Wed, 20 May 2009 20:43:58 +0000 – By Rep. John ShadeggRepublican Representing Arizona's Third District
The House Energy and Commerce Committee, on which I sit, is in the middle of a marathon session to debate and amend the Democratic Party's cap-and-trade proposal.
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Cap-and-Trade, simply put, is an enormous tax on American energy designed to reduce the emission of carbon dioxide. If passed, it will cost American families an estimated $4,300 a year and destroy millions of jobs - many of which will be outsourced to countries without a national energy tax. It will raise electricity prices by 90%, gasoline prices by 74% and reduce the Gross Domestic Product by $9.6 trillion.
Yet, according to the Heritage foundation, this huge job-killing tax hike won't even reduce global temperature by a degree in a century.
So far, Republicans have offered a number of commonsense amendments to the bill as safeguards for the American people. These amendments have been soundly rejected by the committee's Democrat majority.
Perhaps most notably, Democrats rejected safeguard amendments that would halt cap-and-trade if unemployment hit 15% or if gasoline hit $5 a gallon.
In other words, Washington Democrats will side with the fringe environmental lobby even if it has economically devastating consequences.
Republicans in Congress must play the part of Paul Revere. What is happening right now in the Energy and Commerce Committee must be a call to action for America.
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