Energy & Environment

As his campaign heads to his native Bath County, Virginia gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds (D) tied his opponent Bob McDonnell (R) to former President George W. Bush.

Deeds' attack demonstrates the extent to which his state's governor's race has been nationalized. President Obama appeared with Deeds at a campaign rally last week and McDonnell delivered the Republican weekly address this weekend.

@DeedsCountry, a new Deeds campaign Twitter account, tweeted Sunday:

Heading to Bath County...@BobMcDonnell thinks Bush economic policies helped here

McDonnell also played an early role in bringing national issues into the campaign, pressuring Deeds to say if he supports Democratic card-check, healthcare reform, and climate change legislation.

Cross-posted to the Twitter Room

The Alaska state legislature will take up the last remnant of Sarah Palin's gubernatorial term on Monday; a measure overriding her veto of federal stimulus dollars directed toward the state.

Alaska Rep. Mike Hawker (R) told the Anchorage Daily News that he believes enough lawmakers will vote to strip the veto blocking stimulus money intended for energy cost relief. Seventy-five percent of legislators need to vote for the override to secure its passage.

Members of the legislature will vote in a special session Monday.

When she originally vetoed the funds, Palin argued that accepting the money would allow the federal government to compel Alaskan localities to adopt building codes.

Below are web videos of President Barack Obama and the Republican weekly address. This week, Virginia gubernatorial candidate Bob McDonnell spoke on behalf of the Republicans, highlighting his rising star in the party.

President Obama used his address to hit back at critics of healthcare reform legislation and re-take ownership of the debate. McDonnell said Obama's proposals on climate change, union card-check, and heat insurance reform will only lead to a plunge in unemployment.

Read The Hill's coverage of Obama and McDonnell's addresses.

President Obama:



McDonnell:

Rep. John Culberson (R-Tex.) accused House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) of silencing his opposition to Democratic legislation. The Texan ran through a litany of incidents on Twitter on Thursday night, suggesting that Pelosi regularly turns off the microphone on the House floor and changed wording in his newsletter.

He even goaded Pelosi into censoring him on "social media."

Culberson also framed debate between Republicans and Democrats as "sunlight/freedom" versus "liberalism."

Regarding Pelosi's censorship, Culberson tweeted late on yesterday night:

Did u know Pelosi forbids repr from saying "gov't run health care" & I can't quote Obama who said "cap & trade will make electr skyrocket"?

Congressmen r forbidden to call Dems "liberal"; cannot call cap & trade "cap & tax" = I can't speak my mind in my own newsletter to CD7=1984

I hope Pelosi tries to silence me on social media as they have shut out opposition voices/debate/sunlight on House floor; it won't work here

Pelosi regularly turns off the microphone on the House floor, shuts off amends, & debate, shuts out all public sunlight, & gets away w it

She has no control over my voice here; I work for Texas & District 7 & I will not be silenced or intimidated; her staff monitors me here too

He seemed particularly miffed at changes to his newsletter Speaker Pelosi allegedly made him include:

Pelosi made change my newsletter headline from "cap and tax" to "cap and trade" or I would be personally liable for all postage/printing

Pelosi also made me delete Obama's own words "Under my cap & trade plan, electricity prices would necessarily skyrocket" from my newsletter

The fiery Culberson then challenged his tweeps to choose between the two sides of the partisan debate in Congress:

I am literally conducting a test of the Twitter community tonight: here it is - a stark and very real choice.....

R u more devoted to sunlight/freedom of speech/debate, or to liberalism? Will Twitterverse rise up agnst censorship by top US gov't leaders?

Bombard Pelosi & House leadership; let the sun shine in; post all bills online for 72 hrs bf vote, open debate/amendments & end censorship!

Throughout the climate change and healthcare battles, House Republicans have accused Democratic leaders of silencing debate.

Cross-posted to the Twitter Room

House Minority Leader John Boehner did his best impression of a senator Friday evening, invoking his privilege to unlimited debate to stall a final vote on the Democratic climate change bill.

Boehner had been speaking at length about the amendment he said was "filed at 3:09am," which spans 300 pages. Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee Henry Waxman interrupted Boehner, asking the acting speaker Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.) to stop Boehner's mock filibuster.

But under the rules, Tauscher let Boehner continue his speech. The official Twitter of the GOP Conference reported that Boehner will read all 300 pages of the amendment.

A new Rasmussen poll released today indicates the public debate over cap-and-trade is still undefined. In fact, people have no idea what it is.

Well, not NO idea.

Rasmussen asked voters what issue "cap and trade" dealt with, presenting three options: healthcare, Wall Street, or the environment.

Just 24% correctly chose "the environment." 29% chose Wall Street, and 17% chose healthcare. A plurality--30%--said they didn't know.

