With an e-mail sent to members of Organizing for America and a decision to highlight the need for energy reform during his address from the Oval Office on Tuesday evening, President Obama appears to be ratcheting up his push to pass clean energy legislation this year.
The e-mail asked OFA members to sign their names to a petition calling for "comprehensive energy and climate reform" that addresses climate change, ends dependence on foreign oil, and leads to economic growth by creating green jobs.
This is how we will reinvent our economy -- and create new companies and new jobs all across the country.
There will be transition costs and a time of adjustment. But if we refuse to heed the warnings from the disaster in the Gulf -- we will have missed our best chance to seize the clean-energy future we know America needs to thrive in the years and decades to come.
In addition, while tomorrow's presidential address on the national response to BP's oil disaster will focus on relief efforts for the Gulf Coast, Mike Allen reports it will also highlight the urgency of passing comprehensive clean energy legislation.
According to Allen, the administration is insisting that any energy legislation focus on the urgency of breaking our addiction to fossil fuels.
A Senate Democratic leadership aide tells Playbook that the administration has told Sens. Kerry and Lieberman, who last month introduced an “American Power Act,” that an energy deal MUST include some serious effort to price carbon as a way to slow climate change.
Allen also noted that President Obama said on Friday that the BP disaster will shape the national conversation about energy issues in much the same way that 9/11 shaped the national conversation about foreign policy. (Presumably, this time the President wants to get the policy right, however!)