Pelosi’s Gestural Politics

Planet Gore on National Review Online

Madame Speaker did plenty of posturing before Netroots Nation in July, saying that she agreed with Al Gore’s goal of getting the entire U.S. to be 100-percent fossil-fuel-free by 2019. Tomorrow, she’ll have the chance to put her constituents’ money where her mouth is, as San Francisco’s Democratic Central Committee (uh-huh, that’s what they call it) considers the Clean Energy Act, which would require San Fran to be 100-percent free of fossil fuels by 2040. That’s a far less stringent timeline than the Goracle’s — which the speaker claims to support — so how can she not support the Clean Air Act? Frisco mayor Gavin Newsom, who also spoke at Netroots, has already come out as opposed to the Clean Air Act — so clearly, someone in the Bay has to exercise a little environmental leadership.