The newest member of Congress could be among the most adversely affected by new political maps currently being considered by the state's redistricting commission.
Democratic Congresswoman-elect Janice Hahn of San Pedro could find herself in a new district that runs along the coast from the South Bay to Malibu, and stretching inland to grab parts of West Los Angeles and Beverly Hills. Much of that district is currently represented by Rep. Henry Waxman. The other option for Hahn is a Long Beach district that has none of her South Bay political base and also includes two other Democratic incumbents -- Reps. Linda Sanchez and Laura Richardson.
Democratic consultant Paul Mitchell, who has been actively monitoring the redistricting process, says Hahn could be "in serious trouble."
"She's losing the seat that she just won," Mitchell said.
Mitchell says that under new working maps released by the commission this week, the number of Latino seats in Los Angeles is likely to increase, while one of the basin's three African American congressional seats could disappear.
Here's what happened: The California Citizen's Redistricting Commission just released a third version of their "visioning" maps for Congressional and State Assembly Districts. And as indicated above, these new maps are radically different from anything we've seen before.
There are three different proposed versions of CA-36. Depending on which option you chose, our newly-elected Congresswoman Janice Hahn could end up sharing her district with Henry Waxman, or she could even end up outside the district. All of the options include everything from Malibu to Rancho Palos Verdes, while cutting the Beach Cities - Redondo, Manhattan, Hermosa and Torrance - in half just west of the 405 freeway.
To see more detailed congressional maps, go to this link, type in your home address, then go to the "Select District" pull-down menu, and select "congress la opt1, opt2, or opt3"
The new Assembly districts in Southern California aren't much better. My Assembly district, AD53, is now partially divided into three separate districts, with Venice as the nexus. Which means that Venice - 1 square mile wide - could potentially be represented by THREE different Assembly members.
To see the new Assembly map, Go to this link, type in your home address, then go to the "Select District" pull-down menu, and select "assembly la opt1"
So now what? The final district maps are slated to be released July 28, according to a press release, and adopted by the commission on Aug. 15. So you still have time to make your voice heard.
The Commission needs to hear from you. Send an email to votersfirstact@crc.ca.gov and let them know what you think.
Be sure to put down where you live so they know you're a constituent.
February 10, 2010
Winograd accepts Jewish Journal's Debate Offer: Harman, No Response
"Let's pack the house," says Winograd
(Marina del Rey, CA) Congressional Candidate Marcy Winograd (CA-36) accepts the Jewish Journal's offer to participate in a proposed debate with opponent Jane Harman, and urges her opponent to accept, as well. In a recent Jewish Journal article, Editor Rob Eshman issued an open invitation to both candidates, saying, "I invite Winograd and Harman to discuss this issue (Israel/Palestine) in a public forum hosted by The Jewish Journal at a mutually convenient date." Harman has not responded.
The offer to sponsor a debate followed a controversy over a letter Congressman Waxman wrote urging potential high-dollar donors to contribute the maximum to Harman's campaign because of Winograd's support for equal rights for all in Israel/Palestine. Winograd is the co-founder of LA Jews for Peace, an organization which calls for an end to the Israeli blockade of Gaza.
Winograd responded to Eshman's invitation, saying in a letter published in the Jewish Journal, "I thank the Jewish Journal for graciously inviting me to debate my opponent in the June 8, 2010, Democratic Party primary. Given the diversity of opinion, I look forward to a robust and open debate, not only on issues pertaining to middle east peace, but also on single-payer health care, immigration and citizenship, and the transition from a war economy to a new Green economy. Let's pack the house, wrestle with critical issues, and do some serious soul searching."
During the 2006 campaign, Harman refused to debate, or even stand on the same stage. In 2006 Winograd jumped into the race only three months before the primary, mobilizing almost 38% of the vote on an anti-war and pro-constitutional rights platform. In 2010, Winograd's platform calls for ending multiple perpetual wars and investing in human needs at home.
