CBO: Kerry-Lieberman bill trims deficit by $19B over 10 years

[impik]

An energy and climate bill co-sponsored by Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) would reduce the deficit by $19 billion during the next decade, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) found Wednesday.

The American Power Act would cost taxpayers $732 billion over the next 10 years, but bring in even more revenue, the nonpartisan budget office reported.

"There is no more room for excuses — this must be our year to pass comprehensive climate and energy legislation and begin to send a price signal on carbon," Kerry and Lieberman said in a statement. "Many of our colleagues have said they flatly oppose anything that adds a penny to the deficit, so we hope they look anew at this initiative which reduces it.”

The CBO report could give the legislation a boost among deficit hawks before lawmakers return from recess next week. Democratic leaders have said they hope to proceed with some kind of energy and climate bill this summer or fall, though it's not clear what shape that legislation will take.

The score could be particularly appealing to Midwestern Democrats, who have raised fears that the bill would be too much of a tax on the economy, particularly for states relying more on fossil fuels.

The CBO also projected the Kerry-Lieberman bill wouldn't increase deficits in decades to come "because additional direct spending would be less than the additional net revenues attributable to the legislation in each of those periods."

This proposal would also go further than the Waxman-Markey, cap-and-trade climate change bill passed by the House last year, the CBO said. CBO's estimate of that bill said it would reduce deficits by $9 billion over the next decade.

Republicans, for their part, have consistently opposed all of these measures, calling them a backdoor to taxing job producers in the U.S.



http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/107501-cbo-kerry-lieberman-bill-trims-deficit-by-19b-over-10-years

[karynnj]

1. Beteen this, the estimate that it creates 400,000 jobs and that the highest estimate of cost is less

than 50 cents a day - makes this a no brainer.

[YvonneCa]

4. Definitely a no-brainer. I also thought...

...that what the Senator said in the New Yorker interview was critical...that his bill puts in place $$$ to ease the burden of implementation on individuals and businesses. And he said the other route to pricing carbon...EPA rules and the other bill (I forget the sponsor) would not do that.

I think it's important to price carbon...and have that extra $$$ cushion as such a change is implemented.

[karynnj]

7. That interview was so good - and that is an excellent point

The other bill was the Bingaman energy only bill. The interviewer asked about the combination of that with EPA rules. (This was one of several excellent questions that was asked. )

[YvonneCa]

8. BINGAMAN. Thank you...

...:7 Sometimes I just need another cup of coffee. :) It was a very good question, asked by Ryan Lizza. And I thought Kerry answered it well, by explaining how his bill was a much better route to take. :hi:

[vaberella]

9. 400,000 jobs?! Are you shitting me?! This is brilliant.

I hope this gets passed.

[ProSense]

20. That's actually the job creation per year. Lower estimates

are for about 200,000 per year.

[vaberella]

31. Per year?! Are you shitting me?! That's breathtaking. Dear God.

What are they waiting for?! This is what we need, then we can get rid of those coal mining and oil drilling jobs in the mid-West. They're dangerous and should be obsolete by now.

[truedelphi]

2. A savings of nineteen billion over ten years?

Yikes! Our nation spends fifteen billion EACH MONTH on the stupid endless wars.

Other important question to ask - who will be paying for this climate bill? We the little small people that BP won't even offer respirators to, as we clean up their tar ball filled beaches?

Or the Big Players.

Sadly, any thinking person knows who will pay.

[karynnj]

3. The EPA estimate of cost is $79 to $150 a year per household

That is less than 50 cents a day - 50 cents to possibly avoid the biggest catastrophe that could hit the United States.

The significance of the $19 billion reduction in the deficit is that the CW was that it would cost money to do it.

[YvonneCa]

5. That's why Kerry's bill is better. It includes ...

...$$$ to 'cushion' the changes. New Yorker interview:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/currents/2010/07/john-kerry.html


(Thanks, MBS! :) )

[truedelphi]

12. I no longer care about this. Just think about it -

BP has oil gushing at the rate of 500K to one million barrels per however long (Depending on who you listen to - per day, per week, per month) meanwhile, half my friends are so guilty if they waste that one papoer plate, or drive instead of walking half a mile to the store - even though today it is over 100 degrees here.)

