This is one in a series of Adopt A Senator For ACES diaries. RLMiller is coordinating a whip project in which a volunteer targets a particular Senator, ascertains and diaries the Senator's likely vote on ACES, and tracks the Senator's position as the bill moves through the Senate. Meteor Blades has previously written Adopt-A-Senator For ACES Targets Climate Legislation, and RLMiller originally announced Adopt A Senator for ACES, Win Friends, Influence Senate. Please contact RLMiller (email address in her profile) if you're interested in participating.
With my own Senators (Senators Mikulski and Cardin, D-MD) likely to need little encouragement to vote for climate legislation, I instead chose to adopt a Senator from the state of Virginia—the democrat Jim Webb. After all, the mid-Atlantic states of Maryland and Virginia, as well as the District of Columbia, are tied together by that vast yet fragile ecosystem known as the Chesapeake Bay. Having lived my entire life on or near tributaries of the Bay, actions taken (or not taken) by all mid-Atlantic states to combat climate change literally hit home for me.
Few states are being—and will continue be—affected by global climate change more quickly and more profoundly than the state of Virginia. From the ongoing mountaintop removal practices of the coal industry in Virginia’s corner of Appalachia, to the 3,300 miles of coastline and the endangered tributaries and estuaries of the Chesapeake Bay, Virginia is in a perilous place. Without more support for clean energy sources, air quality will increasingly worsen. Mountaintop removal and coal mining practices already contaminate water supplies, endanger public health, and threaten one of the most biodiverseareas in the United States. The citizens of Virginia stand to lose—literally—and they stand to lose big. With a possible 20+ inch rise in sea level over the next century, there’s not one inch of Virginia coastline that won’t be affected. The impact to wildlife, public health, local and national security, and local economies will be catastrophic and, in many cases, irreversible.
Can the people of Virginia count on Jim Webb, a self-described "born fighter," to stand up and be one of the Senators who casts their vote for strong, pro-environment climate legislation?
The short answer: Not without a fight.
Senator Webb isn’t known for being a progressive, and he should be considered a swing vote on this issue. Every vote counts when it comes to ACES, and it’s going to require action on the part of the people of Virginia to ensure the support of Senator Webb. Let me give you a bit of background on Jim Webb, and then I’ll attempt to explain why the voters of the Commonwealth will need to apply a little pressure to convince Senator Webb to support ACES.
A relative newcomer to the Senate, Webb was elected to his first term in 2006 by ousting incumbent republican George Allen (who brilliantly sunk his campaign by inventing the macaca moment). However, he’s no newcomer to politics, especially when it comes to military affairs, national security, and foreign relations. Webb received the Navy Cross, the Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and two Purple Hearts while serving as a Marine in Vietnam, and later went on to serve as Assistant Secretary of Defense and Secretary of the Navy during the Reagan administration. The Senator is also very involved in foreign relations, and is an expert on Asian affairs who speaks fluent Vietnamese. Interestingly, despite his military and political experience, Webb’s designated primary profession is as an author, with 9 books to his credit--several of them novels centered on themes of war--and work as a screenwriter and producer. In the Senate, Webb currently sits on the Armed Services, Foreign Relations, and Joint Economic and Veterans Affairs Committees, and serves as Chairman of the Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs on the Foreign Relations Committee. Webb's seat on the Foreign Relations Committee is of particular relevance, as this committee is one of 6 committees that will have control over pieces of the forthcoming climate legislation.
Webb has been vocal and influential on the issues of national security, military and veteran’s affairs, and prison reform since coming to the Senate, and he has long been a champion for working and middle class Americans. However, on issues of energy and the environment, Webb has been relatively quiet. His voting record reflects that of a Senator who typically votes pro-environment and who typically votes with his party. The League of Conservation Voters (LCV) gives Webb a vote rating of 88% in favor of the environment and, in a recent analysis by Nate Silver at fivethirtyeight.com, Silver concludes that Webb is a "highly likely yes vote" for ACES. Both the LCV and the analysis at 538 considered Webb’s vote for cloture to end debate on the last cap-and-trade bill to make it to the Senate floor, the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act (CSA), a pro-environment vote and one that would suggest support of the bill (or similar legislation). Well, not exactly. Webb quickly made it very clear that, while he voted to end debate and vote on the bill, that this was not an agreement with the legislation itself. Along with 9 other Senators, Webb signed a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) (see the full letter and the names of all 10 Senators here (.pdf)) stating that he would have voted against the bill, had it made it to a final vote.