Contact: Michael Jay
Campaign Manager, Winograd for Congress
michael@winogradforcongress.com
Ph: (818) 445 4520
(Disclaimer: I have been hired as a blog fellow for Brave New Films and their Sick For Profit campaign, exposing billionaire health insurance CEOs and their profiting off of denying care. Join the campaign on Facebook)
It's a little shocking that the story of health insurance CEO largesse hasn't been told, by and large, by the Congress in the debate over health care reform. The debate has covered public options and "death panels" and Nazi comparisons and cost curves without addressing the fact that for-profit health insurance companies add almost nothing of value to access or quality of care and exist only to skim off the top and keep as much of their premiums as possible. And they rake in giant profits at the same time. Now Henry Waxman, no stranger to Congressional investigations, wants to put a dollar sign on those profits, specifically what money goes where.
Two powerful House Democrats have sent a letter to insurance companies asking them to provide detailed information about their conferences and retreats, executive pay, and other business practices [...]
The Waxman-Stupak letter asks companies to provide, by mid-September, the compensation packages of any employee or officer who made more than $500,000 in any year from 2003 to 2008. It also asks the companies to list all their board members and their compensation.
The congressmen also want information "listing all conferences, retreats or other events held outside company facilities from January 1, 2007, to the present."
In addition, the letter demands more basic information, such as the companies' total revenues, net income, and total dividend payments, as well as premium revenue, sales expenses and profits.
It seems like, especially considering the prominence of the subject of health care over the past few months, this should be public information. Here's the full letter.
We already have a pretty good understanding of the profits of the insurance companies, as well as the rewards of their CEOs, in salary, options, and additional perks. That was the subject of Sick For Profit, which in the first installment exposed Steven Helmsley, the CEO of United Health Group, and his $13.2 million in compensation in 2007, his $6 million dollar home in Minnesota, and his $744 million in unexercised stock options ($127 million of which he exercised in 2009). But Waxman asking for this information puts it into an investigation. And that gives it a different feel. He can use subpoena power. He can haul the CEOs before the committee. He is in the best position to contrast the 47 million people without health insurance, and the 40 million who are underinsured, with these obscene profits.
President Obama has officially directed the EPA to review the decision to deny California (and 17 other states) a waiver under the Clean Air Act to regulate its own greenhouse gas emissions, and considering that Obama's EPA is about to hire the lead attorney in the Supreme Court case that found the EPA has the authority regulate carbon emissions, I expect we will see the waiver granted in short order.
"For the sake of our security, our economy and our planet, we must have the courage and commitment to change," Obama said in the East Room of the White House. "It will be the policy of my administration to reverse our dependence on foreign oil while building a new energy economy that will create millions of jobs."
Today's actions come as Obama seeks to fulfill campaign promises in the first days of his administration. The moves fulfill long-held goals of the environmental movement.
Lawmakers and environmentalists throughout California are hailing the move (I'll put some reactions on the flip). But notably, another group on board with the decisions are - wait for it - the automakers.
Auto-industry officials were surprisingly receptive to President Obama's announcement about tightening emission standards, saying the steps he announced were the best they could hope for.
"It seems the president has set out a reasonable process," said a top industry official who refused to be named. "He can say with credibility that there's a new sheriff in town. Now, maybe there's room to discuss this with stakeholders."
The uncertainty of the process, given the Bush Administration's failure to set standards passed by Congress in the 2007 energy bill and this looming fight over the California waiver which could have ended up in Congress or the courts, may be a factor in the auto companies' tepid support. So too is the fact that Obama and the federal government still partially controls the fate of the Big Three in the auto industry bailout.
Eventually, we will much to what amounts to a national standard, with 40% of the country's population poised to back California's emissions targets and the auto industry forced to calibrate to the higher standard. This will SPUR innovation, not dampen it, and will eventually be a boon to an industry which has failed to adapt to changing needs for far too long.
I guess Henry Waxman, a key ally to Nancy Pelosi, wouldn't have made the move to unseat John Dingell if he didn't count the votes.
Rep. Henry Waxman (Calif.) has ousted Energy and Commerce Chairman John Dingell (Mich.), as Democratic lawmakers voted 137-122 Thursday morning to hand the gavel of the powerhouse panel to its second-ranking member.
This, more than anything, could be the biggest change in the federal government in 2009 and beyond. Waxman's Safe Climate Act sets the targets needed to mitigate the worst effects of global warming. It now becomes the working document in the House for anti-global warming legislation. And his constituency doesn't include a major polluting industry.
From a policy standpoint, it's a major progressive victory.
