Kerry-Lieberman supporters often compare the climate bill to social security and the 1957 civil rights act - weak legislation that led to stronger reforms. In essence it is a camel's nose argument. I'm combining two posts I originally wrote for Grist's blog to explain why that view is wrong.
Dead decomposing magic pony: why political circumstances that led to passage of other famous bills don't exist for KL
I've heard supporters describe two paths to passage, though they sound more like wishes upon stars. One is that Obama suddenly prioritizes climate, and makes a large scale push to support the bill. I'll let true believers debate that one. The other path is a massive grassroots surge in support of the bill. Given how awful even supporters admit the bill is, that is even less realistic.
The usual examples supporters give of weak bills that led to big changes are social security and the 1957 civil rights act (though neither was anywhere as bad as KL). But those bills did not pass because there was massive grassroots support behind those particular bills. Social Security arose in response to the Townsend clubs pushing for the Townsend act, and to the "Ham & Eggs" movement, and to the "Share Our Wealth" movement founded by demagogue Huey Long. These movements whose proposals realistically had little chance of passage, many of which were frankly crackpot and impossible to carry out, nonetheless created the pressure that made it possible for Roosevelt to get Social Security passed.
Similarly, the 1957 Civil Rights act was mainly in response to various direct actions - especially the brave actions of the Little Rock 9. The 1957 act was an elite response to the civil rights movement, which was mostly not concentrating on pushing for a legislative agenda. Anyone who calls for grassroots pressure to push KL as part of an inside-out strategy has no clue as to how an inside-out strategy works. Not that the idea of an inside-out strategy is beyond criticism, but anyone who advocates for one really should know what the term means.
But here is the thing. I suspect a lot of supporters of this bill have to know that it is not going to pass. Even ignoring history, supporters have to suspect that a bill that depends on John Kerry and Joe Lieberman crafting a strategy to overcome deep odds is not going to pass.
Can supporters really believe the path to victory will be trail-blazed by John Kerry, the man who was bullied into suppressing most criticism of George Bush at the 2004 Democratic convention? Can they really think Joe Lieberman, a man so treacherous he overtakes himself from behind in dark alleys and stabs himself in the back, is going push through a climate bill? Heck, if Lieberman ends up being the 60th vote, there is a small but significant chance he will change his mind and oppose the bill he wrote. I wonder why many who know this bill is both awful and has no chance of passage not only support it, but verbally bash anyone who opposes it from the left.
I'd guess that it is a humiliation ritual, to build small group solidarity. Fraternities and military schools use hazing to bind their organizations more closely. Religions make members wear special clothes, carry knives, eat special diets in part to promote the feeling of separateness and otherness from the rest of the world. Supporting Kerry-Lieberman is the same thing. Supporters are proving they are not DFH (Dirty F___ Hippies) who oppose a bill just because it is a terrible piece of legislation that won't pass. They are showing a willingness to publicly humiliate themselves. They are undergoing a ritual to demonstrate they are part of the "serious" environmental movement. And of course they are angry at people who refuse to make the same hard choice they did. Here they are making a fool of themselves in public, and those DFH not only won't join them but criticize this hard and noble act. Why is it noble? Well it is hard isn't it? Just like bashing your head against a wall is hard? If it is hard and painful then it must be noble. And those who refuse to take part in this humiliation ritual are weaklings and outsiders and deserve scorn.
I think this old Betty Boop cartoon captures the spirit of KL support perfectly. "Wanna be a member? Wanna be a member?" (warning: Not Work Safe)
The fundamental structure of Kerry-Lieberman differs from social security and the 1957 civil rights acts in ways that ensure it won't lead to further reform. The dead horse's nose won't slide down the slippery slope into the camel's tent.
The main argument for supporting Kerry-Lieberman seems to be "it's a crappy bill, but once it passes it will get better". KL proponents often point out that social security was loophole ridden in a way that excluded most African-Americans when it first passed. But a combination of demographic shifts, and changes to law extended social security to the point that today it covers almost all old U.S. citizens today. Similarly, the civil rights act of 1957 was almost unenforceable as written. But it did create substantial desegregation in limited sectors of society, made civil right enforcement a Federal issue and helped institutionalize opposition to racism to the point that grass roots movements could push forward the far better civil rights laws that followed. It is, in short, a camel's nose argument. Get the camel's nose inside the tent, crappy bill proponents say, and the rest of the camel will follow. Unfortunately KL is structurally far inferior to both these historical examples, and to other "Camel" bills proponents bring up. It is more like a dead horse than a camel. All the cases I can find of weak reforms that grew stronger over time avoided one flaw that is prominent in Kerry-Lieberman. No matter how weak they were, they contained no features that made parts of the problems they were trying to solve worse. The 1957 Civil Rights act did not increase Jim Crow in limited areas to buy off racist Senators. The original Social Security act did not repeal any existing pensions, nor weaken any existing protections for workers or old people.
We have an example of at least one "nose in the tent" bill that did a great deal more harm than good. In Clinton's 1996 welfare reform, originally the Clintons wanted to offer a plan that ended AFDC and required work in return for providing health care, and used the Federal government as an employer of last resort for people who could not find other jobs. People can argue whether that would have been a good tradeoff or not. But once he lost on healthcare and faced difficulty in winning re-election, Clinton ultimately supported a bill that put a time limit on welfare WITHOUT guaranteeing work or offering the government as a guaranteed employer of last resort. When talking to liberals, supporters of the bill claimed it would lead in the long term to being able to create something along the lines of a government as employer of last resort program. In reality, even in the face of the most serious economic downturn since the great depression, the political infrastructure meant job creation had to mostly be done via tax cuts and grants to third party entities, with Federal hiring remaining a minor portion of job creation. And the other results of welfare reform: Most serious examinations of the result of that conclude that this made poverty worse than it would have been under the old system.
Just as the supporters of Clinton's welfare bill claimed it would create conditions that would make it easier to fight poverty and create jobs, the Kerry-Lieberman supporters of today claim it will make it easier to tighten caps and cut emissions - while its actual provisions will make the climate problem worse.
he nominal target has already been more than halfway met just by emissions reductions from the current recession and existing "command & control" legislation. Most of the remaining target could be met by offsets, legal counterfeit do-it-yourself emission permits. So at best the bill would produce few, if any, real cuts - nowhere near the reduction claimed in the nominal cap. Worse, many types of offsets could end increasing emissions even before they served as permission to continue burning coal.
For example, we may see ethanol (which has higher greenhouse gas emissions per mile than gasoline) credited as a carbon offset. Or we may see types of forestry which might release centuries of banked carbon from trees and soil credited as carbon reductions. The protection of offset additionality is phrased in stern generalities with specifics left to regulators. So we don't really know what would or would not be allowed. In an age of regulatory capture, that is not good news.
Even worse, the KL bill repeals the EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse gases. The usual reply from KL supporters: "That old thing? We weren't using it anyway. And that broom is missing a few too many bristles to sweep clean." That misses two points. However weak or strong that authority is, it is the only leverage to get climate legislation through a 60-vote Senate. Pass weak legislation that eliminates the EPA, and what will you use as leverage to strengthen it? Especially after you start seeing big agriculture and forestry garnering massive profits from the counterfeit permit industry (otherwise know as offsets). And while EPA authority does not include the ability to reduce emissions in as optimum a path a we would like, the EPA certainly has authority to reduce emissions by more than the KL bill does.
So for all the KL supports who say "Not bad. Pretty good. I Can't Complain", here is a video of Saything covering an old Johnny Prine song (Lyrics Not Safe for Work)