Before I approve of any climate bill, it better start:

1) making noise about the most senseless use of the planet's resources - wars...

2) start making it mandatory with strictly written and ENFORCED laws so that we don't have these endless oil gushing "accidents" - if you think the Gulf is bad now, just wait until the melting ice in Alaska affects the tundra enough that the entire pipeline system there goes "Splat!"

3) Require our government to follow the lead of Germany regarding the chem trails. Start telling the truth about the resources used in the endless chem trail spraying. And also to tell us Germany is allowing the citizens to sue NATO for the spraying, while the indoctrinated dummies I am surrounded by insist the chem trails are con trails.

Meanwhile I envision we little people being penalized for using paper plates and plastic bags (plastic bag material will end up in the landfills if we don't use it outright - where is all the petroleum distillate waste product that is used to make these gonna go? It will end up being dumped in creeks in the areas of the nation where Big Oil controls the local politics, and end up snuck out of the regulated counties in unmarked trucks in the middle of the night.)

[YvonneCa]

13. SOooo....

...who do you think is working for these goals you believe are important?

[truedelphi]

16. Are you even aware of the fact that the people who are

Wanting cap and trade are totally unaware that it more than likely will weaken the safeguards we now have in a revised Clean Air Act? That once it is in, our Air will be worse?

In case you want to read up on that:

http://news.firedoglake.com/2010/07/07/epa-begins-power-plant-regulation/

[YvonneCa]

17. From 2005...

...CFR (One must listen all the way through the Q and A to get the climate/energy discussion.)

http://www.cfr.org/publication/9397/real_security_in_a_post911_world_audio.html


The Hill: http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/107327-epa-draft-clean-air-could-affect-future-regs-congress


In case you want to read up on that... ;)

[truedelphi]

19. I am one third of the way through the Kerry speech

And of course, it is all very dated.

If Kerry was talking to me, right in my room this minute, I would ask him why the Arabian/Muslim nations have to and must become more like us (per his thesis) - Gee, Sen kerry, I haven't noticed any of their huge oil releases swamping their seas, but instead those spills are efficiently cleaned up.

And on and on he blabs. The inadvertent mistakes the Buish regime has made in Iraq (inadvertant? Does he really beleive that or does he just have to say it to the very conservative Foreign Relations group?)

I would really have liked it if you had explained what it is that is supposed to be the point you want me to know. I am sure I'll be asleep by the time that he gets to the Q &A section of this blabbing.

[politicasista]

21. delete

not appropriate.

[YvonneCa]

23. Okay...

...:7 I am so impressed that you are listening. You are right about it being dated. And most of the discussion of energy security comes after the speech during the Q ans A. Most people I know who have listened, though, say the speech gives context to the Q and A (if you can stay awake. :7 )

The point I want you to know is that Kerry is the one who is (and has been) fighting for exactly what you say you want for years...even before 2004 and this speech in 2005. NOW he has a bill to move us in the right direction...maybe not all the way, because of the GOP stone-walling, but he is doing the right thing. He gets it.

THAT's what I hope you will get from the speech. If you survive it. :7 And if you don't...thank you for trying. I really appreciate that.


P.S. The use of 'inadvertant' is 2005-speak. Remember the 'cut and run' stuff? Kerry was still tip-toeing in 2005. :7

[truedelphi]

25. I finally skipped to the Q & A section.

I am hoping the parts I mention are what you intend for me to hear from Kerry.

In Q & A he mentions Emory Lovins Foundation, forget the name, but the Institute in Colorado for alternate energy.

I actually helped people install solar equipment on their homes in CO during the late nineteen seventies, so am very familiar with that place. So many people had literature from them, and would also go to hear them speak. Like Kerry points out, this nation was moving towards alternative energy sources for running our households, under the Carter administration, due to the tax rebates for people installing alternate energy sources.

Unfortunately this scared the Shit out of the Big Oil Producers, who then under Reagan got the tax rebates removed and we sank into more dependence on oil, gas and nuclear power.

Now one of the things that was great about that era was that people following these programs were energy independent.

