Tag Archives: chamber

Big Oil touts offshore drilling jobs to communities most harmed by oil

by TresaBrickhouse Posted on June 27, 2018

Earlier this month, the American Petroleum Institute, the biggest U.S. trade organization for oil and gas, launched a bipartisan effort to reach out to diverse communities across the Southeastern U.S. The group touts offshore drilling jobs for African American and Latino workers.

“We want to build support in minority communities because the message that increasing the supply of affordable energy and good paying jobs will resonate,” API’s Erik Milito told Reuters.

While the oil and gas lobby is billing offshore drilling as an economic boon, environmental justice leaders caution that it’s pedaling dangerous work to the very communities that Big Oil has hurt the most.

“We used to call that economic extortion — in order to have a job you needed to be in a dirty job,” says Jose Bravo, the executive director of the Just Transition Alliance. Bravo, who organizes for clean jobs in California, says he’s seen decades of false promises by the fossil fuel industry.

Refineries located near neighborhoods of color often promise to hire locally, he says, but then bring on employees from out of town. And oil jobs can be risky.

“There’s a lot of potential damage both to the planet and to health,” Bravo says, citing the Deepwater Horizon explosion off the coast of Louisiana that killed 11 people in 2010. He also points out that the damage eventually makes its way back to land: “Historically, when we bring that oil onshore, we’re bringing it into communities of color.”

Last year, the NAACP published a report that found that over a million African Americans live within a half-mile of oil and natural gas production, processing, or transmission and storage facilities, leading to elevated risks of cancer and asthma attacks from toxic air emissions.

To be sure, many local business organizations have joined API’s effort, including the Florida Black Chamber of Commerce, the South Carolina African American Chamber of Commerce, along with Hispanic chambers of commerce from Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia, among others.

Another touchy subject has been the oil lobby’s outreach to Hurricane Maria survivors. Julio Fuentes, president of Florida’s Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, a partner in API’s initiative, defended the push to hire locals in an email to Grist. “Florida has welcomed many of our friends from Puerto Rico, and it is important to provide secure, high-paying jobs for our residents and evacuees,” he said. “Offshore exploration is one way we can do so.”

Michelle Suarez with Organize Florida, a grassroots nonprofit group that has been assisting hurricane survivors, sees how Big Oil can make an appealing offer to an evacuee who has just lost so much. “We’re in this crisis. And so I imagine that it’s going to be tempting for families that are impacted to get some of those jobs,” Suarez says.

Suarez doesn’t think working in Big Oil, with its links to climate change and more frequent and severe superstorms, is the answer to helping evacuees recover. “We’re talking about the industry that has been one of the causes of these disasters, indirectly through their work,” says Suarez.

Both Suarez and Bravo say that their communities don’t need to choose between jobs and a healthy community and environment.

“We need to switch from that narrative because we do need to take care of the earth. This is our home. We have to make it work so that we have jobs that are not extracting and destroying the environment,” Suarez says.

Bravo believes the U.S. can can still be a global leader in spurring careers in renewable energy.

“We are all for jobs but we’re for jobs that don’t pollute, we’re for jobs that are clean, we’re for jobs that are sustainable,” Bravo says.

Read this article: 

Big Oil touts offshore drilling jobs to communities most harmed by oil

Posted in alo, ALPHA, Anchor, FF, GE, ONA, PUR, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Big Oil touts offshore drilling jobs to communities most harmed by oil

Insurers Have Remained Mysteriously Quiet About Obamacare Repeal

by ShawnaKinsela Posted on March 3, 2017

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

A reader emails with a question:

The repeal-Obamacare mania has been on for years, but I have NEVER read anything about what the insurance industry is thinking or doing about it.

Neither have I! And it’s damn mysterious. Obviously the insurance industry was heavily involved in lobbying for Obamacare back in 2009, and just as obviously there are parts of Obamacare they don’t like. The patient pools have turned out to be sicker than they projected and insurance companies have struggled to make money on Obamacare policies. This year, however, they’re finally there—or close to it. The market has shaken out, premiums have risen to CBO-projected levels, and Obamacare is probably a break-even or better prospect for the insurers who have gutted through the first three years.

What’s more, like it or not, they’ve spent years adapting the way they do business. Everything from computer systems to physician compensation now follows Obamacare’s rules. This has cost tens of millions of dollars, but now it’s done. The last thing they need is to rip it all out and start from scratch.

