What effect will the Republican majority in the house have on Obama’s environmental agenda? Is this a good or bad thing?
Ross Marine (Conservative):
As the returns for the midterm elections rolled in, one beautiful thought shimmered in my mind: I have been saved from the “Green Revolution.” By taking back the House and grid locking the Senate, the Republicans effectively derailed Obama’s environmental agenda and have preserved the country’s return to economic prosperity.
Now all of you bleeding-heart-hippies out there (Shelby) might be crying and carrying on about how “global warming” will kill all of the polar bears and it will be all my fault because my car gets nine miles per gallon.
First of all, I don’t care about polar bears and personally see no problem with playing “Jenga!” with the tower of biodiversity. Secondly, there is substantial evidence that humans are not the cause of the recent rise in temperatures.
According to Dr. Leonard Weinstein, an astrophysicist at NASA, carbon dioxide, the gas blamed for global warming, has practically no effect on global temperature. On top of that, man-made CO2 accounts for just seven percent of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
So just what is the main “greenhouse gas?” Water vapor, and that’s caused by evaporation fueled by the sun. Despite considerable scientific opposition to global warming, some of our leaders still want to fix a problem that isn’t there.
The cornerstone of Obama’s green agenda is the sweeping Cap and Trade bill, which essentially taxes companies for emitting carbon dioxide while manufacturing goods. This type of legislation would cripple businesses by punishing them for producing products.
By raising the operating costs for businesses, companies will be forced to shed even more jobs, which would stall the fragile economic recovery taking place now. The other solution for businesses would be to outsource their manufacturing to China, where there are absolutely zero environmental requirements; which means even if the “greenies” are right about global warming, Cap and Trade will only make it worse.
However, regardless of how you feel about global warming, the faster the Republicans can put the brakes on Cap and Trade, the better.
Pavan Kota (moderate):
The Republicans’ intent on building a brick wall in front of President Obama’s environmental agenda reflects their previous proposition to build a wall across the U.S.-Mexico border. Unlike immigration, there’s no reason that environmental issues should be partisan.
I can’t recall the last time building a wall in front of progressive ideas actually worked.
Improving the environment would have benefits that both parties should approve of.
The policies that Obama has set in place are structured to attack this issue. The current proposition concerns Cap and Trade. The general idea behind Cap and Trade is pretty solid, but whether it could make a significant difference in greenhouse gas emissions is questionable.
Also, Republicans argue that Cap and Trade would actually have a net loss in jobs. It’s true that Cap and Trade creates green jobs, but it may cut jobs in other energy and manufacturing industries.
This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive to create green jobs, but we should be careful with the overall effect. We need green jobs to help our struggling environment.
Sadly for myself, I’ve been at least partly tainted by the “hippie” toxin. I believe a strong environmental agenda is key to curbing global warming.
Global warming, or the less instigating term “climate change,” has a variety of harmful effects. The melting of vast ice sheets in both the Arctic Circle and Antarctica has been linked to climate change.
This melting could lead to a devastating rise to the sea level. This would destroy hundreds, if not thousands of coastal communities such as New Orleans.
If you don’t believe in global warming, then you probably just wasted a couple minutes of your life.
My mistake, but at least we can probably agree that pollution in general is bad. Alternative energy sources such as wind and solar power would help reduce our oil dependency and pollution.
Whether or not the Cap and Trade Bill is the right way to do this can be left up to Ross and Shelby to fight out.
Shelby Mohar (liberal):
The recent takeover of the House by the GOP will have a negative affect on Obama’s agenda. So, naturally, Obama’s plans for the environment will be negatively affected as well.
Duh.
Whether this is a good or bad thing (where the environment is concerned) is a different story.
But let me first make this clear: this is not an issue of whether global warming is or is not fabricated or the level of human contribution to it. It is obvious that our environmentally harmful actions outweigh the helpful, and that it is necessary to make changes or face irreversible consequences. Both parties agree in that regard; it is over the extent of change necessary that we disagree.
Furthermore, my conservative friend, the intellectual merit of your argument is inversely proportional to the extent of which you personalize your statements.
Now, concerning some of Obama’s environmental propositions: there will be both good and bad effects of the Republican takeover of the House. Firstly, I think it is good that the Cap and Trade program will be blocked.
Although good in theory, requiring businesses to pay money proportionate to their level of emission will not reduce pollution. Instead, businesses will look to China (who has made it clear that they could care less about the environment) to hire and the end result will be a loss of American jobs — something the Obama administration cannot afford at the moment. It would be better for the President to focus on the other aspects of his New Energy for America plan, which includes creating five million new jobs by investing in efforts to build a clean energy future.
However, there is the unfortunate possibility that the sole agenda of Republicans in the House is to prevent any Democratic bill from passing. Hopefully, however, through cooperation, open-mindedness, and compromise, a deadlock between parties can be avoided. Otherwise, America has another two years of both environmental and economic stagnation to look forward to.
