Drilling Plan May Buoy Efforts on Energy Policy
Ever since he ran Bill Clinton’s “It’s the Economy, Stupid” presidential campaign in 1992, James Carville has held a reputation for common-sense Democratic strategy.
In recent years, Mr. Carville has seized on the transformation of America’s energy system, which simultaneously touches voter concerns about the economy, national security and the environment. But he acknowledges that “energy independence” has lately lost political altitude.
Relatively low gas prices have drained away urgency, and the recession has heightened fears of economic dislocation. Republican charges that President Obama favors what they call a “cap and tax” plan that would destroy jobs while limiting carbon emissions have further damaged prospects for comprehensive energy legislation in Congress — just seven months before midterm elections.
But Mr. Carville, a Louisiana-bred campaign veteran, found encouragement in Mr. Obama’s new plan to expand domestic oil drilling. The plan makes it easier for Senator Mary Landrieu, a Democrat from Mr. Carville’s home state, to back the president’s goals; it also increases pressure to cooperate on pro-drilling Republicans.
Having prevailed on health care and made progress on new Wall Street regulations, Mr. Obama and his Congressional allies “are starting to move the chains a little bit,” Mr. Carville noted. On energy, “They’re setting the table for something that’s inevitable.”
The springtime 2010 question is: inevitable when?
A Senate Plan
Energy legislation has always been the most challenging item on Mr. Obama’s agenda. It lacks health care’s 70-year pedigree as a Democratic priority. Indeed, it divides Democrats while triggering intense Republican opposition.
Liberal environmentalists echo former Vice President Al Gore in demanding action to embrace alternative energy and move away from fossil fuels that contribute to global warming. Democrats from oil states, like Ms. Landrieu, or from coal states, like Senator John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia, remain wary.
Thus some White House strategists have long assumed that “cap and trade” could not clear Congress before the 2010 elections.
Yet the idea has proved surprisingly resilient. House Democrats, led by Representatives Henry A. Waxman of California and Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts, offered enough concessions to affected interests to pass cap and trade in their comprehensive energy bill last year. Now an ideologically divergent Senate triad — a liberal Democrat, John Kerry of Massachusetts; an independent, Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut; and a conservative Republican, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina — are preparing to unveil their version.
Like the House bill, their work in progress would reduce carbon emissions by 17 percent from 2005 levels over a 10-year period. That matches the goal Mr. Obama specified at global climate talks in December.
The three senators eschew the politically tainted term “cap and trade,” but not the concept. They would begin by capping carbon emissions for utilities, and in later years extend caps to manufacturers.
For the oil industry, they would impose a fee on refiners. To lure conservative Democrats and swing-vote Republicans, they would expand oil drilling and incentives for nuclear power.
Senators Kerry, Lieberman and Graham hope for passage by July 4, then negotiations with the House. But mustering the 60 Senate votes needed to overcome a filibuster represents a huge hurdle.
The Right Time?
Even advocates agree that after the exhausting health care push, it is an uphill fight. In fact, Tim Wirth, a former Democratic senator from Colorado who now leads the United Nations Foundation, warns that the debate could turn into an effort by Mr. Obama simply to prevent Congress from blocking his regulatory authority to limit carbon emissions. That authority represents the administration’s backup plan if legislation fails.
But the administration and its allies have not given up, insisting that only a carbon cap will create incentives for the American renewable energy industry to flourish and compete with economic rivals, notably China. The Senate negotiators have actively wooed support from business, including oil companies.
Within the 59-member Senate Democratic caucus, the conservative Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas and Ben Nelson of Nebraska appear out of reach. But as Mr. Graham prods his party to respond to younger voters’ environmental concerns, there is a chance of offsetting Democratic defections.
“There’s a path to five or six Republicans,” said Carol M. Browner, Mr. Obama’s coordinator of energy and climate policy. Among the prospects: moderate Senators Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine; Mr. Kerry’s Massachusetts colleague, Scott Brown; and George LeMieux of Florida, Richard G. Lugar of Indiana, and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire.
If time runs out before the election, the administration holds out the option of finishing negotiations in a lame-duck session of Congress. Meanwhile, Mr. Obama may have to choose between insisting on a comprehensive bill or setting aside the carbon cap for a narrower approach focused on new energy sources.
Mr. Carville concedes that this may not prove the right moment for a more aggressive approach. But as other nations move to curb fossil fuels, he calls it only a matter of time.
“It’s about 2010,” Mr. Carville concluded, “and it’s about 2014, too.”
