EPA Says No: Dems Get Rolled Again

It took less than 12 hours.

The Democrats got rolled again.

Bush started the day signing the energy bill that Nancy Pelosi called "earth-shattering change in terms of energy policy" and Sierra Club's Carl Pope said "is a clean break with the failed energy policies of the past and puts us on the path toward a cleaner, greener energy future." To get a bill the president would sign, out dropped any challenge to big oil's obscene profits, a national renewable electricity standard, overwhelmingly popular wind and solar tax credits, and plug-in hybrid credits that might truly jumpstart an alternative automotive future.

They decided passing an energy bill and raising CAFE standards was worth any price. And now they've paid it.

They don't know how to lose with dignity and purpose. They could have done a bill, with solar and wind and RPS and plug-in credits and taxes on oil companies to pay for and seen it vetoed. Then when Bush had the EPA kill the CO2 waiver too he'd have looked like the enviro monster he is. Now he disingenuously argues the energy bill provided a 50 state solution, not a patchwork, as the automakers like to say.

So now we have a do-little energy bill and years more litigation.