And yet insurance companies have been surprisingly silent about the Republican plan to kill Obamacare. Do they prefer getting rid of it even if there’s an upfront cost? Have they given up, and assume that repeal is a foregone conclusion that’s not worth fighting? Is all their lobbying behind the scenes? It’s not clear. Insurers are pretty unanimous about wanting some certainty in the rules, but aside from that, this eight-week-old story from the New York Times still describes things pretty well:

Far from reflecting the magnitude of the moment, the most prominent message from lobbyists that lawmakers saw in their first week back at work was a narrowly focused advertisement from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce….Health care professionals are not totally silent, but industries that were integral to the creation of the Affordable Care Act in 2010 are keeping their voices down as Republicans rush to dismantle it.

….Some lobbyists have tacitly accepted the likelihood that major provisions of the health law will be repealed, setting their sights instead on shaping its replacement. They fear that if they come out strongly in opposition to repealing the law, they will lose their seats at the table as congressional Republicans and the Trump administration negotiate a replacement.

Insurers spent $150 million lobbying in support of Obamacare in 2009. So far they’ve spent virtually nothing in 2017. I continue to be mystified by this.

Link to article: 

Insurers Have Remained Mysteriously Quiet About Obamacare Repeal

Posted in FF, GE, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Insurers Have Remained Mysteriously Quiet About Obamacare Repeal

Investigators on the Trump-Russia Beat Should Talk to This Man

by dfdedtcf Posted on January 19, 2017

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>
Sergei Millian, left, pictured with Donald Trump and Jorge Perez. Millian’s Facebook page

Last week, the Senate intelligence committee announced it was commencing an investigation of Russian hacking during the 2016 campaign that would include an examination of connections between Russia and the Trump camp. And a veiled but pubic exchange between Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a member of the committee, and FBI Director James Comey during a hearing on January 10 suggested the FBI has collected information on possible ties between Trump associates and Russians and may still be probing this matter. So with subpoena-wielding investigators on this beat, here’s a suggestion: the gumshoes ought to talk to an American from Belarus named Sergei Millian, who has boasted of close ties to Trump and who has worked with an outfit the FBI suspected of being a Russian intelligence front. If they haven’t already.

Millian, who is in his late 30s and won’t say when came to the United States or how he obtained US citizenship, is an intriguing and mysterious figure with a curious connection to Trump. He is president of the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce in the USA (RACC) and the owner of a translation service. The RACC, a nonprofit which Millian started in Atlanta in 2006 and which has survived on shoestring budgets, advocates for closer commercial ties between Russia and the United States and assists US firms looking to do business in Russia. In 2009, the group called for the US Congress “to foster necessary political changes to produce a healthier economic environment” and grant permanent normal trade relations status to Russia. Its website notes that it “facilitates cooperation for U.S. members with the Russian Government, Russian Regional Administrations, U.S. Consulates in Russia, Chambers of Commerce in Russia, and corporate leaders from CIS Commonwealth of Independent States countries.”

The Russian-American Chamber of Commerce’s 2011 tax return reported the group was based in an apartment in Astoria, Queens, where Millian lived—though the group’s letterhead that year listed a Wall Street address—and that year it brought in only $23,300 in contributions and grants and $14,748 in program revenue. The tax return noted that the chamber “successfully hosted four universities from Russia in New York City” and hosted a trade mission from Belarus. In 2015, Millian received a Russian award for fostering cooperation between US and Russian businesses.

On his LinkedIn page, Millian notes he is also the vice president of an outfit called the World Chinese Merchants Union Association, a group that has only a slight presence on the Internet and that seems to have an address in Beijing. According to a LinkedIn post published by Millian in April 2016, he met that month in Beijing with a Chinese official and the Russian ambassador to the Republic of San Marino to discuss industrial and commercial cooperation between China and Russia.

Millian’s online bio notes he graduated from the Minsk State Linguistic University with the equivalent of a masters degree in 2000. His bio says he is a real estate broker who works in residential and commercial properties in the United States and abroad. He used to go by the name Siarhei Kukuts—that’s how he’s listed on tax returns for the RACC—and it is unclear why he changed his name. Millian also has repeatedly claimed he had a significant business association with Trump.

In an April 2016 interview with RIA Novosti, a Russian media outlet, Millian described his history with Trump. He said he met the celebrity real estate developer in 2007 when Trump visited Moscow for a “Millionaire’s Fair,” where he was promoting Trump Vodka. Millian noted that Trump subsequently invited him to a horse race in Miami. “Later,” Millian said, “we met at his office in New York, where he introduced me to his right-hand man—Michael Cohen. He is Trump’s main lawyer, all contracts go through him. Subsequently, a contract was signed with me to promote one of their real estate projects in Russia and the CIS. You can say I was their exclusive broker.”

