Can Obama Save Us From A Koch Brothers Takeover?

It was almost as an afterthought that we appended an embed of the Robert Greenwald film, Koch Bros Exposed onto the end of a late Sunday night post about Romney and plutocracy. I can't emphasize enough how important it is for every swing state voter to see this movie before November 6... so here it is again. If you have concerns-- or doubts-- about the direction Romney would take this country should he get into the White House-- or what Republican control of the Senate and House will mean-- this documentary is an absolute must-see. Recall the speech Grover Norquist, the quintessential whore for plutocracy, gave at CPAC this summer:

All we have to do is replace Obama… We are not auditioning for fearless leader. We don’t need a president to tell us in what direction to go. We know what direction to go. We want the Ryan budget… We just need a president to sign this stuff. We don’t need someone to think it up or design it. The leadership now for the modern conservative movement for the next 20 years will be coming out of the House and the Senate... Pick a Republican with enough working digits to handle a pen to become president of the United States. This is a change for Republicans: the House and Senate doing the work with the president signing bills. His job is to be captain of the team, to sign the legislation that has already been prepared.

David or Charles Koch-- let alone père Fred, the Bircher-- couldn't have summed up the right-wing case for Romney any better: a weak, vacillating nothing who will be what he's told by the Dark forces of American fascism.

Monday morning the Kochs must have killed a thousand kittens when they read the Washington Post report by Juliet Eilperin, Obama’s Record: Environmental Agenda Pushes Sweeping Attack On Air Pollution. I would have preferred to see the Obama Justice Department round up the banksters-- not to mention the Bush Regime war criminals-- and throw them in prison, but I've still be willing to give Obama the benefit of many doubts primarily because of his record on environmentalism. It's largely because of Obama that I drive a hybrid and that my home is powered by solar energy. That he's willing to stand up to the Kochs-- please watch the film-- is, alone, enough reason to reelect him.

The day after the November 2010 elections made clear President Obama’s greenhouse-gas legislation was doomed, he vowed to keep trying to curb emissions linked to global warming. There’s more than one way of “skinning the cat,” he told reporters.

Since then, Obama has used his executive powers-- including his authority under the 1970 Clean Air Act-- to press the most sweeping attack on air pollution in U.S. history. He has imposed the first carbon-dioxide limits on new power plants, tightened fuel-efficiency rules as part of the auto bailout and steered billions of federal dollars to clean-energy projects. He also has proposed slashing mercury emissions from utilities by 91 percent by 2016.

Obama’s end run around Republican opposition has delighted environmentalists, but it has drawn the ire of business groups and conservatives who argue he is crippling the coal industry, driving up energy costs and hurting the overall economy.

“Environmental regulation should be about protecting public health, and not about creating green jobs and mitigating hypothetical risk,” said Diane Katz, research fellow in regulatory policy at the conservative Heritage Foundation. “Being unemployed and poor from overregulation, or zealous regulation, is a greater risk than global warming.”

When Obama was elected in 2008, environmentalists were confident their most-cherished goals-- ending coal-fired power plants, limiting greenhouse-gas emissions and invoking new protections for public lands-- were finally within reach.

Following up on a campaign promise, the president backed legislation that would slash America’s carbon output by 80 percent by 2050. Under the proposed cap-and-trade legislation, companies would buy and sell emissions credits allowing them to pollute more.

The bill was passed by the House, which at the time was controlled by Democrats, but in June 2009 it was blocked in the Senate by Republicans and moderate [NOTE: in Washington circles the word "moderate" now connotes far right-wing reactionaries] Democrats. When Republicans won control of the House in the 2010 elections, the bill was dead.

The administration turned to the Clean Air Act, which Obama allies said the president became familiar with while serving on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Using the law’s extensive authority, the administration issued six major environmental rules, including ones that placed limits on toxic air pollutants, greenhouse gases, soot and smog-forming pollutants.

The strategy was bolstered by some outside factors. Its effort to limit carbon emissions was benefited by the natural-gas boom; many utilities are switching from coal to natural gas, which is more economical and emits much less carbon. The automobile bailout gave Obama the leverage to impose tougher fuel-efficiency standards, and the Environmental Protection Agency faced several lawsuits pending from the Bush administration that needed to be resolved.