This is a very big deal. Henry Waxman has been nominated by the House's Steering Committee to be the head of the House panel on Energy and Commerce, ahead of longtime chair John Dingell. The implications for such a change would be huge, but it's not over yet.
The House Democratic Steering Committee has nominated Henry A. Waxman to be chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee next year - a stinging rebuke of the sitting chairman, John D. Dingell .
Waxman won a 25-22 vote over Dingell in a closed-door meeting Wednesday by the Steering panel. Because Dingell got more than 13 votes in the secret balloting, he can be nominated to run against Waxman at Thursday's Democratic Caucus meeting, at which all of the Democrats elected to the 111th Congress are eligible to vote.
That means we have one day to whip our Congresspeople on this vote. Waxman, who wrote the Clean Air Act and who has an understanding of what is needed to be done on global warming and the post-carbon future, would make a great chairman, as opposed to the Dingellsaurus, who is still trying to protect the auto industry from moving into the 21st century, even as the verdict on their approach is defined by their trudging to Capitol Hill for a bailout. A majority of the caucus has signed a letter to Nancy Pelosi asking for greater efforts to combat climate change. Waxman at Energy is a key to that happening. We must eliminate this roadblock.
Marc Ambinder sets the scene (this was written before today's vote)
Waxman wants the job for obvious reasons: the committee will be the most powerful in the new Congress, one that'll deal with health care and energy legislation. (Ways and Means? Pleghghgh.) A lot of impatient liberal Democrats want to see Dingell go; he is too old, too blinkered in his thinking and too at odds with the party on energy, they say; just as many, it seems, want him to say, including some influential members of the leadership, even if for reasons of preserving the integrity of the seniority system.
Senior Democratic aides expect that the vote will go to the full caucus; all the loser of the steering committee vote has to do is present a letter with 35 House members. The full vote would be Thursday via secret ballot.
Lots of members of Congress put themselves in the position of someone like Dingell, who earned his chairmanship with seniority, and they don't want to see him pushed out because they wouldn't want it to happen to them. That's the kind of institutional thinking that must be vanquished, as it restricts change. The enviro groups are backing away from this fight because they don't want to feel Dingell's wrath if he wins. There is nobody else left to step in but us. I was skeptical that House Democrats would be pushed in the direction of progress, but with Waxman's former chief of staff, Phil Schiliro, in the Obama White House, some pressure may be coming down from the top. It's in all of our interests to have Henry Waxman atop this committee.
Call Congress and tell them you want to see a committee chair with bold ideas on energy as the head of the Energy Committee. If you want some extra incentive, read the smugness of the Blue Dogs who are fighting for their roadblock:
Dingell's supporters said they are not worried by the vote of the Steering panel, which they say is stocked with left-leaning members who do not represent the broader makeup of Democratic caucus.
"If you look at the makeup of that committee in terms of geography and political leanings, this is not the same dynamic as our whole caucus," said Jim Matheson , D-Utah, who is part of a team working the phones for Dingell, D-Mich.
In particular, if your member is in the Congressional Black Caucus or the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, both of which are supporting Dingell, ask them if they want their constituents to breathe clean air in the future.
That's if you believe Tim Fernholz, who talked to a couple people in the know.
2. At least two people who would know (blind quotes suck but that's the way of the world) don't expect the Waxman challenge to Dingell at the Energy committee to get anywhere, in part because the last two classes of new representatives are more conservative on the whole than other members and will support the incumbent. The leadership hopes that it won't come to a vote, because Waxman, who is more closely identified with Pelosi (who isn't taking a position on the challenge) will drop out when he realizes he doesn't have the votes.
I want to push back on the idea that the most recent classes of Reps. are all conservative, because while that is ossified conventional wisdom inside the Beltway it's simply not true. Alan Grayson is not conservative. Tom Perriello is not conservative. Larry Kissell is not conservative. In fact, in this cycle the four Democrats who lost Congressional elections were all deeply conservative - Tim Mahoney, Nick Lampson, Don Cazayoux and Nancy Boyda.
This isn't totally about right-left, it's about those in the status quo who want to protect the seniority system in the event that they stick around Congress look enough to secure a plum post. That's why you have liberals in the Congressional Black Caucus like John Lewis pushing for Dingell to stay in his chairmanship. Dingell is trying to sucker new members by saying he is good on health care, but of course that's not totally true.
