And no, this isn’t an invitation for folks on either side to explain how the seemingly-inconsistent caricatures of their opponents are somehow both true.

…the President shall submit to Congress a plan identifying domestic and international actions…

So we can expect to bomb China to rubble?

How involved are you in Democratic grass roots if you’ve never heard of Alinsky until a Republican introduced him? The guy basically invented modern community organizing (relentless boycott, picketing, hectoring, etc of individual targets) and made it an effective political force. As a 60s activist, Hillary Clinton’s interviewed Alinksy personally and her 80 page college thesis is called “There is Only the Fight … An Analysis of the Alinsky Model.” His teaching were all over the community organizers Obama taught and allied with.

I am not saying they are Alinksy cultists (or that its even wrong to use the man’s effective methods), and I don’t think the means they consciously deploy in their political machinations are out of bounds, but like any phase of life, the lessons Obama, Hilary and their peers found useful during their dalliance with Alinsky and his followers probably stayed with them.

Alinsky’s son thought so: “The Democratic National Convention had all the elements of the perfectly organized event, Saul Alinsky style. Barack Obama’s training in Chicago by the great community organizers is showing its effectiveness. …I am proud to see that my father’s model for organizing is being applied successfully beyond local community organizing to affect the Democratic campaign in 2008. It is a fine tribute to Saul Alinsky as we approach his 100th birthday.”

You are misunderstanding what this study is saying. It is not saying that carbon levels have remained the same. It is only saying that the fraction of human-produced carbon that stays in the atmosphere has remained the same.

But it does show something very important: a very significant factor in the climate forecasts is wrong, and nobody knows why. From the article:

Another result of the study is that emissions from deforestation might have been overestimated by between 18 and 75 per cent

So we are making very huge policy decisions based on science which can’t get a particular, important factor even close to right? 18-75 percent? Not only that, this is just a guess as to the problem with carbon sink estimates.

But don’t worry, the other science is just as bad – especially the paleoclimatology used to create the “hockey stick” and to magically vanish the midieval optimum (warm period), and the magical climate models that do not produce falsifiable results (i.e. are not testable in a scientific manner).

As for the provisions… ho hum… I’ll check tonight and see if Glenn Beck has integrated it into his paranoia yet.

Steve: Yeah, the wingers are really funny the way they wave around Alinsky’s rules. Like, did you know ridicule never existed as a political tactic before Alinsky invented it? Anyone who mocks their political opponents must be an Alinsky disciple, which is why the Right never ever does it.

Or, a disciple of Gorgias’.

Under current law, the President has the discretion to “use existing statutory authority to take appropriate actions,” etc.,

Is this correct? I don’t think so. For example, the President doesn’t have discretion to address global warming under the CAA – at least according to the Supreme Court in Massachusetts vs EPA. Can you point me to some specific provision of law under which the President has discretion under current law but which could be made mandatory under Section 707?

A.S.: If the agencies already have existing authority, then this provision is unnecessary. The provision is only meaningful if it is intended to accomplish something beyond what is already provided under current law.

And it does. Under current law, the President has the discretion to “use existing statutory authority to take appropriate actions,” etc., but under the proposed Section 707 he is required to do so. This wouldn’t make much practical difference to the Obama administration, but it would constrain the next President.

cubanbob: What happens when science finally debunks the AGW hysteria? Do the agencies loose all their tools with respects to this enviro-idiocy?

Um… yes, since those regulatory tools require an endangerment finding? Not that your first sentence is plausible.

The mandate to use existing authority overrules any rational decision by a Department head…like refusing to use the ESA to block oil and gas leasing because of a polar bear “crisis”.

If Barack is in the WH in 2015, think of the havoc he can create because his “hands are tied”. If we take back the WH, NRDC will be the first to sue to compel compliance…challenging ANY and ALL permits, NEPA/EIS findings, etc. There will no discussion about standing.

Mark T. Tillar: Mistaken Policy ignores science, as carbon has remained the same since 1852.

You are misunderstanding what this study is saying. It is not saying that carbon levels have remained the same. It is only saying that the fraction of human-produced carbon that stays in the atmosphere has remained the same.

“Dr Wolfgang Knorr at the University of Bristol found that in fact the trend in the airborne fraction since 1850 has only been 0.7 ± 1.4% per decade, which is essentially zero.”

So let’s look at what this is saying. Saying “the trend is essentially zero” means that there has been no significant change in something. What is that something? It is “the airborne fraction”. That is, it is what fraction of the CO2 remains airborne.

So, if the fraction stays the same, that means X tons of CO2 emitted in 1850 resulted in Y tons of CO2 in the atmosphere then and it will still result in more or less Y tons of CO2 in the atmosphere if emitted now. Thus the many times more tons of CO2 we are emitting now results in that same huge number more tons of CO2 in the atmosphere.

geokstr: This is an argument I have seen the left make over and over again here and on lots of other sites. It goes something like this:Barf.

That reminds me, I came across this:

TMZ is following Rule 4 of Saul Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals”:

There are certain words that simply reveal that the reality ship sailed a long, long time ago.

Also, that oppressed martyr outfit you’ve donned doesn’t fit you well.

And BTW, as someone who has been involved with Democratic politics for a while, I can assure you that Alinsky or his book NEVER came up until righties made a big deal of it back around election time. And I’ve worked with Bernadine Dohrn!

rj says:
(and no, “the other guys do it too!” is not a valid argument. Just because your opponent is wrong doesn’t make you right.)

This is an argument I have seen the left make over and over again here and on lots of other sites. It goes something like this:

Hey, just because when we were out of power, we used all these sleazy, slimy, dishonest, disgraceful and disgusting tactics to beat up on you, like Alinsky’s Rules, and Cloward-Piven (never let a good crisis that you have created go to waste), and fake evidence, and made up quotes, and lying, and intimidation, and lawfare, and the politics of personal destruction, etc, et al, ad nauseum, you wouldn’t want to lower yourself to our level by even thinking about doing the same things to us, now would you? Why, then you would become just like those you oppose, and two wrongs don’t make a right.

Barf.

Seriously, were you expecting entirely truthful debate with politicians and massive rent-seeking opportunities involved?

Nick

Then, there was Sen. Inhofe’s phony list of AGW-skeptical scientists, many of whom didn’t want to be on the list and even more of whom weren’t even in relevant fields.

Now there’s Vitter playing the Chavez card.

If the denialist case is so strong, why this constant stream of two-bit hackery?

(and no, “the other guys do it too!” is not a valid argument. Just because your opponent is wrong doesn’t make you right.)

And Vitter is supporting the story and spreading it.

He’s just as big a liar as the Examiner.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091110141842.htm

So we all lose our freedoms as envisioned by the founders for pop culture.

It ain’t so. Since it was the Examiner, not Vitter, that claimed that the provision would lead to “strong man powers”.

If the agencies already have existing authority, then this provision is unnecessary. The provision is only meaningful if it is intended to accomplish something beyond what is already provided under current law.

“demands the President “submit to Congress” a request for additional authorities the President believes are necessary to ensure greater emission reductions”

That doesn’t sound Constitutional to me. The Constitution (Art II, Sec 3) provides that the President shall “recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient”. Accordingly, submissions to Congress are within the President’s discretion and may not be required by this type of law.

This isn’t an enabling law by a long stretch, but the purposefully vague language urging the President to act unilaterally is a troubling aspect as far as the relative power of the two branches goes. I don’t know if it’s worthy of a press conference but I am glad somebody noticed.