Monitor: Obama Should Focus on Economic Impacts of Climate Change

The Christian Science Monitor, in an editorial, said that during the two-week lead-in to an expected Senate vote on blocking the EPA from imposing strict limits on CO2 emissions, President Obama should use his bully pulpit to try to persuade senators from coal-dependent states to vote against the measure.

Noting that "any EPA ruling on carbon emissions would likely be tied up in the courts for years, delaying a solution," the Monitor said Obama "now needs to justify a climate-change law mainly on economic grounds. Fear of global warming doesn't seem to work in the Senate. Many top lawmakers believe that setting a cap on carbon emissions will damage the economy--especially if America's competitors around the world don’t do the same. And they say there's little chance of Senate passage in 2010 if unemployment stays high."

Obama needs "to prove his argument that setting carbon limits and making hefty investments in clean energy will boost the economy--and not limit it, as his critics on Capitol Hill contend." The Monitor said Obama administration agencies already have moved to restrict CO2 emissions in several rulings, and many states and numerous companies are shifting to lower-emission technology. If Obama "can make his case for economic results, that will be far better than all the previous warnings about rising seas and major storms."