But Dingell is good on health care. Well, by good, I mean he has pushed 'single-payer' for literally decades, while preventing action on drug prices and appointing most of the members of the Energy and Commerce Committee that killed Clinton's health care plan, because they were reliable pro-auto industry votes on other issues Dingell prioritized (there aren't a lot of single payer pro-polluting members out there). But health care is all Dingell has, so he's emphasizing his willingness to work on health care with Obama in return for keeping his chairmanship of the enormously powerful Energy and Commerce Committee.
With the Senate appearing to take the lead on health care anyway, and Waxman just as solid on the issue, this is an irrelevant argument. What should be far more central to the debate is this:
The California economy loses about $28 billion annually due to premature deaths and illnesses linked to ozone and particulates spewed from hundreds of locations in the South Coast and San Joaquin air basins, according to findings released Wednesday by a Cal State Fullerton research team.
Most of those costs, about $25 billion, are connected to roughly 3,000 smog-related deaths each year, but additional factors include work and school absences, emergency room visits, and asthma attacks and other respiratory illnesses, said team leader Jane Hall, a professor of economics and co-director of the university's Institute for Economics and Environment Studies.
The decades of shameless defense of a heavily polluting auto industry should be grounds for Dingell's resignation, not just for booting him from this key committee (especially because it's resulted in the car companies being broke and looking for a government handout). But it's awful hard to impact an insider caucus battle with anything resembling reason.
However, we must keep trying. Call Congress and tell them you'd rather have someone concerned about catastrophic climate change in charge of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, instead of someone who uses it as a pretext to keep his failing auto industry executive buddies happy.
I can't even begin to link to all the examples (just click back through the tag), but Darrell Issa is an embarrassment, an idiot, and a fundamentally mean person. Which, if you think about it, makes him a perfect contender for Ranking Republican on the House Oversight Committee.
But with Rep. Waxman looking to leave the committee for more glamorous pastures and the heir to the chairmanship on the Democratic side still unclear, FedBlog notes, this would be
a great opportunity for Republicans who want to make names for themselves. In the Senate, Susan Collins, the ranking member on HSGAC, presumably isn't going to go anywhere, but she's not going to go out of her way to score points against Obama. So it makes sense that members of the Republican Conference would look for an attack dog in the House. Issa fits that bill.
Which is the point of course. He gets to grandstand and spew vitriol from a better pulpit and fashion himself into a no-holds-barred attack dog of the new, more-extreme GOP minority. And with Rep. Dan Lungren making a play for Minority Leader and Chuck DeVore announcing his plans to challenge Sen. Boxer in 2010, it looks like the lack of Obama coattails in California is inspiring some ambition from the far right of the state.
After following Darrell Issa for several years, I know with considerable confidence that he's often sophomoric but always vicious. His is a scorched earth, nose-to-spite-the-face approach to government that prefers the fundamental destruction of function to anything besides his own agenda moving forward. He's filthy rich in an exceptionally safe seat, so he's not going anywhere unless he chooses to. Which means that obnoxious as it'll be, Issa is likely gearing up to be a professional pain in the ass for at least the next two years. Time to get used to dealing with his antics.
Among the many executive orders that Barack Obama will seek to overturn to rack up some quick victories at the beginning of his term, none may have a more lasting impact than granting the waiver to California to regulate their tailpipe emissions.
The president-elect has said, for example, that he intends to quickly reverse the Bush administration's decision last December to deny California the authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from automobiles. "Effectively tackling global warming demands bold and innovative solutions, and given the failure of this administration to act, California should be allowed to pioneer," Obama said in January.
California had sought permission from the Environmental Protection Agency to require that greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles be cut by 30 percent between 2009 and 2016, effectively mandating that cars achieve a fuel economy standard of at least 36 miles per gallon within eight years. Seventeen other states had promised to adopt California's rules, representing in total 45 percent of the nation's automobile market. Environmentalists cheered the California initiative because it would stoke innovation that would potentially benefit the entire country.
