“Sen. Barack Obama has chosen Sen. Joe Biden to be his vice-presidential running mate.” I was halfway through my Obama-flavoured follow up to the McCain Short List, when CNN tweeted the news.
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Okay, you say he’s not the Vice President. I say, yet. It’s good news to me. Much ado has been made in the direction of Sen. Obama’s experience. And while I don’t think the Senator quite has the inner propeller beanie that his opponents have painted him with, I myself question his ability. But Biden comes with mad experience. As a sixth term Senator – that’s 34 in people years – he can assuage a lot of those concerns. Also as Chair of the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee, that’s just one more thorn he pulls from the Obama camp’s side.
Weighing in with a lifetime score of 84-percent from the The League of Conservation Voters, he shows real environmental cred. Not surprising, during his 2008 presidential run, he had this to say at a rally in South Carolina:
“If I could wave a wand, and the Lord said I could solve one problem, I would solve the energy crisis. That’s the single most consequential problem we can solve. It’s what you have to do to get greenhouse gases under control.”
Along with energy security, he’s been a strong voice on how our own accountability factors into the climate crisis. Instead of fairytale solutions, he calls upon us to clean up our own mess:
“I personally believe that the single most important step we can take to resume a leadership role in international climate-change efforts would be to make real progress toward a domestic emissions-reduction regime. For too long we have abdicated the responsibility to reduce our own emissions, the largest single source of the problem we face today. We have the world’s largest economy, with the highest per-capita emissions. Rather than leading by example, we have retreated from international negotiations.” He said before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
And before you whip out your Al Gore-shapped measuring stick, take a longer look at his scorecard:
- Cosponsor of the Global Warming Pollution Reduction Act, penned both by Sen. Boxer and Sen. Sanders.
- Calls for raising the fuel-economy standard to 40 mpg by 2017.
- Opposes subsidizing technology and practices that would only worsen global warming.
- Introduced a bill to promote the use of CFLs, unlike that other Senator.
- Active supporter of the U.S. participating in the U.N. climate negotiations.
Is he the absolute greenist candidate Obama could have picked – maybe, maybe not. But I bet he can spell potato(e).
Related Posts:
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Obama and Ethanol: Is it Just About Winning Votes?
The 5 Best Presidential Candidates to Address Climate Change
Image source: Joe Biden’s Senate website
About Jerry James Stone
[...] An Environmental Brief About Vice-President Joe Biden “If I could wave a wand, and the Lord said I could solve one problem, I would solve the energy crisis. That’s the single most consequential problem we can solve. It’s what you have to do to get greenhouse gases under control.” [...]