The cap-and-trade bill: Waiting for the other shoe to drop | The Economist

Back in the Senate, fear that cap-and-trade will be painted as a murky, confusing job-killer and a bureaucratic hassle makes Democrats in conservative states nervous. They include Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu and both senators from North Dakota. Head counts fall far short of the 60 votes required to ensure passage.
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Environmentalists have problems with the House bill’s concessions to coal and other special interests. But most of the main interest groups support it, including the Sierra Club, the Environmental Defence Fund and the World Wildlife Fund. Greenpeace is a notable exception. Phil Radford, the group’s executive director, says with disappointment that “You have the president really hiding behind Congress.” He complains that Mr Obama has sacrificed his vision to conservative “Blue Dog” Democrats, and that it would be better the other way around.

Joe Romm, a senior fellow at the Democrat-leaning Centre for American Progress, says that while the bill has its limitations, “Obama can’t pass a substantially stronger bill than Waxman-Markey. It’s not possible.” He notes that after Bill Clinton’s health-care reform fell apart it took 16 years to revisit the issue. Climate-change purists should bear in mind the consequences of failure. “If this bill goes down,” he says, “it will be a very long time before we come back to it. [And] I don’t see how the international process survives.”

Whatever Happened To The Climate Bill?

Remember the other sweeping, complex legislation in Congress -- climate change?

The big sucker is still there -- it's ostensibly to clear the U.S. Senate by September 28 -- but it seems unlikely President Obama will sign a bill this year with Washington intensely focused on health care reform.

By the way, the article is accompanied by a picture of ominous black smoke--are we supposed to believe that's carbon dioxide?