Thursday, January 21, 2010

Hope you kept your snorkels, New Orleans

One must marvel at the lengths our elected betters go sometimes to completely toady to their corporate donors. Take, for instance, Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu. As Senator for the beleaguered state she must know that any of the adverse effects of global warming and climate change will adversely effect her state. From floods, to heat, to extra powerful hurricanes, to New Orleans going under water a couple more dozen times, to Drew Brees pulling a hamstring, all of these are climate dangers that will specifically damage states like Louisiana.

On the other hand, she gets $1.5 million in donations of pro-pollution, anti-environmental sectors so, her hands are tied. So you can see why she's working so hard to make sure her state drowns.
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) told reporters Wednesday that she is working with Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) on Murkowski's efforts to block EPA from regulating greenhouse gases under the agency's current Clean Air Act powers.
...
"I am considering that right now," Landrieu said when asked whether she backed Murkowski's plan. "I have been working with her on it."

Landrieu said she is not yet ready to announce anything but believes the Clean Air Act is not meant to be applied to carbon dioxide emissions.
Yeah, of course carbon dioxide isn't a pollutant that should be regulated by the Clean Air Act or the EPA. It's as obvious as the fact that the Earth was formed 6,000 years ago and the fact that I DIDN'T DESCEND FROM NO ORANGUTAN!!!!!!

You know you can kind of understand when congresspeople from South Dakota don't get all that thrilled about acting on climate legislation. Hell, it's not like South Dakota is going to be covered by melted ice cap water or hit by extra powerful hurricanes. South Dakota could take a direct meteor strike and the entire state would barely look different. In fact increased temperatures and a coastline that advances inland by a couple hundred miles would actually dramatically improve most of the Midwest. But for a Senator who represents a state that contains large chunks of population and infrastructure below sea level and is already vulnerable to extreme weather? It's almost completely indefensible.

On the other hand, $1.5 million is a lot of money. She probably made the right choice.

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