Response 4

The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 is an extremely complicated bill with many facets. Interestingly, different websites portrayed the bill in very different lights and each seemed to be almost a different piece of legislation entirely. For example, from govtrack.us, I found the bill to have several amendments to previous legislature such as the CAA, Safe Drinking Water Act, and the Energy Policy and Conservation Act. I saw much fewer instances of the word “require” than I would have liked to and no actual numbers for reducing emissions or dates to phase in new technology by. There were also many examples of establishing programs without necessarily explaining how/when they would be established or paid for. From this, it was extremely difficult to tell the degree of change that the bill would create and would have been difficult to understand even without prior background knowledge of climate and energy legislation.

Sightline.org seemed to oversimplified many aspects of the bill, creating confusion in contrast to the previous information. A quick Google search for “climate bill” or “American Clean Energy and Security Act” retrieved top hits of anti-ACES information about job losses and tax increases. It was finally the Energy and Commerce Department of the U.S. actually did the best job of describing ACES and how it would affect the general public—monetarily, employment-wise, etc. It gave actual numbers (e.g. $90 billion invested in energy efficiency and renewal by 2025) and described the many types of jobs that it would create (millions, including many blue collar such as construction). It also discussed the five programs that would be created to protect consumers from energy price increases and the CBO estimates of how much the legislation would cost consumers per day ($0.50, without considering the savings consumers would benefit from).

In all, I found it difficult to research the bill and find solid information that would be accessible to the mainstream public. This is a problem, especially with such an important bill that has come to a close vote already in the House and faces much opposition on its journey to the Senate and President Obama. It is crucial for the community to be knowledgeable about policy so that they may influence their legislators. With such contradictory and confusing information, people are likely to give up the search (if they are politically concerned enough to even begin) without obtaining the facts they deserve. ACES is a perfect example of one of the big issues that American political policy faces today—public ignorance. Without any sort of voice from the community, elected officials are free to decide as they wish—or how they are swayed by big industries.

SOURCES:
http://www.sightline.org/research/energy/res_pubs/cap-and-trade-101?gclid=CPGl29TM kp0CFeFM5QodKzei2Q
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-2454
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h2454/show
http://energycommerce.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=16 33&catid=155&Itemid=55


-->I can comment more specifically if you want. I just feel like I need the background behind my thoughts and have a hard time with the 400 word limit (already over here..) Let me know if you want something different for this one; I certainly have more I can say.