Millian said he had helped Trump “study the Moscow market” for potential real estate investments. In the April 2009 issue of the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce newsletter, Millian reported that he was working with Russian investors looking to buy property in the United States, and he said, “We have signed formal agreements with the Richard Bowers and Co., the Trump Organization and The Related Group to jointly service the Russian clients’ commercial, residential and industrial real estate needs.” Millian’s claim did jibe with what Donald Trump Jr. said at a 2008 real-estate conference in New York. Trump’s son noted, “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets.” He added, “we see a lot of money pouring in from Russia.”

In the 2016 interview, Millian asserted that Trump would be good for Russia if elected president. Trump, he noted would improve US relations with Russia and lift economic sanctions imposed by Washington on Russia. He said that Trump was interested in doing business in Russia: “I don’t want to reveal Trump’s position, but he is keeping Moscow in his sights and is waiting for an appropriate time.” Millian added, “In general Trump has a very positive attitude to Russians, because he sees them as clients for his business. Incidentally, he has done many projects with people from the Russian-language diaspora. For example, Trump SoHo in New York with billionaire Tamir Sapir.” (Sapir, who died in 2014, was an American billionaire real-estate developer from the former Soviet republic of Georgia.)

Millian apparently was proud of his association with Trump. In 2014, he posted on Facebook a photograph of him with Trump and Jorge Perez, the billionaire real-estate developer in Miami who owns the Related Group.

Millian seemed delighted to spin for Trump and push the impression he was a Trump insider. During the Republican convention, he told the Daily Beast that Trump was a “powerful, charismatic, and highly intelligent leader with a realistic approach toward Russia.” He added, “I, personally, wholeheartedly support his presidential aspirations. It’s been a great pleasure representing Mr. Trump’s projects in Russia.” But weeks later, as the Russia hacking controversy was heating up, Millian in another exchange with the Daily Beast, downplayed his connection to Trump. And the website reported that after its reporter spoke him, Millian removed mentions of his Trump association from an online biography. It also appears that references to the Trump Organization working with the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce in the USA were at some point scraped from its website.

Millian’s activities and ties to Trump have raised questions. In October, the Financial Times mounted an investigation of him and the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce. It reported:

Most of the board members are obscure entities and nearly half of their telephone numbers went unanswered when called by the Financial Times. An FT reporter found no trace of the Chamber of Commerce at the Wall Street address listed on its website. At the same time, the chamber appears to have close official ties, arranging trips for visiting Russian regional governors to the US.

As part of its inquiry into Millian, the newspaper pointed to Millian’s connection to Rossotrudnichestvo, a Russian government organization that promotes Russian culture abroad. In 2013, Mother Jones reported that Rossotrudnichestvo was under investigation by the FBI for using junkets to recruit American assets for Russian intelligence. Through cultural exchanges, Rossotrudnichestvo, which operates under the jurisdiction of the Russian Foreign Ministry, was bringing young Americans—including political aides, nonprofit advocates, and business executives—on trips to Russia. The program was run by Yury Zaytsev, a Russian diplomat who headed the Russian Cultural Center in Washington, DC.

Americans who participated in the exchange trips who were later questioned by FBI agents told Mother Jones that the agents’ questions indicated the FBI suspected Zaytsev and Rossotrudnichestvo had been using the all-expenses-paid trips to Russia to cultivate Americans as intelligence assets. (An asset could be a person who directly works with an intelligence service to gather information, or merely a contact who provides information, opinions, or gossip, not realizing it is being collected by an intelligence officer.) After Mother Jones published a story on the FBI investigation, the Russian embassy in Washington issued a statement: “All such ‘scaring information’ very much resembles Cold War era. A blunt tentative is made to distort and to blacken activities of the Russian Cultural Center in DC, which are aimed at developing mutual trust and cooperation between our peoples and countries.” (A year later, in November 2014, Zaytsev spoke at a Moscow press conference and said, in reference to the upcoming US presidential elections, “it seems to me that the Russian ‘card’ will certainly be played out.” He added, “I think that this presidential election first of all will very clearly show a trend of further development” in US-Russia relations.)

