The main purpose of this ongoing blog will be to track planetary extreme or record temperatures related to climate change. Any reports I see of ETs will be listed below the main topic of the day. Iâll refer to extreme or record temperatures as ETs (not extraterrestrials).đ
Main Topic: Why Build Back Better Won’t Pass
Dear Diary. Ever since starting this site in 2017 at the beginning of the Trump administration I’ve held onto a ray of political hope coming from the United States. The ray grew brighter in 2018 as Democrats took control of the House of Representatives. Then Biden ousted Trump in 2020, and the Democrats took control of the Senate, mainly because two seats in my home state of Georgia flipped. So, early in this year it was time to pass Green New Deal initiatives through Congress. Biden and company formulated a plan to do so called Build Back Better. It was thought that BBB would pass through Congress through a process called reconciliation, despite the Democrats not getting rid of the necessary 60 vote Senate filibuster. Unfortunately, the Democrats built a house of cards…which will fall, I fear. My ray of political hope has been darkened by greed, corruption, and even lies.
Today I am very disappointed and very angry. Despite having very thin margins in both houses of Congress, the powers that be should have built a stronger dwelling to get needed initiatives passed. Biden often told us that through his government experience, he knew how to get bills passed through Congress. His political wrangling using telephone calls and snoozing won’t be enough this time around. So where does this leave everyone fighting the climate crisis?
If we are to win the Clinate War we will have to fight it using the private sector with positive market factors. I’m glad to learn that domestic car companies are opening big plants to build electric vehicles, mainly because corporations have discovered that there is a lot of money to be made from EV’s. Also, the cost of renewable energy has gotten below that of that generated by fossil fuels. Can the private sector win the Clinate War without much government help? The majority of climate activists doubt that, but we will see.
Here is a Washington Post article detailing why Build Back Better won’t pass. Now, I could be totally wrong here, and Democrats could come to their senses, getting elated after BBB passes this Thursday. Also, there might be another delay with voting, which could keep BBB on life support but in a proverbial comma. We will see:
Opinion: Will corporate Democrats derail Bidenâs agenda?
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) walks from the Senate chamber ahead of a procedural vote on raising the debt limit on Sept. 27. (Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)
Opinion by Katrina vanden Heuvel Columnist Yesterday at 10:13 a.m. EDT
This week, Americans will get a very clear view of the two political parties in high-stakes showdowns â and possibly a sobering insight into how corrupted our politics has become.
Republicans are now committed to fierce obstruction. All the high-minded rhetoric about bipartisan cooperation is background static. The clearest proof will play out this week as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) leads a filibuster against a bill to lift the debt ceiling so that the United States does not default on the debts it already owes. Default would probably have catastrophic effects on bond markets, credit and the United Statesâs standing around the world. McConnell risks this because he wants Democrats to take the blame.
McConnellâs obstruction comes as no surprise, but whatâs telling is that there are not 10 Republican senators responsible enough to break the filibuster. Virtually without exception, they echo the lie that Democratic spending is the reason the debt ceiling must be lifted. In fact, the raise would cover much of the past debts accumulated when Republicans held power under President Donald Trump. Sustaining the full faith and credit of the United States by empowering the government to pay its debts does not require a profile in courage. Republicans â in unison â are more committed to partisan posturing than to simple patriotic service.
In the face of this, Democrats must demonstrate that they are prepared to govern. This week, the House is slated to vote on a traditional infrastructure bill. It supposedly has bipartisan support, but the Republican House leadership has announced it will whip members to vote âno.â At the same time, intense negotiations go forward on the heart of the presidentâs âBuild Back Betterâ agenda, packaged in a budget reconciliation bill to avoid a Senate filibuster.
The $3.5 trillion plan contains reforms that enjoy overwhelming public support. In its current form, it improves familiesâ lives by sustaining the monthly child allowance, investing in daycare, providing universal pre-K and guaranteeing paid family leave. It makes community college tuition free. It extends Medicare to cover hearing, vision and dental expenses. It lowers prescription drug prices to help seniors and save the government over $500 billion. It makes the first serious investments addressing the threat of climate change. And these measures would be paid for largely by raising taxes on the richest and corporations (at or below the rates before the 2017 tax cuts), cracking down on tax avoidance and curbing fossil fuel subsidies. Whatâs not to like?
The overwhelming majority of Democrats in both Houses support the presidentâs plan. But with a margin of three votes in the House, and the 50-50 split in the Senate, any one senator or three House members can torpedo the package. Much of the press portray the Democratic conflict as pitting âmoderatesâ against progressives; the former threatening to vote against the reconciliation package; the latter demanding passage of both bills or neither.
But the dissenters are far from âcentristsâ or âmoderates.â They oppose the plan of the president of their own party, a lifelong moderate, who was just elected with a record number of votes. They undermine a plan that has popular support â both for the package and the individual reforms. If anything, the progressives have acted as the moderates, compromising from their initial $6 trillion plan, giving up favored programs to bring the caucus together.
The few dissenters more accurately should be labeled as corporate Democrats. They enjoy lavish support from corporate lobbies mobilized to oppose all tax hikes and reductions in industry subsidies. Their objections are informed by deep pocket interests that pay for their campaigns. For example, Democrats have long campaigned to allow Medicare to negotiate bulk discounts on drugs. Yet the reform was torpedoed in committee by three House Democrats who have hauled in roughly $1.6 million in campaign contributions from the pharmaceutical industry. Joining them is Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), another leading recipient of Big Pharma donations.
Or the dissenters could simply be labeled conservative Democrats because the excuses they use to oppose the popular reforms echo conservative mantras. They object to the cost, raising fears about the deficit and about inflation. Yet $3.5 trillion over 10 years constitutes only a 5 percent increase in projected spending. It pales next to the recently expanded Pentagon budget that will cost a whopping $9.7 trillion over 10 years â which these conservative Democrats supported without objection. And most of their major objections concern raising taxes on the rich or corporations or lowering drug prices and ending fossil fuel subsidies, all of which are designed to pay for the program.
Can Democrats unite to pass the presidentâs popular program? Or will corporate Democrats gut the reforms to protect the moneyed interests that so corrode our politics? All Democrats realize that failure to act will be political suicide. Whether the president and the Democratic leaders get to agreement on a package that can pass may well be a measure less of their skill than of how corrupted our politics have become.
Here is an “ET” from Wednesday:
Here is more climate and weather news from Wednesday:
(As usual, this will be a fluid post in which more information gets added during the day as it crosses my radar, crediting all who have put it on-line. Items will be archived on this site for posterity. In most instances click on the pictures of each tweet to see each article. The most noteworthy items will be listed first.)
Now here are some of todayâs articles and notes on the horrid COVID-19 pandemic:
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Guy Walton âThe Climate Guyâ