Having the two largest polluters on the planet working on such a deal is really big news. The news out of Washington yesterday about stepping up the gas mileage for US cars is another positive move. If China can demand a 38 mpg minimum today from the car industry, there is no reason why the US has to settle for less. The Guardian:hilzoy: Emissions StandardsThe initiative, involving John Holdren, now the White House science adviser, and others who went on to positions in Barack Obama's administration, produced a draft agreement in March, barely two months after the Democrat assumed the presidency.
The memorandum of understanding was not signed, but those involved in opening up the channel of communications believe it could provide the foundation for a US-Chinese accord to battle climate change, which could be reached as early as this autumn.
"My sense is that we are now working towards something in the fall," said Bill Chandler, director of the energy and climate programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the driving force behind the talks. "It will be serious. It will be substantive, and it will happen."
This is wonderful:
"The Obama administration today plans to propose tough standards for tailpipe emissions from new automobiles, establishing the first nationwide regulation for greenhouse gases.
It will also raise fuel efficiency targets to 35.5 miles per gallon for new passenger vehicles and light trucks by 2016, four years earlier than required under the 2007 energy bill, sources close to the administration said. (...)
The deal has been under negotiation since the first days of the administration. It represents a compromise among the White House; the state of California; and the auto industry, which has long sought national mileage standards and has waged an expensive legal battle against the California waiver. The industry will get its national standard, but at the price of one that approximates California's targets. Industry officials said they would drop all related lawsuits."
According to the Post, one of the factors pushing the auto companies to make a deal was the prospect of having their CO2 emissions regulated by the EPA. The deal involves both mileage and tailpipe standards, which the Post describes as roughly equivalent. The state of California, for its part, gets national standards that are almost as stringent as the ones it has tried to set for itself.
Grist adds (quoting a "senior administration official"):
"Another significant change in the new standards is that the new standards will include tougher standards for each class size of vehicles, as well as a higher average across each company's fleet, according to the official. The previous rules covered only the fleet average, which meant that companies could offset a giant SUV with some more fuel efficient models.
"This has the effect of preserving consumer choice," said the official. "You can continue to buy whatever size car you like, all cars get cleaner.""
This will raise the cost of cars. The Washington Post estimates that today's rules will add $600 to the price of an average car, though it's not clear to me whether this figure is for price increases between now and 2016 or for some other time frame. But I think it's well worth it. For one thing, we badly need to reduce our dependence on oil for the sake of the climate. Grist's "senior official" again:
"The official also estimated that this emissions reductions from the CAFE increase will equate to taking 177 million cars off the road, or shutting down 194 coal-fired power plants."
That's a lot of CO2 not being emitted.
For another, if you expect the price of oil to spike again once the world economy revives and to (more or less) stay high as the world's oil supplies dwindle, then it makes sense to take steps to ensure that the transition to more expensive gasoline is as gradual and painless as possible. Getting a good start on more fuel-efficient cars will help a lot.
Good move.
Marshall: Best Line of the Day
Actually, several.
Yglesias ...
You know, Newt Gingrich knows a lot about saying stupid things and being forced out of the job as Speaker. ... But one way or the other -- I mean, I wasn't in the room, you weren't in the room, Newt Gingrich wasn't in the room. None of us know exactly what happened there. But whatever it is Nancy Pelosi knew about, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, John Yoo, Jay Bybee, they knew more. And ultimately, when we have a thorough investigation of what happened, the bulk of the blame has to lie with the architects of the policy, not with a member of the opposition party.
- Marshall: Reading More Closely
From deep in The Politico beast, we find that Josh Gerstein's close reading acumen has not at all been impaired. Here's Gerstein looking closely this afternoon at that Leon Panetta statement from last Friday ...
Central Intelligence Agency Director Leon Panetta didn't reject or deny House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's allegations that she was falsely briefed by the CIA about interrogations.
Look carefully at Panetta's statement from Friday, especially the verb tense used. "Let me be clear: It is not our policy or practice to mislead Congress." First, "let me be clear" always precedes an ambiguous statement. Without fail. Panetta isn't opining on past acts. He's referring to the current policy. He's also not saying it never happens or happened that someone lied to or misled Congress. He's saying the agency as a whole doesn't intend to.
Panetta was at his Monterey, Calif. think tank when this all happened in 2002 and 2003. He doesn't know if Pelosi was lied to. He also doesn't say he talked to the briefers and is convinced they're telling the truth. He just says the paper records say she was briefed about the techniques. We knew that already from agency statements. So he's adding his voice to the mix and sending a signal that he'll stand by his agency, but to say he sided with the briefers on the specifics is just wrong.
Again, I'm not saying Pelosi was lied to or even misled. It would seem rather brazen to do that. But Panetta's statement says less than people are claiming.
This is just right. This was certainly Panetta standing up for his Agency after Pelosi, the second person in line to the presidency, had taken a swipe. But to get the full significance of a document, even a simple memo, you need to look past the toplines to what the text actually says. And if you read Panetta closely he didn't take any position at all on the key question of whether Pelosi was right or not. It was a point lost on virtually everyone in town.
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Kleefeld (TPM): Gallup: GOP Falls With Nearly Every Group, Down To Conservative, Church-Going Base
A new analysis by Gallup, compiled from their national polling done all this year, shows just how extensive the Republican Party's drop in voter self-identification has been, with decreases in nearly every demographic.
Compared to 2001, when George W. Bush first took office as president, GOP self-identification has fallen by ten points among college graduates, nine points among those 18-29 years of age, nine points in the Midwest, six in the East, five in the West, and even four points in the South. Married people identifying as Republicans have decreased by five points, and the difference is eight points among the unmarried. The list goes on and on.
In 2001, voters were 33% Democratic, 32% Republican, and 34% independent, with a Republican edge of 47%-46% after leaners were pushed. But now, it's 36% Democrats, 27% Republicans and 37% independents, with a huge Democratic advantage of 52%-37% with leaners.
The only bright spots for the GOP are three base groups: Frequent churchgoers, with no decrease at all; conservatives, with only a one-point decrease; and voters 65 years of age or older, with a one-point decrease. It should also be noted that they've only gone down one point among non-whites -- but this is because they didn't have much party identification there to begin with.
- Patrick Appel: GOP Losing Everyone, Ctd
Larison reacts to that Gallup poll:
The Midwest figures are stunning: Republican ID in this region has dropped by nine points. This is not just the heartland, which the GOP is supposed to represent so well, but it has been the historic core of Republican politics at a national level since the founding of the party. Even having lost the Northeast is not quite as bad as being decimated in the Midwest. The GOP has even lost five points among married voters, six points among whites, seven points among men and nine points among middle-income voters, all of which are equal to or greater than the national average. This is the hollowing-out of the Republican coalition as we know it.
Daughter defense May 18: Liz Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, criticized Col. Larry Wilkerson, who happens to be Colin Powell's former chief of staff, about "VP fantasies" he said about her dad. Col. Wilkerson talks to Rachel Maddow about her comments.
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