"An early move by the Obama administration to sign the California waiver would signal the seriousness of intent to reduce the nation's dependence on foreign oil and build a future for the domestic auto market," said Kevin Knobloch, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
There are two reasons this is a major change. One, by granting that carbon dioxide emissions threaten human welfare, you open up a whole toolkit of innovative policy choices to follow to restrict them. Cap and trade or a carbon tax becomes not just a policy option but a madate under the EPA. The second, as noted in the article, is that dozens of states will seek to follow the California ruling on tailpipe emissions over the federal government. And once you have 45% of the market mandating a higher fuel efficiency standard, it is unlikely that automakers will create a secondary market at the lower standard. You will have raised the CAFE number by default.
All of this is a recognition that the dangers of global warming is real, and that an Obama Administration will not stand in the way of sound science that declares the danger and seeks to mitigate it. For all of the effort by polluters to save John Dingell's chairmanship from the clutches of Henry Waxman (and they're enlisting all the legislators they've bought off to that end), this executive order would have lots of reach regardless who controls global warming legislation in the Congress. It would mean that California can control its own destiny and regulate its own air. It will force innovation and create economic opportunity and improve public health and possibly save lives.
A couple weeks ago I wrote about three looming battles that we had to think about after the election. Two of them have already fizzled. The open primary ballot initiative filed with the state has been withdrawn. That's probably because the Governor wanted to present it himself, so we'll see where that goes, and a lot of it might have to do with whether or not Prop. 11 actually passes. Second, Bush Republican and rich developer Rick Caruso decided against running for Mayor of Los Angeles against Antonio Villaraigosa. There is now no credible candidate running against the incumbent. Caruso may figure that Villaraigosa is primed for bigger and better things (he's in Washington today with President-Elect Obama's council of economic advisers), and if Villaraigosa vacates the seat he'd have a better shot of capturing it.
However, there are a couple other looming battles that are out there. First, Jane Harman, Congresswoman from the 36th Congressional District, is in line for a top intelligence post with the Obama Administration, and the odds are extremely likely that she'd take it. Laura Rozen has a profile here. After a tough primary against Marcy Winograd in 2006, Harman has been a moderately better vote in Congress, but this represents a real opportunity to put a progressive in that seat. Winograd has recently moved into the district, and would certainly be my first choice if it comes open (or if it doesn't - Harman voted for the FISA bill this year).
The other major news is that Henry Waxman, my Congressman, is looking to oust John Dingell from his post atop the Energy and Commerce Committee. This is a long time coming, and I don't think Waxman would go for it without the support of the Speaker. The Dingellsaurus, while a decent liberal on most issues (and also a former representative of mine in Ann Arbor, MI), has blocked progress on climate change and modernizing the auto industry for years. We were finally able to get a modest increase in CAFE standards last year, but Waxman, who wrote the Clean Air Act of 1990, would obviously be a major step up. And with the auto industry on life support and asking for handouts as a result of the old ways of doing business, it's clearly time for a Democratic committee chair who isn't protecting their interests at the expense of the planet. Waxman's "Safe Climate Act" introduced last year would mandate a cut in greenhouse gases of 80% below 1990 levels by 2050. That's exactly the right attitude from the committee chair, and with energy issues obviously so crucial in an Obama Administration, we need someone in that post who recognizes the scope of the problem. It should also be clear that the committee has likely jurisdiction over health care reform.
Just to update on the EPA's denial of a waiver to California to regulate its own greenhouse gas emissions - the White House is now refusing thousands of documents on the matter to Henry Waxman's Oversight and Government Reform Committee, citing executive privilege.
"I don't think we've had a situation like this since Richard Nixon was president," said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, which is conducting the investigation.
An EPA official, Jason Burnett, has told committee investigators that EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson had favored granting the waiver but denied it after meeting with White House officials. In testimony last month, Johnson refused to say whether he'd discussed the waiver request with Bush.
The White House waited until the very day that the Oversight Committee was going to rule on contempt citations for failing to respond on this issue. And the OMB and the EPA basically answered by saying "we've given you enough documents, no more documents for you."
It's clear that the EPA and the Bush Administration will stonewall until the day they leave office on this front, and so it's up to the next President to make a determination on the waiver. And all you need to know about California's chances of being able to regulate emissions is that Obama supports the waiver, and McCain has been vague and evasive about it (not to mention he's taken more money from oil companies than any other Presidential candidate).
