As you probably are aware, House Democrats are pushing hard to pass an energy bill that raises fuel economy, enacts a serious renewable portfolio standard, and much more. Speaker Pelosi hopes to pass this legislation through the House by July 4, what she's calling "Energy Independence Day." Unfortunately, in recent weeks, Pelosi has had to battle not only anti-environment Republicans, but also two leading members of her own party - John Dingell of Michigan and Rick Boucher of our own fair Commonwealth. Those two members are working together to protect the auto and coal industries, respectively. That's not surprising, given the districts they represent. However, to protect their pet industries, they are attempting to water down fuel economy standards to mush; to mandate costly, controversial, and economically/environmentally questionable "coal-to-liquids" production; and - worst of all - to "[pre-empt] California and 11 other states from enforcing tougher tailpipe emission regulations than the federal government."
Wonderful.
For now, however, there's a bit of mildly good news: "a tactical retreat ? not a surrender" by Dingell and Boucher. That means the energy bill can now proceed without Dingell's and Boucher's poison pills. Unfortunately, as CQ explains, the bad news is that Dingell "plans to resurrect the proposals when the House writes a climate change bill in the fall."
Perhaps it's exactly these types of shenanigans that are - as E.J. Dionne writes in today's Washington Post - "dragging down the Democrats?" As Dionne explains:
Middle-of-the-road voters who backed the Democrats don't much like the war, but they also looked to the party of Reid and Pelosi to get things done on political reform, health care, energy, the environment and the economy.
Well, none of that is going to happen if the Dingells and Bouchers (or whoever else) of the world keep inserting amendments that will gut important legislation and also undercut Speaker Pelosi. And, as Dionne explains, if Democrats can't get things done in 2007, "middle of the road" voters may very well turn against them in 2008. I'm sure that's not what Dingell and Boucher want, but that's the result they might get.
They are simply doing politics as usual, and are 1) not making the Democratic case as a matter of public relations during the Iraq War funding debate, thuys letting republicans frame the thing as "Democratic surrender," and 2) not going about really passing all the reforms and legislation they promised during the canpaign. What does it take for these national Democratic so-called leaders to be more aggressive on making their case?