. And yet conservative members of Congress oppose it. Why? Because they say it will "kill jobs." This is a familiar tactic for politicians opposed to any sort of regulation. Conservatives have been scarily disciplined in appending the job-killing label to all regulations, both old and new. As somebody who has been on the front line of this particular battle, I'm afraid to say that the tactic seems to have resonance. Of course, it has also been a disaster for those interested in a true assessment of regulation's impacts on the economy.

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grist.org — After long anticipation and many delays, EPA is expected to issue its first limits on carbon pollution from power plants this week. With Republicans increasingly desperate in the face of economic recovery, they are sure to treat this as a lifeline, a focus for renewed attacks. They will try to make the rule a stand-in for government overreach, job-killing regulations, and Obama’s secret plan to raise gas prices. Also probably Sharia. These conservative attacks will be meritless, flying in the face of the considered judgment of credible, independent analysts. But the political media is unlikely to play “truth vigilante” by fact-checking them. Instead, expect endless horserace coverage of political tactics based on tired conventional wisdom. With that coming fact void in mind, here are the top five things you need to know about the rule and the attacks that will follow it.

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nytimes.com — To be a modern Republican in good standing, you have to believe — or pretend to believe — in two miracle cures for whatever ails the economy: more tax cuts for the rich and more drilling for oil. And with prices at the pump on the rise, so is the chant of “Drill, baby, drill.” More and more, Republicans are telling us that gasoline would be cheap and jobs plentiful if only we would stop protecting the environment and let energy companies do whatever they want. The irony here is that these claims come just as events are confirming what everyone who did the math already knew, namely, that U.S. energy policy has very little effect either on oil prices or on overall U.S. employment. For the truth is that we’re already having a hydrocarbon boom, with U.S. oil and gas production rising and U.S. fuel imports dropping.

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thenation.com — It was not very long ago that America seemed headed on a path of reduced dependence on fossil fuels—oil, coal and natural gas—and greater reliance on renewable forms of energy, such as wind and solar. “Our addiction to fossil fuels is one of the most serious threats to our national security in the twenty-first century,” Barack Obama declared while campaigning for president in 2008. Not only does the consumption of these fuels contribute to global warming, he argued; it also finances anti-American tyrants and terrorists. Upon entering the White House, Obama announced a series of programs aimed at promoting the transition from fossil fuels to climate-friendly renewables, and his 2009 economic stimulus package provided billions of dollars for green energy projects. But Obama’s commitment to renewables has wavered in the face of relentless attacks from Republicans in Congress and the economic realities of energy production.

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creators.com — For Rep. Allen West, the skyrocketing price of gasoline is not just a policy matter, it's a personal pocketbook issue. The Florida tea-party Republican (who, of course, blames President Obama for the increase) recently posted a message on Facebook wailing that it's now costing him $70 to fill his Hummer H3. It's hard to feel the pain of a whining, $174,000-a-year congress-critter, but millions of regular Americans really are feeling pain at the pump — especially truck drivers, cabbies, farmer, commuters and others whose livelihoods are tethered to the whims of Big Oil. It's an especially cynical political stunt, then, for congressional Republicans, GOP presidential wannabes and a chorus of right-wing mouthpieces to use gas price pain as a whip for lashing out at Obama's January decision to reject the infamous Keystone XL pipeline.

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washingtonpost.com — Congress isn’t planning to tackle climate change anytime soon, which means the Environmental Protection Agency is now the last line of defense. But could the EPA’s new rules on carbon pollution get tossed out by the courts? We’re about to find out. On Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit will hear two days of oral arguments from industry groups that are challenging the EPA’s authority to regulate carbon dioxide. Way back in 2007, recall, the Supreme Court ruled that the EPA could regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act if it found that those gases posed a risk to human health (which, most scientists agree, they do). The EPA made that determination in 2009 and moved ahead with crafting new fuel-economy standards for cars and light trucks. Power plants and oil refineries are next on the list. Unless, that is, the EPA gets bogged down by lawsuits.

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