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President Obama set a goal of 1 million new manufacturing jobs in his second term. Last month we added zero. Not one. Nada. Zip. We did add low-wage jobs, though. Maybe we can talk about a national manufacturing strategy now? A Million Manufacturing Jobs? In the 2012 campaign President Obama set a goal of creating [...]
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The Pew Charitable Trust’s fourth annual report on “Who’s Winning the Clean Energy Race?” doesn’t give the United States much to celebrate on this Earth Day. The report, released last week, finds that the United States is no longer the global leader in renewable energy investment. China is. From 2011 to 2012, China attracted $65.1 [...]
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“Tell me I’m your national anthem.” That was the theme of the hundreds of environmentalists and labor union members gathered today at the BlueGreen Alliance’s annual conference in Washington. They wanted to remind President Obama and Congress that the middle class is still the national anthem of this country. In response, Obama administration officials and [...]
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Can something be equally beneficial for both the environment and the economy? Leaders of the nation’s largest environmental organizations and labor unions say yes. This week in Washington, the BlueGreen Alliance will be holding its annual conference, appropriately themed “Good Jobs, Green Jobs.” Often considered each other’s adversary, both the labor and environmental movements share [...]
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The Department of Energy (DOE) has announced a new Clean Energy Manufacturing Initiative. This initiative is about both manufacturing clean energy products and manufacturing using advanced techniques to drive energy efficiency. Both will help make American companies more competitive in the world economy. At the Energy Blog, David Danielson, Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and [...]
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Republicans are always warning us of the scourge of federal power and glorifying the genius of the states – aka the laboratories of democracy. On clean energy standards, conservatives have been getting their way. While Republican obstructionism has prevented the federal government from setting clean energy standards, many states have decided to set their own. [...]
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The climate in Washington has been heating up as lawmakers brace for the automatic spending cuts come March 1 known as the sequester. However, the only real thing heating up is our climate, and that’s where the House GOP prefers to remain silent and cold. In reality, climate change should be taken as seriously as [...]
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As I discussed yesterday, David Leonhardt of the New York Times counseled President Obama to drop using green jobs as a selling point for address climate change. Thankfully, last night Obama did not listen. Obama made clear that tackling the climate crisis can be accomplished while growing the economy: We have doubled the distance our [...]
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Expectations are high for President Obama to get specific about his second-term plans to protect the climate, particularly regarding plans to bypass Congress and use the EPA’s authority to further reduce greenhouse gas pollution. The appeal is obvious: no need to wrangle with the climate change deniers that currently run the House. Still, there are [...]
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The strong reaction to President Obama’s extended remarks on the climate suggests that he wasn’t doing anything on the matter and suddenly feels liberated to do so. Not so. As I have discussed twice previously, after the failure of the Congress to pass a carbon cap in 2010, when Democrats had full control, the President [...]