So what are Webb’s concerns with enacting legislation to fight global warming? The points outlined in Senators’ letter to Reid and Boxer express concerns over the potential cost to consumers, the impact on jobs, and effects on the economy of a cap-and-trade system, among others. Hill Heat does an excellent job of dissecting the points outlined in this statement, complete with comparisons to industry-based concerns and a debunking of each (many of the Senators’ issues with the climate bill had already been appeased addressed in Boxer’s amendment to the CSA). Webb continues to vocalize concern over similar points that may be present in any future legislation and his opposition to cap-and-trade itself—apparently favoring a cap-and-dividendapproach to limiting carbon emissions—fearing that cap-and-trade is a system ripe for fraud, abuse, and waste of taxpayer dollars and may cause undue financial burden on the working class through rising energy costs. While Webb supports the expansion of clean energy sources, he also supports nuclear energy and technologies that will allow further use of fossil fuels. After the CSA was removed from the Senate floor last year, Webb told Politico that "environmentalists will be forced to compromise next year and support the development of clean coal, nuclear power and other alternative fuels."
We need to be able to address a national energy strategy and then try to work on environmental efficiencies as part of that plan," Webb said. "We can’t just start with things like emission standards at a time when we’re at a crisis with the entire national energy policy.
Many of Webb’s positions on climate legislation appear to mirror those of the traditional (i.e., dirty) energy industry. It wouldn’t be wise to ignore the potential influence of industry in Webb’s position on climate legislation—coal is big business in Virginia, and it’s no surprise that the industry is courting Senator Webb—during his time as a Senator thus far, Webb has taken $21,500 from the coal industry. While this may not seem significant when compared to the 6-digit figures some of his colleagues have received, it can’t be counted as insignificant, either. Also, let’s consider the source of most of Jim Webb’s coal money: Dominion Resources. Dominion, the large power entity in the process of building a new coal-fired plant in Wise County in southeast Virginia, with a proposal to build yet another dirty coal plant in Surry County, near Williamsburg, Virginia, is one of the biggest polluters and perpetrators of mountaintop removal mining in the state.
While Webb’s issues mirror those of the energy industry, he has always stressed that he will stand up for the well-being of working class citizens over big business. He did, in fact, speak out against Dominionwith regard to rising energy costs. If this is true, and he is not beholden to industry, than those very issues that he has with climate legislation can be the issues that convince him that climate legislation is part of the solution. These recurring themes in Webb’s opposition to climate legislation--including the potential of the cap-and-trade system to place undue financial burden on the working class, or the belief that other, more pressing issues must first be solved before a real war can be waged against climate change—can be addressed with solid, strong climate legislation. From Webb’s work of nonfiction, A Time to Fight: Reclaiming a Fair and Just America:
Issues such as global warming are indeed troubling, but at a time when our national security is in such disarray and our workers are watching their jobs disappear, those themes are not clear enough or strong enough to generate a defining, rock-hard support for any broadly based political platform. To understand this reality, one need only consider basic human nature, according to the hierarchy of needs. First, people want to eat and to be clothed and to procreate. Then they want employment and personal security. Once they have that, they look for meaningful careers and community stability, which also translates into national security. And once all of that is accomplished, they will be able to turn toward global issues such as the suffering on other continents and whether the polar ice cap is melting.
The basic needs that Webb speaks of are not mutually exclusive when it comes to climate change. Strengthening and passing ACES is what this country and the residents of Virginia need to create jobs, improve public health, and strengthen national security--and Senator Webb may prove to be a strong ally--if we're willing to fight for his support.