Today in Washington, D.C. - June 10, 2010 - Senate Vote Today Will Determine If the EPA Has The Right to Regulate and Thus Tax Breathing

Today, the Senate will be voting on a resolution being offered by Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, to block the EPA’s recent decision that it can regulate greenhouse gasses (carbon dioxide - CO2 - what people and animals exhale) as a pollutant.  The EPA must believe that God (if they even believe there is a God) made a mistake and they are going to fix it.  It is thinking like this that has lead in the past to eugenics thinking and the killing of humans. No, the EPA is not addressing killing anyone,  but their actions devalue life which leads to actions that threaten humanity as well as other living animals. Of course, the focus is not on the morality of the issue but the economics created by excessive government expansion, taxation and the killing of jobs.

S.J. Res. 26 if passed could block the EPA’s action. There will be up to 6 hours of debate on the motion to proceed to the resolution. Upon use or yielding back of the time (likely around 3:45 PM), the Senate will vote on the motion to proceed. If the motion is agreed to, there will be another hour of debate and then a vote on passage of the resolution. The resolution cannot be filibustered and requires a simple majority to pass.

Following the final vote on the Murkowski resolution, the Senate will resume consideration of the House message to accompany H.R. 4213, the debt-extending “tax extenders bill”. Yesterday, the Senate rejected several amendments to the extenders bill. Among those were: an amendment from Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD) to allow adult children up to age 26 to stay on the health plans of federal employees, an amendment from Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) to exempt pediatric medical devices from a new tax on them imposed by the Democrats’ health care bill, and an amendment from Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) to impose discretionary spending caps for the next 3 fiscal years. Later, senators approved two amendments concerning reporting of foreign debt holdings.

In an op-ed for The Hill, former CBO Director Doug Holtz-Eakin explains the resolution: “The move essentially vetoes the endangerment finding by the EPA — a determination that greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare, and therefore must be regulated through the Clean Air Act. Unfortunately, the Clean Air Act was designed to take on stationary air pollution sources, not something as complex and as far-reaching as carbon dioxide.”

Writing in the Cape Cod Times today, Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) adds, “While many of my colleagues have argued that giving the EPA the ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions is the answer to our energy problems, I disagree. This action would give an unelected and unaccountable government agency the power to impose restrictive and damaging carbon dioxide regulations that will drive up energy prices and hurt job-creating small businesses in our country. . . .The bottom line is that we cannot have every restaurant owner or small farmer worried about the costs of complying with new carbon dioxide emissions restrictions. This is why I am supporting Sen. Lisa Murkowski's resolution to oppose these costly new EPA regulations.”

Speaking on the floor this morning, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell pointed to the importance of this vote. “This vote is needed because of the administration’s insistence on advancing its goals by any means possible, in this case, by going around the legislative branch and imposing this massive job-killing tax on Americans through an unaccountable federal agency. . . . That’s why groups representing farmers, builders, manufacturers, small business owners, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are so strongly opposed to these EPA regulations, and so supportive of the Murkowski resolution to stop them. These groups know that this backdoor move by the EPA would deal a devastating blow to an economy that’s already in rough shape. . . . At a time of nearly 10% unemployment, these new regulations would kill U.S. jobs.”

And as Holtz-Eakin points out, this is a bipartisan resolution. He cites the objections to the EPA regulation from Democrat Reps. Ike Skelton of Missouri and Charlie Wilson of Ohio. Even Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) spoke out in favor of the Murkowski resolution on the floor today, saying, “EPA regulation of greenhouse gases does not move us any closer to a clean energy future or to reducing our dependency on foreign oil. And, furthermore, it simply is the wrong tool for addressing greenhouse gas emissions. Congress, the elected representatives of the people of this nation, not unelected bureaucrats, should be making the complicated multifaceted decisions on energy and climate policy.”

It’s worth noting that this resolution only requires a simple majority of 51 votes to pass the Senate. But if it is defeated by any fewer than 60 votes, it should be clear to Democrat leaders that not only do senators on both sides of the aisle reject the EPA’s actions, but there is clearly bipartisan opposition to any carbon cap-and-trade bill. Regardless of whether the Murkowski resolution passes, a clear bipartisan rejection of the EPA’s overreach should demonstrate that there are not 60 votes for the Obama administration’s cap-and-trade scheme.

That said, the Senate should support the bipartisan Murkowski resolution to block the EPA’s overreach in regulating human's and animal breathing, and protect Americans from new regulations that will kill jobs and raise the cost of energy.

Additional items to consider:

- Kevin Mooney's article: EPA’s Proposed “Tailoring” of Clean Air Act Violates Separation of Powers
- Senators Speaking on the EPA Carbon Regulations Would Eliminate Jobs, Tax Businesses [video]

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