Climate changer-in-chief Jim Inhofe
President Obama's efforts to fight climate change are high on the Republican list of policies to obstruct or undo once their Senate majority is sworn in. The GOP plan is to push for approval of the Keystone pipeline while
attacking Environmental Protection Agency regulations. Because Republicans are opposed to cleaning up emissions from power plants for a host of reasons.
At this point, Republicans do not have the votes to repeal the E.P.A. regulations, which will have far more impact on curbing carbon emissions than stopping the pipeline, but they say they will use their new powers to delay, defund and otherwise undermine them. Senator James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, a prominent skeptic of climate change and the presumed new chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, is expected to open investigations into the E.P.A., call for cuts in its funding and delay the regulations as long as possible.
For Inhofe, promoting global climate change may be the ultimate article of faith. Because powerful energy companies should get what they want. Because Americans shouldn't be inconvenienced in any way, however small, to keep the glaciers and polar ice caps from melting and coastal areas from being flooded and agriculture from becoming unsustainable and all the other effects of climate change coming down the road at us. Because science is suspect, so if science tells us this is an issue, the issue is suspect. To that, Mitch McConnell adds local reasons to fight regulation of emissions from coal-fired power plants:
For Mr. McConnell, fierce opposition to the E.P.A. regulations is more than just a political priority. Kentucky is one of the country’s top coal producers, and coal generates over 90 percent of the state’s electricity. His re-election campaign was driven by a promise to protect Kentucky from what Republicans called Mr. Obama’s “war on coal.”
In reality, Kentucky has been losing coal jobs for decades due to mechanization and the state's coal getting tapped out after a century of mining. At this point, coal mining accounts for
0.6 percent of jobs in the state and brings in $528 million in state revenue
while costing $643 million in state expenditures. But defending coal is a way for McConnell to play the populist while actually being on the side of big business.
Welcome to the next two years. It'll be like the last four years, but now the Republican obstruction will be on steroids.