The way it is being set up now - people can only get help for doing this (unless they are uber rich) by plugging into the PG & E utility here in California. And PG & E is planning on these huge solar and wind farms, which means they still control everything. You always lose a lot of the power when you have to transmit it - and of course the Big Utilities do not want the consumers to truly break free. Where I live, it would be truly great to have the government subsidize every household plugging into rooftop solar and rooftop wind turbines (Some wind turbines are not not much larger than the standard attic fans you see on every other home in this suburban tract development.)

But of course, with the economy down, and no ability to make house payments, these programs would really have to have full government backing. if the government did do that, then employment would zoom right backup again - where I live many people were in the trades during the housing bubble, and if they could start equipping each others' homes with various types of new-fangled alternate energy devices, the economy would be booming. And once we got this community into ship shape, people could start commuting down to the Bay Area and equipping homes there.

The other thing that Kerry mentions of course is that the ice caps are melting.

I concur with all of this - but due to the fact that so may in the Democratic party handle, especially the DLC, every single Bill And Piece of legislation by forming some damn Committee or other, and also by giving it all away to the Big Power Brokers, like oil and gas and nuke power people, so I don't hold much hope out that any bill "regardless of the name," will really get us to the point we were at back in the early eighties when Reagan went about undermining all of this.

Unless of course people really start taking to the streets and demanding it.

[YvonneCa]

26. I'm glad you listened to the Q and A. I just wanted to have you hear Kerry's...

...own words, because it's hard to miss his sincerity when you do. I DO think he's a realist about what it takes politically to change things...and his bill reflects that. Many environmentalists don't think it goes far enough, but politics does limit things.

I think we are about to 'take to the streets' figuratively...online. And I agree with you that PG and E and SCE want control. I, too, live in a part of California where wind and solar (or maybe earthquake power :7 ) could provide my energy needs. I can't afford it, either...but I'm hoping, if done right, there will be subsidies at least.

Thanks again for listening...most people don't. :)

[truedelphi]

29. Well, thank you for your patience with me.

We live in an area that is seismically interrupting us due to geysers and so I know a little bit about Earthquake power. That is an imaginative suggestion - the Russians are now harnessing the power of the waves of the oceans. So a good deal is possible that our scientists don't yet dream of.

You seem a bit more idealistic than I am and I don't mean that as a condescending old fart (even if that is who I often am.) Keep bumping up against me with your idealism,as I wouldn't mind if some of it rubbed off on me.

[YvonneCa]

30. And thanks for your patience with...

...me. I hope you know I was kidding about the earthquakes...we just had a big shaker here yestyerday, right before I posted. :)

I think it takes all of us, idealists and realists and everything in between, to push together to reach our goals. Peace.

[karynnj]

28. That is not true - no matter what FDL says

The fact is that the EPA still regulate all other pollutants just as they do now. As to carbon, what it does is define ho carbon in each sector will be regulated. Note that Kerry said that the EPA WILL regulate any sector not regulated by the bill.

[ProSense]

6. So you're criticizing the climate bill

because the country is at war and BP isn't offering respirators?

I'm not seeing how these two things have anything to do with the climate legislation.

More information here.

[vaberella]

10. There is never a limit. People seem to demand a panacea for all the woes of the world.

And they expect the Obama Presidency to do it.

[KeyWester]

11. Agreed.

"Daddy , I want a goose that lays a golden egg , and I want it now"

[politicasista]

14. LOL!

:rofl:

[politicasista]

15. If it was a favorite liberal's name on the bill, there would be less complaining n/t

[great white snark]

18. Exactly!

:thumbsup:

[politicasista]

22. Thanks n/t

[Luftmensch067]

24. One of the things I was glad to be reminded about in the Kerry New Yorker interview

Was that the proof that this saves money and creates jobs is that some huge players, like GE, have already figured out the profit potential of pricing carbon. If even the corporations, which are by definition purely interested in what's best for them and their money, find that pricing carbon is good for their coffers -- of course it's going to be good for our national interest, too!

Kerry puts it so plainly here that it's hard to see how anyone can miss it: this bill is win-win-win-to-infinity. Good for jobs, national security, the budget, oh, yeah, and the planet, too, just in case you want a place for your grandkids to live.

[YvonneCa]

27. As I have four of those...

...grandkids, I think preserving the planet is a pretty good idea. :7