Climate 411

Claim:

“Unveiled: Democrat Cap and Tax Proposal”

That’s the headline of a Republican Study Committee “fact”sheet taking on the Waxman-Markey draft climate bill.

Their points include:

• The [Waxman-Markey] draft [legislation] includes a study to implement a cap and trade system, or more accurately: ‘cap and tax.’
• According to a study conducted by the Massachusetts of Technology [sic], the total energy bill for the average household will increase by up to $3,128 per year.
• A cap & tax system would raise costs for American manufacturers, reduce market share, and in turn ship jobs to competitors that are not subject to similar limits on greenhouse gas emissions.

— Republican Study Committee responding to the draft legislative proposal offered by Reps. Henry Waxman and Ed Markey, March 31, 2009

Truth:

As we’ve posted before, global warming is not a partisan issue. Its impacts will be felt by Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike.

Key Republican leaders support national global warming action — including Governors Arnold Schwarzenegger from California and Jon Huntsman from Utah; senior statesmen like former Senator John Warner from Virginia and Senator Richard Lugar from Indiana; and the Republican nominee for President last year, Senator John McCain.

We are working with leaders on both sides of the aisle, because we need an American solution, not a partisan fight.

So, we take no pleasure in challenging the Republican Study Committee’s false claims (okay, we may have had a little fun).

The RSC mangled the facts. For example, far from being a job killer, the Political Economy Research Institute reports that every dollar invested in renewable energy and energy efficiency will produce roughly three times more jobs than spending the same amount within polluting industries.

And, the RSC reuses the bogus claim that the average household will see their energy bills increase by up to $3,128 per year. One of the authors of the MIT report on which this claim is based wrote a letter to Republican leadership saying the number is really $340 (estimate for the average total impact per family) and urged Republicans to stop misrepresenting the MIT report.

Here’s our slightly cheeky FACTsheet rebuttal.

Claim:

“Families and small businesses are struggling to get by, but the Democrats’ budget would raise taxes on every American who drives a car, flips on a light switch, or buys a product manufactured in the United States. In fact it would cost every family as much as $3,100 a year in additional energy costs through their ‘cap-and-trade’ energy tax, and will drive millions of good-paying American jobs overseas.”

— House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), from his “Leader Alert,” April 2, 2009.

Truth:

Groundhog day is February 2nd, not April 2nd, and April Fool’s was yesterday. So, we’re having a hard time understanding why the House Minority Leader would reuse the bogus $3,100 per household figure in describing the costs of a carbon cap.

He must not read the Truth Squad. Nor does it appear he reads his mail.

As we posted yesterday in a response to the National Republican Campaign Committee’s misuse of this same number — what PolitiFact called a “Pants on Fire” lie — John Reilly, the author the MIT study on which Rep. Boehner bases the $3,100 number, wrote him a letter yesterday [pdf] urging Republicans to stop misusing that figure.

Reilly wrote, “The [NRCC] press release claims our report estimates an average cost per family of a carbon cap and trade program that would meet targets now being discussed in Congress to be over $3,000, but that is nearly 10 times the correct estimate which is approximately $340. Since the issue of legislation to control greenhouse gases is now under consideration, I wanted to take an opportunity to clear up any misunderstanding created by this press release and to avoid further confusion.”

So, that’s $340, not $3100. Yet, Boehner seems to think he knows more about the MIT study than the actual author of the MIT study.

DeSmogBlog calls it a lie while Grist says he’s just off by 98%.

We prefer to think Boehner just got his months confused and believes today actually is Groundhog Day.

Claim

“MIT researchers released an ‘Assessment of U.S. Cap-and-Trade Proposals,’ which shows that the increase would be an increase of more than $3,000 a year for each household.

— From press release issued by the National Republican Congressional Committee targeting new and politically vulnerable House Democrats, March 31, 2009.

Truth

PolitiFact, a nonpartisan watchdog group whose full response is available here, calls this a “Pants on Fire” lie.

According to PolitiFact, the NRCC used an MIT report analyzing a similar cap-and-trade bill last year. The MIT report said the bill, under certain assumptions, could raise $366 billion per year. The NRCC divided this by 117 million households in the U.S. to get to $3,128.