Obama’s standards for new vehicles, said Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, rank as “the biggest move to get us off our oil dependence by any president ever.” The rules, which took effect this year, will require the U.S. auto fleet to average 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025.

Heather Zichal, deputy assistant to the president for energy and climate change, said the administration’s array of environmental rules go to the “sweet spot of energy security, economic opportunity and reducing pollution,” and fit into a favorite Obama theme during the 2008 campaign.

But the business community argues that the regulations are heavy-handed and are hurting the nation’s economic security.

“The utility sector, which we consider a part of the manufacturing sector, has been hit extremely hard,” said Ross Eisenberg, vice president of energy and resources at the National Association of Manufacturers.

Utilities, he said, are shuttering older plants and holding off expanding existing ones out of fear that the EPA will deny them permits.

Last month, urged on by several business and energy groups, the GOP-controlled House passed the Stop the War on Coal Act, which would reverse several Obama regulations and proposals. It would bar the EPA from regulating greenhouse gases, jettison the stricter fuel standards and give states primary authority over the storage and disposal of coal-combustion waste. But that bill has little chance in the Democratic-controlled Senate.

Because the administration, faced by partisan polarization, has moved ahead on its own, opportunities for compromise have been lost, some say. Eisenberg notes that during former president Bill Clinton’s second term, the two parties negotiated passage of such significant environmental laws as the 1996 Safe Drinking Water Act.

“The big difference is you had a Congress and an administration a little bit willing to work together on the issues,” he said.

...Obama friends and foes agree on one thing: The president will probably pursue an even more aggressive environmental agenda if reelected.

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (R-Wash.) said in a statement he would expect Obama to push for more national monument designations in a second term. “From nearly day one,” he said, “the Obama Administration has attempted to impose policies that would block public access to public lands and cause significant economic harm and job loss.”

When it comes to putting more public land off limits to development, he added, “Such decisions should not be made by unilateral orders from the president” using a 106-year old law.

Environmental leaders expect Obama to try to take tougher action on limiting greenhouse-gas emissions from existing power plants if reelected.

Obama hinted as much during a speech to a crowd of Colorado State University students in August.

“We’re on track to emit fewer greenhouse gases this year than we have in nearly 20 years,” he said. “You can keep those trends going. That all happened because of you.”

The bill Eilperin referred to above, H.R. 3409, which the GOP calls the Stop the War on Coal Act was introduced by a shill for the mine owners and polluters, Bill Johnson (R-OH) and had 19 consponsors who take large legalistic bribes from the anti-environmnetal polluters. Although 13 Republicans broke with their leadership to oppose it, it passed 233-175, as the Blue Dogs and New Dems rallied, to their corporate masters' sides (including, dangerously, Shelley Berkley, the exceptionally corrupt New Dem who would sell her grandmother for a nickel and is the Democratic candidate for the Nevada Senate seat and an even worse Blue Dog, Joe Donnelly, who the Democrats are running for the Indiana Senate seat). One of the co-sponsors of the bill was West Virginia corporate whore (and crooked multimillionaire) David McKinley. McKinely is always on the side of the mine owners and always against the miners... always. His opponent this year is an advocate for miner families, Sue Thorn. I can't imagine she would ever have voted for this unserious legislation. Thorn:

Being a "Friend of Coal" isn’t enough, especially when regulations concern worker safety. In the recent draft 2013 budget, House Republicans added language that would prevent the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) from implementing new limits on coal dust. An amendment by Congressman David McKinley will make it tougher to control combustible coal ash or unsafe air quality in mines, even though there is a surge in black lung cases. Black lung is now striking coal miners at younger ages and with less time in mines. This is no time to prevent the enforcement of these life-saving regulations.

When elected officials receive campaign contributions from coal barons they seem to ignore the needs of coal miners. I will always be a "Friend of Coal Miners."

The Koch brothers and the political whores like McKinley who are their willing puppets, are an existential threat to this country and to our families. It's enough of a reason to overlook Obama's many flaws and defeat Romney and it's enough of a reason to consider making a contribution to congressional candidates who will help the president along the way with a forward-looking environmental agenda.