News
We have two op-eds this morning about tomorrow's pending Senate vote on S. J. Res. 37, the Inhofe Resolution to overturn Obama's Utility MACT rule and War on Coal.
In the Charleston Daily Mail I coauthored a piece with Donna Holstine urging Joe Manchin -- who deserves credit for publicly supporting Inhofe Resolution -- to somehow persuade his Democratic coal-state colleagues Jay Rockefeller, Bob Casey Jr., and Sherrod Brown to also vote yes.
In the Bangor Daily News I have a piece arguing that Susan Collins, who is undecided, should support the Inhofe Resolution on Utility MACT for the same reasons she worked so hard for her own amendment on its sister rule, Boiler MACT. Her leadership could also convince fellow New England moderate Republicans.
Senator Lamar Alexander is headed to a field hearing in Chattanooga, Tennessee today to once again argue in favor of the electricity price-hiking, job-destroying Utility MACT rule. Alexander is convinced that this economically disastrous rule will somehow benefit public health.
In contrast, four of his medical doctor Senate colleagues -- Sens. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and John Boozman (R-Ark.) -- wrote a stinging letter to President Obama today highlighting the lack of any health rationale for the Utility MACT rule, and the disastrous health consequences of imposing its economic costs. They said:
As you know, proponents of your EPA’s aggressive agenda claim that regulations that kill jobs and cause electricity prices to skyrocket will somehow be good for the American people. We come to this issue as medical doctors and would like to offer our “second opinion”: EPA’s regulatory regime will devastate communities that rely on affordable energy, children whose parents will lose their jobs, and the poor and elderly on fixed incomes that do not have the funds to pay for higher energy costs. The result for public health will be disastrous in ways not seen since the Great Depression.
(The full letter is below.)
The Senate is scheduled to vote on overturning this disastrous rule on Wednesday. Will your senators side with Obama and Alexander and cause an economic and public health disaster? Weigh in at www.WarOnCoal.com!
With the pending vote on Senator Jim Inhofe's S.J. Res 37 coming any day, Democrats are deeply concerned that a centerpiece of President Obama's regulatory War on Coal is about to go down in flames. The only way Democrats can prevent that outcome is by having multiple vulnerable in-cycle Democrats join Obama's War on Coal, against their own political interests.
The only Senate Republican who has publicly sided with Obama in support of the disastrous Utility MACT regulation that would cripple coal-fired power plants and therefore imperil the U.S. economic recovery is Tennessee's Lamar Alexander, and we've exposed him to his constituents in a hard-hitting TV ad.
The outcome of the vote, which is not subject to filibuster, is on a razor's edge. But Senator Alexander, who is under the mistaken impression that this economically devastating regulation will make his mountain retreat slightly more picturesque, refuses to back down.
Instead, according to sources on Capitol Hill, Alexander is poised to make a desperate attempt to get himself off the hook politically, thwart Inhofe's resolution and give Obama's War on Coal a green light. The ploy is a phony amendment, reportedly being offered with Arkansas's Mark Pryor that would extend the timeline for the Utility MACT rule from four years to six.
The amendment would not and could not pass, because it will surely be filibustered by Barbara Boxer. Inhofe's resolution needs 50 votes and has a good chance of getting there; the phony Alexander amendment will need 60 and be dead-on-arrival. And even if by some miracle it could pass, the Alexander amendment would accomplish little -- delaying a disastrous rule is hardly a victory, and most plants will close rather than attempt expensive retrofits no matter how many years they are given.
After West Virginia, no state is hit harder by Obama's War on Coal than Kentucky. It's time for Mitch McConnell to enforce some party discipline and explain to Alexander that this vote and this issue are far too important economically for phony political amendments and games that would pave the way for Obama to accomplish his goal of making electricity prices "necessarily skyrocket" and making it so that "if somebody wants to build a coal plant, they can — it’s just that it will bankrupt them."
If Alexander does offer the amendment, neither he nor anyone who votes for it should be let off the hook politically if they fail to vote for the only real vehicle that can put the brakes on the War on Coal, the Inhofe Resolution.
American Commitment led a broad coalition of free-market and conservative groups that today sent a letter to the Senate urging support for Senator Jim Inhofe's S.J. Res. 37 to overturn the Utility MACT rule.
The letter, signed by key national groups including FreedomWorks, Americans for Prosperity, Crossroads GPS, and Heritage Action as well as key state groups including the Ohio Liberty Coalition, United for Missouri, the Nashville Tea Party, and the Commonwealth Foundation.
The letter concludes:
We urge you to take your responsibility as a United States Senator seriously and to stop the effort to usurp legislative power and make electricity prices skyrocket via the Utility MACT rule. We urge you to VOTE YES on S.J. Res. 37.
American Commitment is launching a $1 million campaign aimed at stopping President Obama’s War on Coal. The campaign urges the United States Senate to support the Inhofe Resolution, S. J. Res. 37, to overturn the controversial Utility MACT regulation.
The Tennessee ad (“Alexander Joins Obama’s War on Coal”) criticizes the Republican senator for siding with Obama in his War on Coal, and urges him to reconsider.
The West Virginia ad (“Manchin, It’s Time to Lead”) recognizes that Senator Manchin is likely to vote right, but urges him to step up and be a leader.
American Commitment is also promoting a National Petition to Stop the War on Coal that has already resulted in over 20,000 letters to the Senate to support the Inhofe Resolution. It is available at www.WarOnCoal.com.