Meanwhile, California is offering another regulatory solution: they're adding a Global Warming score to the sticker of every car for sale in the state.
The California Air Resources Board said Thursday the window sticker will give consumers the information they need to choose a cleaner-burning car or light truck.
"This label will arm consumers with the information they need to choose a vehicle that saves gas, reduces greenhouse gas emissions and helps fight smog all at once," board chairman Mary Nichols said in a statement. "Consumer choice is an especially powerful tool in our fight against climate change. We look forward to seeing these stickers on 2009 model cars as they start hitting the showrooms in the coming months."
We'll see if this affects consumer choice in the coming months, although the fuel economy portion of the sticker is already driving demand. To say nothing of those 5 hydrogen fuel cell cars turning up on Southern California roads.
• Do read Robert in Monterey's report about Abel Maldonado, Don Perata's best buddy, running as a write-in candidate in the Democratic primary to stall an attempt to get an opponent on the November ballot. First of all, this is an example of why crossfiling should be banned once and for all. Second, Abel Maldonado is a snake and I can now see why Don Perata would knock on doors for him. Apparently, neither of them have much interest in the democratic process.
• Arnold thinks the legalization of gender-neutral marriage will be a boost to the sluggish economy, but I hope he's not basing his entire budget on a sharp uptick in gay weddings. I mean, there are only so many Mr. Sulus rich enough to have that surge register more than a blip. By the way, good for Mr. Sulu. And good for Ellen DeGeneres for telling Straight Talk Express where to shove it.
• Lucas mentioned this, but Darrell Issa got in the middle of a heated exchange between Henry Waxman and EPA Adminstrator Stephen Johnson over the EPA's breaking the Clean Air Act. Emptywheel has video:
• Why Fabian Nuñez is claiming racial bias at this late date over questions about his travel practices is completely beyond me. And he's taken to Spanish-language television for these accusations to stoke divisiveness in the Latino community, too. It's so counterproductive, as well as misleading.
• Speaking of Spanish-speaking media, this is an older story, but it's fascinating to me that the Spanish-language channels in LA are so much more substantive than the English-language ones, featuring longer, "more deeply reported" pieces.
• We could see a settlement very shortly on prison overcrowding in the state which would not require early release. There are some decent components to this deal, but it basically gives everyone three more years to clean up their act, and I wouldn't be surprised if it just puts us in the same siutation come 2011. The policies needed are well-known; the political will remains elusive.
• The Bay Area AQMD passed a carbon tax for businesses that emit greenhouse gases. It's "not enough to change behavior," one expert said, but it does presage what may be coming down the pike for polluters. Whether you get there through selling carbon permits at auction or with a tax, the bottom line is that pollution is going to cost enough money to alter business' approach to engaging in it. This is a good step.
• Interesting that we denied the endorsement to Rep. Laura Richardson (CA-37) on the same day that she is forced to defend herself against allegations that she walked away from her foreclosed home in Sacramento. It sounds like the Congresswoman renegotiated the loan, but the conservative fever swamps are all over this one (check the comments in that LAT blog post). She did buy the half-million-dollar home with no money down, and then left Sacramento almost immediately after winning election to fill the open seat in Congress.
Henry Waxman has assembled a litany of evidence detailing the role of the White House in the EPA denial of a waiver to California to implement the landmark tailpipe emissions law under the Clean Air Act. The most intriguing pieces of information are emails between EPA staffers and White House officials, which show how the staff found the waiver routine, and the White House stepped in to block it. Also, EPA Associate Deputy Administrator Jason Burnett admitted in a deposition that the White House was the main player in the negotiations:
According to Mr. Burnett's deposition testimony, Administrator Johnson's preference for a full or partial grant of the waiver did not change until after he communicated with the White House. When asked by Committee staff "whether the Administrator communicated with the White House in between his preference to do a partial grant and the ultimate decision" to deny the waiver, Mr. Burnett responded: "I believe the answer is yes."
California creates the same amount of greenhouse gases as the entire country of Mexico. With the other 17 states that have signaled they would take the option of following the California emission plan added in, you have the emissions equivalent of maybe half a billion to 750,000,000 people on the planet that would be reduced if it weren't for the White House stepping in to stop progress. I believe in state-level innovation as steps to solving the crisis of climate change, but here we have a case where California did everything right, and the White House still held the trump card.
