Cross-posted from the Wonk Room.
As Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) work to craft comprehensive climate legislation that can overcome a fossil-fueled filibuster, swing vote Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) is trying to dig the carbon hole deeper. Before climate policy had a chance of becoming reality, Murkowski claimed to recognize that global warming from fossil fuels is destroying Alaska. Now, she has continued down that path by demanding that drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is “one of the must-haves“:
I’m still saying ANWR is one of the must-haves. You want to have me sit down at the table and talk about what a strong domestic production piece is, you have to be willing to talk to me about ANWR. Pretty simple.
Murkowski is increasingly sounding like an oil industry lobbyist, leading the effort to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from enforcing the Clean Air Act with respect to greenhouse pollution. Murkowski’s Dirty Air Act resolution is a blatant rejection of science and safety on behalf of her fossil industry contributors. This week, she praised Sen. Jay Rockefeller’s (D-W.Va.) two-year Clean Air Act moratorium, saying she is “hopeful that this bill will draw additional support and advance quickly.”
Only in the United States Senate could you find someone demand that a climate bill involve drilling in one of the last pristine places on earth. Murkowski is working to unleash the only two imminent threats to the remote and unique Arctic Refuge — global warming and oil drilling. Murkowski, it seems, is willing to destroy her state in order to save it.