Millian has collaborated with Rossotrudnichestvo. In 2011, he and the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce worked with Zaytsev and the Russian group to mount a 10-day exchange that brought 50 entrepreneurs to the first “Russian-American Business Forum” in Moscow and the Vladimir region, according to a letter Millian sent to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev after the initiative. In that letter, Millian praised Rossotrudnichestvo, and he added, “My entire staff, fellow participants, and I, here at the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce in the USA, very much look forward to assisting Rossotrudnichestvo with the preparations for next year’s trip.” (Millian now says, “We are not affiliated with Rossotrudnichestvo in any way.”)

Toward the end of the presidential campaign Michael Cohen, the Trump lawyer, told the Financial Times that Millian’s claims of working with Trump were “nothing more than a weak attempt to align himself with Mr. Trump’s overwhelmingly successful brand.” But the newspaper reported that Cohen “did not respond to questions about whether he interacted with Mr. Millian or why Mr. Millian is one of only 100 people he follows on Twitter.” (Cohen no longer follows Millian on Twitter.) Hope Hicks, Trump’s campaign spokeswoman, told the paper that Trump had “met and spoke” with Millian only “on one occasion almost a decade ago at a hotel opening.”

Cohen, Hicks, Sean Spicer, Trump’s designated White House press secretary, and the Trump presidential transition team did not respond to a request for information regarding Millian’s interactions with Trump and his associates.

Reached by telephone this week, Millian said he would not discuss his relationship with Trump and requested he be sent questions via email. Mother Jones subsequently sent him a list. Millian responded in an email with answers to a different set of questions, and he noted he would not answer any queries about his personal background or provide any details beyond what was in this reply. He said in the email, “I have a solid reputation with businesses around the world. It’s a common practice for immigrants to change name upon immigrating to the USA. I am US citizen and do not have and never had Russian citizenship. I live and work in NYC.”

In the email, Millian asserted, “I have never said that I worked personally for Trump. I said I was a broker for one of his many real estate projects. There are several brokers who work on such real estate projects. I never represented Mr Trump personally and I am not working with Mr Trump.” He added, “I have signed an official contract with talks of exclusivity that authorized me to represent Trump name project in Russia and CIS.” But he said he had never been paid by Trump for any work. He maintained that the last time he spoke to Trump was in 2008.

Millian insisted he had “never worked for Russian Government or Russian military as a translator or in any other capacity.” He said, “We never got any business with Rossotrudnichestvo.” And he made this point: “I’m a member of the Presidential Trust of NRC-GOP and supporter of Mr Trump who contributed to his campaign just the same way as many millions of Americans. I’m proud that Mr Trump became our president. I’m sure he will rebuild our great nation to the highest standards just as he did with his distinguished buildings. We desperately need better infrastructure, airports, railways in this country. Also, high time starting paying off national debts. I feel upset that press tries to distracts him from making our country great again by distributing fake news.” (A search of campaign finance records revealed no contribution from Millian to the Trump campaign or Republican National Committee; a contribution of $200 does not have to itemized.)

Millian’s response ignored several questions Mother Jones sent him. He would not say when he left Belarus or explain how he became an American citizen. He would not discuss the details of the deal he previously claimed to have struck with the Trump Organization. He would not say how many times he worked on projects or exchanges with Rossotrudnichestvo. (His response seemed to suggest he had nothing to do with the Russian organization, yet the 2011 letter he wrote indicated his Russian-American Chamber of Commerce had collaborated with Rossotrudnichestvo.) He did not explain why references to the Trump organization had been scraped from the RACC’s website and his bio. And he did not answer this question: “In the last year and a half, have you had any contacts with Donald Trump or any of his political or business associates?”

Various media outlets that have examined links between Trump and Russia have focused on Carter Page, a Moscow-connected foreign policy adviser for Trump ‘s presidential campaign (whom Trump spokesman Sean Spicer recently falsely claimed Trump did not know) and Paul Manafort, Trump’s onetime presidential campaign manager who had business ties to Russians and Putin-allied Ukrainians. Any official investigators would likely be interested in these two men. They also should schedule a sit down with Millian.

Originally posted here:

Investigators on the Trump-Russia Beat Should Talk to This Man

Posted in Casio, Citizen, FF, G & F, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Oster, Prepara, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Investigators on the Trump-Russia Beat Should Talk to This Man

Conservatives try out bizarre energy attack ad

by TemekaLittler Posted on June 17, 2016

Conservatives try out bizarre energy attack ad

By on Jun 17, 2016 4:43 pmShare

Welcome to 2016, where “run, Jimmy, run!” is an actual line from an real-life, non-satirical campaign ad.