There's a hearing today in the House Oversight Committee, and EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson is planning to testify.
Yes, you're not seeing things; the headline of this post is accurate. But there is a twist, as the WSJ's Dana Mattioli reported yesterday afternoon:
In a letter today, two senior Republicans on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform asked the panel’s chairman, Henry Waxman (D., Calif.), to investigate whether top EPA staffers either violated federal rules that restrict regulators from lobbying, or “misused their positions to surreptitiously influence” EPA’s decision on whether to allow California to regulate carbon-dioxide emissions from vehicles.
Reps. Tom Davis (R-VA) and Darrell Issa (R-CA) are mad at Margo Oge and Christopher Grundler, the senior EPA officials tasked with evaluating California's waiver request and (unsuccessfully) telling Administrator Stephen Johnson that he had no choice but to grant it. Congressional oversight of that decision revealed that the pair subsequently provided former EPA Administrator William Reilly-- at Reilly's request-- talking points for arguing the waiver's merits to Johnson. Davis and Issa argue that this deserves the same level of scrutiny that Waxman devoted to a surreptitious plan to lobby Congress and governors against the waiver-- Johnson may have also been a target, but he could not recall whether that was the case-- concocted last summer by Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters, White House officials, and industry lobbyists.
This actually isn't the first time that congressional Republicans have gone after Oge and Grundler. During a hearing that followed the revelation of the Reilly memo and other EPA documents, Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) asked Administrator Johnson whether his employees had violated the Hatch Act. Johnson, to his credit, defended their actions, saying that he has "always encouraged my staff to give me candid and open advice" (he just reserves the right to ignore it, even when phrased as a clear mandate and not simply advice, and the resulting fallout severely alienates staff unions).
Rep. Waxman responded to the letter by pledging to give it "careful consideration," but noting that the Committee had "found no evidence that EPA career staff lobbied members of Congress with respect to [California’s request]" (translation: the Davis-Issa analogy to his previous investigation is bunk). For his part, Reilly, who ran EPA under the first President Bush and granted California several waivers, has said that his communications with career staff who served under him were not unprecedented, let alone improper or illegal.
Several developing developments to close out your week today.
The Dump Denham folks are turning in 50,000 signatures in support of the effort. Just over 31,000 valid signatures are required to qualify. Seems that we should start getting geared up for this one.
Rep. Waxman is continuing the agitation on the California EPA waiver, dropping subpoenas for documents reviewed by the EPA before rejecting California emission regulations.
Sacramento Bee's Ed Board weighs in on the double bubble trouble and is none too pleased with Los Angeles County's screwy ballots or acting Registrar Dean Logan. (full disclosure: I work for the Courage Campaign)
55 people were indicted over welfare fraud that snagged millions in a scheme centered around fake child care facilities in and around Los Angeles.
Speaking of Los Angeles, I'll be there tomorrow for no particular reason and with nothing particular to do. Or as Bran Van 3000 says
But we did nothing, absolutely nothing that day, and I say:
What the hell am I doing drinking in L.A. at 26?
I got the fever for the flavor, the payback will be later, still I need a fix.
When we last left EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson, his agency was facing a lawsuit from California and over a dozen other states over his failure to grant a waiver allowing tailpipe emission regulation. It was fairly clear that this decision was wholly political and in no way matching the scientific studies inside the EPA; Johnson's staff was unanimously opposed to the decision. Last week, Sen. Boxer chaired a field hearing in Los Angeles to investigate what was behind the denial of the waiver. Johnson failed to attend. This is from an email:
California Attorney General Jerry Brown, California Air Resources Board Chair Mary Nichols, the Sierra Club's Carl Pope, the NRDC's Fran Pavley, and Congresswoman Hilda Solis all appeared as witnesses. Unfortunately, one chair at the briefing was noticeably empty: the seat we reserved for EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson.
Clearly, EPA Administrator Johnson does not want California and 18 other states to implement California's higher emission standard for automobiles -- a key part of our fight against global warming -- but the public deserves to know why. We can't let Administrator Johnson hide the truth from the American people.
