AWOL Eight Years On Global Warming

by Steve Soto

As we have said before, John McCain will spend the next several months recasting himself as a better conservative than George W. Bush, especially on issues important to swing and independent voters like health care and global warming. McCain has already modified his earlier, lame health care agenda, which originally relied upon Bush's tax credit approach and did nothing to make coverage more affordable. He and his chief advisors have re-issued his proposal to rely upon purchasing pools, technology, and competition without mandates to make insurance more affordable, a small-ball approach that does little to ensure affordability or deal with the millions who don't have insurance. Then again, that really isn't the point behind McCain's pivot. He simply wants to spin his new proposal as a better approach that shows he cares, even though it does nothing to rein in costs or extend coverage to the uninsured, especially those with pre-existing conditions. McCain simply wants to scare voters away from a Democratic proposal by using the same "Harry and Louise" talking points that Obama has already used against Clinton and Edwards' proposals.

Similarly now, McCain is racing to recast himself as a conservative who will do something on global warming. Yesterday, McCain separated himself from Bush's inaction on the issue by saying eight years of neglect was wrong. He supported caps on emissions and a trading system along the lines of what he and Joe Lieberman have touted for years. The only problem with McCain's sudden indignation against Bush's record is that McCain was a member of the majority party in the Senate for much of this decade, and was in a position to be a leader on this issue with broad bipartisan support already in place. And yet never in those six years did McCain take on Bush directly and mount a bipartisan assault on the administration's negligence. He had the right issue, the right pulpit, the street cred, and broad bipartisan support for the taking, and yet he never hammered away on this issue.

And now suddenly, when he is running as the Better Bush, he wants us to believe that this is a major issue that has his attention, when he couldn't be bothered to challenge Bush directly on it for eight years?