In the same poll, 69% of respondents said healthcare is a bigger priority than global warming (15% chose the latter.) That question is not arbitrary. Congressional negotiations over cap-and-trade are making progress, but many Democrats are nervous that the legislation will take a back seat to healthcare. From today's NY Times:

[T]here is also a hint of nervousness that Waxman, who took over this year as the new chairman, may still stumble and be forced to drop the climate issue altogether -- to begin work on health care -- because of a lack of votes from some of his own moderate party members. Few dispute that would be a huge blow to President Obama's domestic agenda.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) blasted President Obama's cap-and-trade proposal today, saying it represented a "irresponsible, ill-conceived and distorted version of a cap-and-trade system."

Under cap-and-trade, the government would establish an emissions ceiling that polluters can exceed only if they obtain allowances.

Obama favors auctioning off all of those allowances, while some Republicans and moderate Democrats think a portion should be given away initially to ease businesses' transition into the new system.

"The president's proposal of auctioning 100 percent of the carbon credits is bad economic policy that would cost businesses billions of dollars and allow for little-to-no transition into a low carbon system," McCain told the Reform Institute Forum today. "I am a supporter of a strong cap-and-trade system, but I will not and cannot align myself with a giant government slush fund that will further burden our businesses and consumers."

The legislation currently being discussed in the House does not dictate what portion of the allowances would be auctioned. Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), a co-sponsor of the legislation, has said he believes at least some portion should be given away at first.

"Initially, at least, we have to set aside a certain amount of the carbon credits to ensure that the steel, the paper and other trade-sensitive, energy-intensive industries are not exploited in the near term by the Chinese and others in terms of them taking advantage of this increased cost," he told an MIT conference. "Right off the top, we cannot auction off all those credits."

President Obama did say during his campaign that all allowances under a cap-and-trade policy should be auctioned. But there are signs the administration is open to a compromise.

In an interview with the Washington Post, White House Science Adviser John Holdren hinted that an all-auction policy might not be feasible.

"The idea, obviously, is to end up with a bill that reflects both the thinking of Congress and the administration, a bill that the president can sign," Holdren said. He added that "whether you get to start with [100% auctions] or get there over a period of time is something that's being discussed."

Even environmentalists are flexible on the issue.

"It's not essential to us that there be 100% auctions from the start," said David Doniger, Policy Director of the Climate Center at the National Resources Defense Fund. "I think over time you want to get there."

Remember that Republican budget outline last week that was supposed to be the GOP's alternative to the president's? Remember how House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said: "Two nights ago, the president said we haven't seen a budget yet out of the Republicans...Well, it's not true, because here it is, Mr. President"?

Not so much, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said Wednesday morning. Appearing on MSNBC, Ryan said, "The thing you saw last week was not the alternative budget, this is our alternative budget," referring to the budget the GOP plans to introduce on Wednesday.

More, that budget last week, which was widely panned for lacking specifics, was a "marketing document," Ryan said.

'Somewhere along the line there was a misimpression given that that was our budget," he said.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed today, Ryan, the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, previewed the Republican budget to be revealed later this morning.

The major components, according to Ryan, include:

• SPENDING: A five year non-defense disrectionary spending freeze, with veterans affairs excluded.


• DEFICIT: By 2019, the deficit would be half that of Obama's proposal


• ENERGY: More oil exlporation, no cap-and-trade


• ENTITLEMENTS: Current Medicare secure for those over 55, with a new income-relative program moving forward


• TAXES: Make permanent the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts while setting up a parallel, simplified tax code that taxpayers could opt-in to.

Ryan also blasts the President's budget: "If this agenda comes to pass, it will mark this period in history as the moment America turned European."

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) blasted oil companies and U.S. energy policy today, responding to news that Exxon Mobil raked in the highest ever quarterly profit for a U.S. company Thursday with its third-quarter earnings of $14.83 billion.

Oil companies "continue to run up record profits to maintain the status quo even as Americans struggle to pay the high costs of heating their homes, fueling their cars, and meeting the mounting challenges of a growing economic crisis," Clinton said, calling for higher taxes on oil companies to fund develoment of clean energy technology and "immediate energy relief" for the middle class.

See Clinton's full statement below: Read more...

The White House said this morning pressed the House of Represenatives to pass a Wall Street assistance package in light of the Bureau of Labor Statistics' September jobs report, which today showed the U.S. economy losing 159,000 jobs.

The employment numbers prove that the subprime mortage crisis has spread throughout the U.S. financial system to cause a widespread financial crisis, the White House said, pressing the House to pass the Wall Street package currently under consideration to address the crisis.

"The House of Representatives must pass the Senate financial rescue package immediately," the White House said in a press release this morning. "We are in the midst of a serious financial crisis--the financial system is clogged, and credit is not available to many families and business owners who need it."

"Problems that originated in the credit markets--and first showed up in the area of subprime mortgages--have spread throughout our financial system and are threatening Main Street.