At the hearing, Attorney General Brown called on Boxer to subpoena Johnson and all of the relevant documents that went into the decision. Boxer is planning a hearing on January 24th with the EPA Administrator, and she's attempting to use public pressure to get Johnson to release the documents. She's asking supporters to forward Johnson this email (over):
The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday signaled it is prepared to comply with a congressional request for all documents - including communications with the White House - concerning its decision to block California from imposing limits on greenhouse gases.
The EPA's general counsel directed agency employees in a memo to preserve and produce all documents related to the decision including any opposing views and communications between senior EPA officials and the White House, including Vice President Dick Cheney's office.
The documents should include "any records presenting options, recommendations, pros and cons, legal issues or risks, (or) political implications," said the all-hands memo from EPA General Counsel Roger Martella Jr.
They're saying that now, of course, but David Addington hasn't gotten his hands on the memo to use his red pen.
The presiding committee in the Congress on this one is Henry Waxman's House Oversight Committee.
Happy New Year, Fourthbranch. We got you Henry Waxman.
Barbara Boxer and Henry Waxman are expecting defeat in the fight to get the EPA to grant a waiver to the state so it can implement Fran Pavley's landmark tailpipe emissions law.
In a gathering with reporters Tuesday, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said she has "very little hope" that the EPA will grant the waiver, which would open the door to California and more than a dozen other states imposing emission standards more stringent than federal requirements [...]
Asked whether she thought the decision would be made by the EPA or at the White House, Boxer said: "If you look at everything done on the environment, a lot of this leads back to the vice president's office."
"Politics is alive and well in relation to this waiver," said Boxer, chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
It's difficult to understate how abnormal this would be. The EPA has never denied a waiver to California allowing them to regulate their own emissions.
The EPA Administrator, Stephen Johnson, has claimed there will be a decision on the waiver by the end of the year, but he's ducking requests for meetings with Boxer, and ignoring letters from Waxman. The handwriting is on the wall. I don't know if the lawsuit prepared by the state demanded that a decision be made on the waiver or that the waiver be granted. Either way, expect some legal recourse as a result of the expected denial. And expect little movement on implementation of a law central to California's efforts to curb emissions until the swearing in of a new President.
The Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday slapped down California's bid for first-in-the-nation greenhouse gas limits on cars, trucks and SUVs, denying a request for a waiver that would have allowed those restrictions to take effect.
"The Bush administration is moving forward with a clear national solution _ not a confusing patchwork of state rules _ to reduce America's climate footprint from vehicles," EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson said in a statement.
EPA's decision ignores the law, science, and commonsense. This is a policy dictated by politics and ideology, not facts. The Committee will be investigating how and why this decision was made.
Woohoo! Jerry did it! Jerry McNerney has managed to become the most un-progressive Democrat of the entire California congressional delegation. For those keeping score at home, Jerry's 82.45 was about a half point lower than the next CA Dem, Jim Costa, that progressive stalwart, at 82.97. And for all the talk of Harman changing her ways, she's still worse than even Joe Baca, almost 7 points worse from a very safe Dem seat.
For all of you CA-45 fans, "moderate" Mary Bono came in with a stellar 4.42 Chips are Down score. So, for all the bluster of the SCHIP vote, she's still dancing the same jig as the rest of her party.
On thing must be said, the Speaker has done an excellent job at preserving unity amongst the caucus. Whether that means she's being too incremental and/or ineffective, or just laying down the law is the big question. The reason her approval rating, and the Congress in general, is down has a whole lot to do with the fact that little has changed on the Iraq front. So, would it be better to have a speaker who is more willing to take risks? Perhaps, but the impediment of the president always lingers over her head, veto pen in hand. So, whether the unity is really there, is an open question. Full data over the flip.
(I was working on a similar post, but I'll still post my own, with all CA data and some other miscellany. - promoted by Brian Leubitz)
The problem with most scorecards is that they are written by lobbyists concerned with always getting the votes of potential supporters. Thus, there is an equal weighting while in the real world not all votes are equal. In fact, regardless of everything else, some votes are dealbreakers and when they show up on scorecards as one of 12 votes or something, it looks silly. However, Progressive Punch has a new "when the chips are down" scorecard. After the flip is the ratings of CA's congressional delegation, in descending order.
