not going to be able to compete on the international basis. unlike after 9/11 where our country did not move forward on energy, this is another movement in time to move forward. i didn t expect him to give an hour-long dissertation on what should be in the bill. i think what he did was lay out a call to action for congress to get moving, whether or not the votes are there for pricing carbon or cap and trade, we will see in the senate, but the most important thing is to move forward on an energy bill so we start the investment going and get the standards in place. senator, there certainly are more low-hanging food on the energy side, but the best thing to do is cap and trade. as you indicate and people indicate on the hill, those votes aren t there. did the president need to be more specific and send that check out about cap and trade if he s really serious about going for it? well, i believe if we want to start moving on pressing carbon, he has to make sure that some of the work be
i will work with anyone to get this done. and we will get it done. he did say some of those same words tonight, but it seemed like a very different guy. could some combination of the guy we saw tonight and the guy we saw two weeks ago in pittsburgh actually make some progress here? possibly. there are two things i think are important about tonight s speech. one is that it was about bp oil, right? i think a lot of policy wonks really wanted him to talk about climate change and talk about pricing carbon. but this was about the bp oil spill and the political problems therein and the feeling of anxiety in the country over it. it was never going to be the speech you or i wanted. the second thing, since that speech he gave in pittsburgh, the situation has somewhat absurdly deteriorated for energy legislation in the senate. murkowski tried to bar the epa from regulating carbon which the supreme court said it had to do, and got 47 votes for it. and then lindsey graham abandoned a climate b
there s another version in the senate. they re looking closely at parsing these words. he spoke in a generality that gives them comfort but also pause. everybody of all stripes agrees we ought to have less dependence on foreign oil. the devil is in the details. what you didn t hear is the very clear reference to pricing carbon or pricing pollution. that s something that republicans see as an energy tax. something that would be passed right on to consumers. this is something that most democrats feel is the only way to do something about climate change. we didn t see that specific language, which sets up a situation where the president goes out and pushes a lot harder than anybody thought he would on energy. does it turn into that from the health care debate, the old public option routine where the president said, i prefer if we price carbon. but i m going to try to get the
i will work with anyone to get this done. and we will get it done. he did say some of those same words tonight, but it seemed like a very different guy. could some combination of the guy we saw tonight and the guy we saw two weeks ago in pittsburgh actually make some progress here? possibly. there are two things i think are important about tonight s speech. one is that it was about bp oil, right? i think a lot of policy wonks really wanted him to talk about climate change and talk about pricing carbon. but this was about the bp oil spill and the political problems therein and the feeling of anxiety in the country over it. it was never going to be the speech you or i wanted. the second thing, since that speech he gave in pittsburgh, the situation has somewhat absurdly deteriorated for energy legislation in the senate. murkowski tried to bar the epa from regulating carbon which the supreme court said it had to do, and got 47 votes for it. and then lindsey graham abandoned a climate b
luke, that driving demand is one of the reasons we have deep-water drilling, to keep up with not only america s consumption but the world consumption of oil. so how does looking at the disaster influence now the way lawmakers are approaching a new energy policy? well, it s one of the things that president obama wants too accomplish this summer along with harry reid, is a comprehensive energy reform bill that would go through the united states senate and ultimately through the house and become law signed by the president. democrats i spoke to today say they are really looking for president obama s leadership tonight during his address to the nation on what exactly would be in this bill and how they go forward. obviously we re going to see a few things about regulatory reform within the oil industry, so the tragedy that happened in the gulf would not happen again. that would be the front end of the bill. you ll probably also hear the preside president probably talk about sun, nuclear,