Los Angeles Times — Obama champions energy bill but not its tariffs
In a Sunday-night interview with a group of reporters including writer Jim Tankersley, President Obama praised the climate bill that he helped squeeze out of the House. One point Obama took exception with was the 11th-hour addition of tariffs on foreign goods from counties that don’t take similar steps. But since the only way to get the bill passed in the more-liberal House was to add the tariffs, the bill’s real chances to pass the Senate seem even less likely without some acknowledgement of the competitive disadvantage created by the bill.
Senators know that placing burdens on the relatively clean American energy and manufacturing sectors while BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) continue to increase their industrial and carbon output will kill jobs and increase the trade imbalance. If the Senate does move a bill, expect their version to perhaps forego the tariffs and instead prevent implementation until the BRIC countries have followed suit, which is to say, never. The president said that those worries are unfounded, because the real money is in green jobs.
