When it comes to the environment, John McCain's record doesn't match his rhetoric.
You might not agree with me on every issue, but I hope you know I'm not trying to trick you or misrepresent my intentions should I be so privileged to be elected to the office I seek.
-John McCain
John McCain and his traditional media base are selling you a grand lie about his candidacy. They tell you he's a maverick, yet his economic policies are hard right. They tell you he has experience, but even he admits that he knows nothing.
Another lie: McCain is environmentally friendly. In fact, he's inconsistent, having a rating of 24% with the League of Conservation voters.
In fact, McCain's entire environmental record is riddled with opportunism. The only time he broke 50% with the League of Conservation Voters was in the 2003-2004 Congressional Year, the year of his reelection campaign. The chart below shows his environmental ratings for the past few years:
h/t League of Conservation Voters
One huge thing should jump out at you from this. Do you see all of those question marks? They're there because John McCain missed every single vote on critical environmental issues in 2007. This guy is not a leader on environmental issues - he's just a regular Republican. In fact, John McCain's score in 2007 is lower than that of ALL of the 535 Representatives who served in Congress last year - including that of one who died in office.
But it's not even that - on the issue he claims to champion, a cap-and-trade carbon emissions system - he did not support the Sanders-Boxers bill, which both Clinton and Obama supported, nor did he support the much watered down version, theLieberman-Warner bill.
From Gristmill:
McCain has never updated his position on cap-and-trade legislation, despite the steady advance in public opinion and climate science since he introduced his bill in 2003. He has not discussed, much less matched, the ambitious targets of his Dem rivals. He has not signed onto the Sanders legislation, or even Lieberman's new bill. He has not said whether he'll vote for it, and has hinted ($ub. rqd) that he'll vote Nay unless big buckets of nuclear pork are added.
In short, McCain's take on cap-and-trade legislation is now anachronistic, lagging well behind what's current, what's possible, and what's needed.
This isn't the only instance of McCain talking out of both sides of his mouth when it comes to the environment.
In 2005, John McCain put up a Climate bill. This would have been great, only he made sure that it was impossible to pass, by adding provisions to the nuclear industry that he knew would never fly.
In the 1990s, it was "my way or the highway":
But, when he wasn't safeguarding Arizona scenery, McCain usually held the conservative line, voting to hollow out clean-water and health protections or to expand offshore drilling. He also famously agitated for the construction of a controversial telescope atop Arizona's Mount Graham - which meant the razing of a forest containing an endangered species of red squirrel. When a Forest Service supervisor wanted to halt work on a road into the area, McCain was livid, according to a later investigation, threatening that, "if he did not cooperate on this project, he would be the shortest tenured forest supervisor in the history of the Forest Service."
This is a chilling and sad tale. There will be no compromise in a McCain administration, and you can be sure that St. John McBush doesn't care about the environment. You see, although McCain did some good things in 2000, like holding hearings with climate scientists, it always been established that any unorthodox stance taken by John McCain is purely for political purposes.
"A lot of us were saying it privately, but he [McCain] was one of the few willing to voice it publicly," says Riggs. "The Republicans could not be seen as anti-environment." McCain's gambit worked: The press hailed him as a kinder, gentler Republican in 1999, even as he was promising to repeal a Clinton-era ban on new roads in protected forests and skipping key votes on fuel-efficiency, wildlife, and mining bills.
You know how both Senator Clinton and Senator Obama have websites with plans on them? You know, extended PDFs with numbers, citations, expected CAFE standards, costs, and predictions? Yeah, well, McCain has none of that. His entire environmental policy consists of three paragraphs of platitudes.This guy is all talk, no substance.
So let us summarize:
- John McCain does not have a specific environmental policy.
- McCain's advisors do not intend to introduce one.
- McCain deliberately poison pilled his own environmental legislation.
- McCain missed more votes than the entire United States Congress on environmental issues in 2007.
- John McCain refused to support environmental legislation when directly confronted about it by Joe Lieberman(R-CT).
- McCain's entire environmental record is not based on a caring for the environment, but rather on the appearance of caring so as to acquire maverick status
- McCain wanted to raze the home of an endangered species of squirrel.
- John McCain is not a maverick - he is a conservative Republican with a partisan agenda. There will be no compromise or caring for the environment in a McCain administration.
Do I think John McCain will re-establish his McMaverickness for the general election? Probably, unless you guys spread awareness. Do I expect John McCain to actually do anything for the environment? Well, I'll let his advisor speak on that:
McCain's economic guru, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, told me that McCain would "consult experts" on such questions, but "probably won't put out a specific bill that keeps up with these developments." [on the environment]
Peace.
The above is part of my ongoing diary series, Taking Daily Kos back, one anti-McCain diary at a time. Everyone is invited to participate.