John Kerry: Palin Misses Point on Cap and Trade

By John Johnson, Newser Staff

Posted Jul 14, 2009 8:54 PM CDT

(Newser) – John Kerry takes Sarah Palin to task for missing the big picture in her essay today against President Obama's cap-and-trade proposal. Palin, he writes in the Huffington Post, manages to criticize legislation to curb climate change without acknowledging the dangers of climate change itself. "It's like complaining about the cost of repairing a roof without factoring in the leaks destroying your home."

Global warming poses catastrophic long-term threats to our economy and national security if we don't act, writes the Massachusetts senator. Palin, however, chooses to ignore this and instead presents a distorted picture of "certain" job losses under the legislation. "Democrats and Republicans will be better off if Governor Palin joins the debate we need to have—one about climate change as well as energy security—rather than leaving so many important details on the editing room floor."

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Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., in May. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Sarah Palin in August of 2008. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia)

Sarah Palin in February of 2008. (AP Photo/Al Grillo)

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Even in the areas Gov. Palin does focus on, she gets things wrong. She focuses on energy production, but ignores the huge expansion of new, clean energy sources made possible through smart energy reform legislation. - Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.

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COMMENTS

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Showing 3 of 15 comments

JonmarkP

Jul 15, 2009 7:49 AM CDT

The problem, the really huge problem, is that the temperatures of the *oceans* is rising. That means ocean currents are changing, and it's causing severe drought, and the ocean levels are rising, and ice caps are melting, and oceans contain more energy for violent storms and tsunamis. That some air temperature somewhere went down a few degrees for a few years is utterly irrelevant.

The_Pinkston

Jul 15, 2009 7:35 AM CDT

Please stop writing/talking about this woman!

chas_m

Jul 15, 2009 7:03 AM CDT

Agreed, you CAN disbelieve the info about global warming and still work to preserve the environment. Absolutely. So will someone please tell Gov. Dumbell that she's got the wrong end of the stick, as usual? She'd win a lot of respect back if she embraced the POSITIVE (caring for the earth, something she really does know something about) instead of the NEGATIVE (denying global warming, denying evolution, focused on oil money and greed, etc etc).

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