But, according to John Reilly, an MIT economist and one of the authors of the report, the interpretation that what is raised under a cap policy can be equated to cost per household is “just wrong. It’s wrong in so many ways it’s hard to begin…”

And, courtesy of Think Progress, here is a letter [pdf] Reilly just sent to House Republican Minority Leader John Boehner urging the NRCC to stop misrepresenting the MIT report.

Read the full PolitiFact post for more on how NRCC got this all wrong.

Pants on fire indeed!

Claim:

Despite Democrats’ promises to deliver tax relief to families who need it the most, the recent budget proposal from the White House includes a “cap-and-trade” provision that should more appropriately be named the “cap-and-tax” provision, because if it became law it would raise energy taxes on every single person who flips on a light switch. As Congress takes the President’s federal budget under consideration, [insert state] families deserve to know if Rep. [insert name] would support such a devastating energy tax proposal.”

— From press release issued by the National Republican Congressional Committee targeting new and politically vulnerable House Democrats, March 31, 2009.

Truth:

Global warming is not a partisan issue. Its devastating impacts will be felt by Democrats, Republicans and Independents alike. And it will take our combined efforts as a nation to overcome the grave threat of run-away global warming.

Many leading Republicans support a strong bill to cap America’s global warming pollution — including Governors Arnold Schwarzenegger from California and Jon Huntsman from Utah; senior statesmen like former Senator John Warner from Virginia and Senator Richard Lugar from Indiana; and the Republican nominee for President last year, Senator John McCain.

These leaders understand what the NRCC and other opponents apparently don’t — that ignoring global warming won’t make it go away; that sticking with our current energy policies will only keep us addicted to foreign oil; that a real economic recovery depends on rebuilding our energy infrastructure; and that a cap on carbon will create new millions of new jobs in clean energy industries throughout our country.

Instead of offering constructive ideas on how to seriously deal with the threat the global warming and free America from our dependence on foreign oil, the same people who brought us the worst economic mess since the 1930’s are simply trying to scare us. These tired political tactics have no basis in reality — they are just one made up statistic after another about how bad things will be if we try anything different.

In reality, the costliest action we could possibly take is to do nothing about global warming — just stick our heads in the sand and pretend there’s no threat. This will lead to rising insurance premiums, increased infrastructure costs, and billions more we’ll have to spend to deal with natural disasters: floods, droughts, wildfires and the like.

What our opponents really advocate is a huge do-nothing tax that will blow up our economy and devastate our environment.

This morning, Congressmen Henry Waxman (D-Ca.) and Ed Markey (D-Ma.) released a 600-page draft and put their committee on the path to passing climate legislation this year.  The details will be worked out in the legislative process, but this is great progress.

If Congress succeeds in passing a cap on carbon emissions, we will address global warming and pump billions of dollars into clean energy and new jobs. If we fail — well, let’s not fail.

Here’s the response from EDF’s president, Fred Krupp:

Chairmen Waxman and Markey are experienced legislators who have focused on exactly the right issues to quickly build consensus and allow Congress to pass a strong bill this year.

We applaud the Chairmen for moving forward boldly and deliberately with their proposal for comprehensive legislation, and we look forward to working with them, the congressional leadership, and the Obama administration to help refine and pass a bill this year.

Claim:

“I want people in Minnesota armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax because we need to fight back. Thomas Jefferson told us, ‘Having a revolution every now and then is a good thing,’ and the people – we the people – are going to have to fight back hard if we’re not going to lose our country. And I think this has the potential of changing the dynamic of freedom forever in the United States…

“The science is on our side on this one, and the science indicates that human activity is not the cause of all this global warming. And that in fact, nature is the cause, with solar flares, etc.”

— Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) on AM1280, a local radio station, 3/21/09 (thanks to The New York Times Green Inc. blog for highlighting the quote).

Truth:

We’ll leave it to the authorities to decide whether Rep. Bachman’s call to arms crosses the line of inciting violence.

As to the substance of her statement, the Congresswoman is way off the mark.

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