The following just came into the comm-box:
House Passes Punitive Cap-and-Tax Bill
New energy tax “demonstrates just how distant and out of touch
Washington is from Wisconsin,” says Ryan
WASHINGTON – Wisconsin’s First District Congressman Paul Ryan today spoke out on behalf of the families and small businesses that would be on the receiving end of a massive new energy tax. Earlier today, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 2454, American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, by a vote of 219 to 212, with bipartisan opposition. Ryan voted against this legislation.
The center of the deeply flawed H.R. 2454 is a cap-and-trade scheme aimed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by increasing energy costs on all Americans. The complicated cap-and-trade program would require all energy producers to purchase expensive government permits in exchange for the right to produce energy from certain natural resources or to produce certain goods like steel, aluminum, or cement. Without regard for the detrimental economic consequences, the proponents of the legislation believe this unilateral energy tax would help reduce global temperatures by a fraction of a degree by the end of the century.
Ryan’s vote against the 1,200 page bill came after only three hours of general debate, with Majority rejecting the single amendment they allowed. In addition to the job losses that would result from the smaller economy, Ryan raised concerns with the impact on the budgets of individual households. Families would face increasing costs on not only energy – but all products that require energy to make them (i.e., everything). Various nonpartisan studies have estimated that average annual household cost increases would range from $425 per household to over $4000 per household. Specifically, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimate that Wisconsin families will pay an extra $230 million in energy tax once the bill is fully implemented in 2012.
Congressman Ryan fought against this draconian energy tax and supports H.R. 2828, the American Energy Innovation Act, a commonsense alternative to promote a cleaner environment without causing further economic devastation in the middle of a painful recession.
Following today’s action of the House floor, Congressman Ryan issued the following statement:
“Today’s vote reminds me of just how distant and out of touch Washington is from Wisconsin. At a time when jobs are increasingly scarce across Southern Wisconsin, Congress passed legislation explicitly designed to shrink our economy and increase energy costs on all Americans. Wisconsin is one of the nation’s top manufacturing States. Wisconsin entrepreneurs, small businesses, and workers shouldn’t need permission from the federal government to produce, grow, and create jobs, yet that is exactly the paternalistic message sent by Congress today.
“The Majority added a 300 page amendment to the 1100 page bill at 3:09am this morning which effectively regulates the national energy sector (8% of the U.S. economy), and no member of Congress has even read it. This bill is the biggest federal power grab of the American economy this year and that’s quite a statement.”
“Should this bill become law, Wisconsin would suffer a disproportionate economic blow. As the legislation’s authors and chief advocate reside far from the Midwest, the cap-and-trade legislation wasn’t primarily concerned with cold-weather, manufacturing States that get most of their energy from coal. Families in Southern Wisconsin don’t have the luxury of turning off the heat in the winter.
“What’s worse, because we are imposing this energy tax unilaterally, the legislation will actually hinder the environmental goals we’ve set out to achieve. By making manufacturing more expensive here in America, this bill would send our manufacturing jobs overseas to our competitors like India and China. For every ton of emissions we reduce, India and China will produce several tons more. Under this bill, we will send our competitors American jobs while they are negating the minimal environmental gains made here at home.
“There is a better way forward. I was proud to support a substitute energy reform – the American Energy Act – on House floor today, which focused on an all-of-the-above approach to creating a cleaner environment and a stronger economy. Rather than lock-up domestic energy supply, we should expand our use of American-made resources as we encourage the use of renewable and alternative energy sources, including nuclear, wind, solar, and more. Environmental stewardship and economic growth are not mutually exclusive goals, and I will continue to fight for both of behalf of those I serve in Southern Wisconsin.”
wakeupamerica.blogivists.com
Cap and Tax: Smoot Hawley Lysenko Cocktail
Peter Theron Candidate for WI 2nd Congressional district
(response to recent vote in the house of representatives)
On 1930 June 17 the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act was signed into law. It raised US import tariffs to record levels, prompting trade retaliation from other nations. The resulting trade barriers crippled the global economy, contributing to the Great Depression.
On 2009 June 26 the US House of Representatives approved a Cap and Tax bill that surpasses the Smoot-Hawley tariff in economic destructiveness. Wisconsin’s delegation voted along party lines with the five Democrats voting to sacrifice the US economy to the false god of Anthropogenic Global Warming and the three Republicans voting against the insanity.
When voting for this bill, none of the Wisconsin Democrats knew exactly what was in it. How could they, 300 pages were added less than 24 hours before their floor vote. But we can deduce the Democrats’ intent from three revealing votes in the Energy and Commerce committee. As reported in the Wall Street Journal on 2009 June 26, while the bill was in the Energy and Commerce committee “…Republicans offered three amendments: one to suspend the program if gas hit $5 a gallon; one to suspend the program if electricity prices rose 10% over 2009; and one to suspend the program if unemployment rates hit 15%. Democrats defeated all of them.”
From their committee votes we know that Tammy Baldwin and the other committee Democrats intend to raise the price of gasoline to at least $5 a gallon. No surprise, as their goal is to decrease the use of carbon-based fuels and raising the price will do that. That is the only way that Americans will buy the electric cars that Government Motors is going to be trying to sell.
The second vote indicates that Tammy Baldwin et al do not mind if electricity prices jump. Unfortunately this could make it expensive to charge the electric cars they want us to buy.
But the third vote is the most revealing. It shatters the myth that the Democrats care about the poor. An unemployment rate of 15% means 1 out of every 7 American workers is without work. Democrats are willing to sacrifice the jobs of 1 out of every 7 Americans because a computer program claims this will lower the temperature 0.2 degrees in 2100. So, Democrats are content with a 50% increase in the unemployment rate, throwing millions of Americans out of work. All this dislocation because a computer program claims it will lower the temperature 0.2 degrees.
Others elsewhere have dissected the myths of Anthropogenic Global Warming. All I will do here is point out that a Madison weatherman provides only a 4 degree guarantee on his forecasts of the next day’s high temperature. The global-warming acolytes have put their faith in a computer program claiming 20-fold greater accuracy in making a temperature prediction 90 years hence. That has passed from the realm of science and entered the realm of religion.
In the 1930s and 40s Russian biology was strongly influenced by the theories of Trofim Denisovich Lysenko. While his theories had little scientific backing, they did have Joseph Stalin’s blessing. Needless to say political backing more than compensated for the lack of experimental supporting evidence. Dissent was punished and contrary evidence suppressed. In the US the reliance on government grants has paved the way for similarly politicized science. Those expressing dissent from the global warming “consensus” lost grant funding and their papers were not published in prestigious journals. Some day soon Anthropogenic Global Warming will join Lysenkoism as an embarrassment to the world scientific community.
Making policy based on politically influenced science needlessly sacrifices lives and livelihoods. Smoot-Hawley contributed to the Great Depression. If signed into law, Cap and Tax, based on politically-correct science, will increase the price of fuel, increase the price of electricity, and increase unemployment. It will not “promote the general welfare” and so should be scrapped as quickly as possible.