As you may have heard, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee kicked off an amendment process on a climate change bill sponsored by Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Barbara Boxer (D-CA) today over the howls of the committee’s Republican minority.
The back story’s pretty simple, and not at all surprising. The committee minority, led by Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), don’t want a climate change bill to move forward. The most moderate among them–Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH)–isn’t pleased that official EPA reports don’t paint a sufficiently gloomy picture of a post-cap and trade future and together, the GOP is boycotting committee proceedings at least until such time as they get their hands on such a study.
But then there’s Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).
Graham doesn’t sit on the committee at all, but he surprised everybody when he co-authored an op-ed with Kerry sounding the alarm on the need for climate action. Quickly, the conventional wisdom became that the road to comprehensive legislation goes through him. So what did he think of the GOP gambit?
“I can understand the concerns, I mean one you get this bill dumped on you at 5 o’clock, I mean you really can’t make meaningful amendments and…Senator Voinovich can be part of the solution here and his request is not unreasonable. But such is life.”
So much for urgency, I guess.
