First Read: “So here we are again, another attempt to simply ‘start’ the conversation. Yes, the president will announce some executive actions, but to do what he really wants he needs some legislative action, and this Congress is just not going to prioritize anything having to do with climate. Already, Republicans seem to be licking their political chops, labeling every proposal that’s been previewed today as some form of an increase in cost for energy that’s being passed on to the consumer. Opponents have successfully stopped previous climate-change policy efforts by simply turning the issue into a pocketbook issue by labeling it as an energy tax or a rate hike on average Americans’ power bills. And there’s no reason to think this same tactic won’t work again.”

President Obama “will lay out a multi-pronged plan to tackle climate change in a speech Tuesday at Georgetown University, stressing the ‘moral obligation’ he feels to start advancing policies that can rein in greenhouse-gas emissions in the U.S. and overseas in the absence of legislation from Congress,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The most anticipated part of the climate plan he will unveil will be a push for tougher emissions standards for new and existing power plants. The plan will also include more federal support for fossil-fuel development, energy efficiency, breaking down trade barriers in clean-energy products and boosting bilateral climate cooperation with major economies such as China, India and Brazil. In all, it will outline steps to reduce carbon emissions both at home and overseas.”

Wonk Wire: Even the most ambitious climate plan may not be enough.

The Washington Post reports that President Obama told donors eager for the government to take action on climate change that he was concerned “about the political pain involved, saying that ‘dial testing’ of his State of the Union speech showed that the favorability ratings ‘plummeted’ when he vowed to act on climate change if Congress refused to do so.”

President Obama has been telling Democratic party donors that he will unveil new climate proposals in July, Bloomberg reports.

While Obama has not detailed the specifics of his plan to the donors, Keystone XL pipeline opponents anticipate the package will include a plan from the Environmental Protection Agency to issue final rules to limit greenhouse-gas emissions from new power plants.

Organizing for Action, the advocacy group formed to support President Obama’s political agenda after the election, has launched an initiative — and released a new video — to shame members of Congress who deny the science behind climate change, the Guardian reports.

The group said “it was time to call out members of Congress who deny the existence of climate change, saying they had blocked efforts to avoid its most catastrophic consequences.”

[Read more…]

Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) said you can have “an honest difference of opinion” of what’s causing climate change without “automatically being either all in that’s all because of mankind or it’s all just natural,” BuzzFeed reports.

Barton then cited the biblical Great Flood as an example.

“I would point out that if you’re a believer in in the Bible, one would have to say the Great Flood is an example of climate change and that certainly wasn’t because mankind had overdeveloped hydrocarbon energy.”

“I may be a Republican. I’m not an idiot.”

— Lancaster, California Mayor Rex Parris (R), quoted by the New York Times, when asked if global warming was a threat.

President Obama “is preparing to tell all federal agencies for the first time that they have to consider the impact on global warming before approving major projects, from pipelines to highways,” Bloomberg reports.

“In taking the step, Obama would be fulfilling a vow to act alone in the face of a Republican-run House of Representatives unwilling to pass measures limiting greenhouse gases. He’d expand a Nixon-era law that was intended to force agencies to assess the effect of projects on air, water and soil pollution.”

“You would be giving off more CO2 if you are riding a bike than driving in a car.”

— Washington state Rep. Ed Orcutt (R), in an interview with the Seattle Bike Blog, arguing that bicycle riding also causes pollution.

President Obama is leaning toward choosing Gina McCarthy, a top official in charge of air quality at the Environmental Protection Agency, to run the EPA in his second term, Reuters reports.

A Biloxi Sun Herald editorial takes their local congressman to task for voting against disaster relief for people affected by Hurricane Sandy noting that, “Seldom has a single vote in Congress appeared as cold-blooded and hard-headed as one cast by Rep. Steven Palazzo (R-MS) last week.”

Palazzo quickly reversed himself in a statement saying, “I am fully committed to providing the relief they so desperately need.”

The New York Times
reports that Lisa Jackson is stepping down as administrator of the
Environmental Protection Agency “after a four-year tenure that began
with high hopes of sweeping action to address climate change and other
environmental ills but ended with a series of rear-guard actions to
defend the agency against challenges from industry, Republicans in
Congress and, at times, the Obama White House.”

BuzzFeed reports Jackson departs in part to her opposition to the controversial Keystone pipeline.

A new Associated Press-GfK poll finds that 78% of Americans now think temperatures are rising and 80% say global warming will be a serious problem for the United States if nothing is done about it.

Key finding: The biggest change in the polling is among people who trust scientists only a little or not at all. Within that highly skeptical group, 61% now say temperatures have been rising over the past 100 years. That’s a substantial increase from 2009, when the poll found that only 47% of those with little or no trust in scientists believed the world was getting warmer.

Just published: The Greatest Hoax: How the Global Warming Conspiracy Threatens Your Future by Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK).

Inhofe’s defense of his thesis is the Bible, not science.

On a radio show yesterday, Inhofe explained: “Well actually the Genesis 8:22 that I use in there is that ‘as long as the earth remains there will be seed time and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, day and night,’ my point is, God’s still up there. The arrogance of people to think that we, human beings, would be able to change what He is doing in the climate is to me outrageous.”