This week, the political arm of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce launched a new offensive against Pennsylvania Senate hopeful Kathleen McGinty, who is the Democratic nominee. The group, which is backing Republican incumbent Pat Toomey in the Senate race, blasted McGinty’s climate record in the inventive ad.

It features two mothers worrying McGinty will show up to zap their kids’ energetic playtime. “I can’t believe how much energy they have,” says one mom of the children. “Shhh … don’t say that,” says the other, adding, “Have you seen how Katie McGinty tries to tax energy?”

A child is seen running away by the end of the ad, leaving viewers baffled.

All this plays on old-school fears of cap and trade and a carbon tax in a state that has a pretty significant coal and gas industry. McGinty, former Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, is endorsed by the League of Conservation Voters and will go head-to-head against Toomey this November.

If this really is a preview of the new conservative attack line on climate, then we suggest running far, far away.

Find this article interesting?

Donate now to support our work.

Get Grist in your inbox

Visit site – 

Conservatives try out bizarre energy attack ad

Posted in alo, Anchor, Everyone, FF, GE, LAI, ONA, solar, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Conservatives try out bizarre energy attack ad

U.S. Chamber of Commerce joins anti-solar crusade

by ArethaMaxie Posted on June 15, 2016

Throwing shade

U.S. Chamber of Commerce joins anti-solar crusade

By on Jun 15, 2016Share

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is the latest conservative group to start spreading anti-solar messages. In an email sent to supporters on Wednesday, the chamber attacks net metering, a policy in place in many states that pays people with solar panels on their roofs for the electricity they feed into the grid. The group also posted a video on YouTube last week making its anti-net metering case. This is fairly new territory for the chamber, according to energy regulation experts.

In its email, the group warns: “While your neighbor is receiving a credit (in the form of a reduced electricity bill) for putting excess energy back on the electricity grid, these outdated net metering policies overlook the costs to use, maintain, and update the grid. So, who is actually paying those costs? You — and everyone else!”

There is actually some truth to this. But the problem with the chamber’s analysis is that it ignores the positive effects of rooftop solar — most importantly, that it reduces the need for dirty, fossil fuel-based energy that causes air pollution and worsens climate change.

Here’s a more fair way to paint the situation: Electric utilities are using outdated technologies that poison our air and destabilize our climate. Who is actually paying for those costs? You — and everyone else!

We reported on Tuesday about the utilities’ trade association, the Edison Electric Institute, feigning concern for consumers who could be ripped off by unscrupulous solar companies. The Chamber of Commerce’s new campaign takes a different approach by heaping blame on solar consumers. But it’s all part of the same big effort by conservative groups and dirty energy companies to kneecap the solar industry, any way they can.

Find this article interesting?

Donate now to support our work.

Get Grist in your inbox

See original article: 

U.S. Chamber of Commerce joins anti-solar crusade

Posted in alo, Anchor, Everyone, FF, GE, LAI, ONA, solar, solar panels, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on U.S. Chamber of Commerce joins anti-solar crusade

Saudi Arabia’s US-Backed Air War in Yemen May Have Committed War Crimes—Again

by WhitneyG05 Posted on January 8, 2016

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Saudi Arabia is yet again adding to its trail of destruction in its war in Yemen, and its tactics are drawing condemnation from the United Nations. The Saudi’s latest actions include firing missiles on civilian buildings in the capital, Sanaa—striking a wedding hall, the Chamber of Commerce, and a center for the blind—as well as dropping US-made cluster bombs on at least two of Sanaa’s residential neighborhoods.

This morning, a spokesman for United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon condemned the latest strikes, and stated that the use of cluster munitions in civilian areas “may amount to a war crime.”

This is by no means the only time the US-backed, Saudi-led coalition has been called out for potentially violating the laws of war in Yemen and using US-made cluster munitions in civilian areas. (See our previous reporting on that here, here, here, and here.) Now, nine months into the conflict against Houthi rebels who ousted the Saudi-backed government of President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi last January, nearly 3,000 noncombatants have been killed, the majority of them from Saudi-led airstrikes. Despite increasing concern over civilian deaths, the United States continues to ink arms deals and provide intelligence and logistics support to the Saudi coalition.

Excerpt from: 

Saudi Arabia’s US-Backed Air War in Yemen May Have Committed War Crimes—Again

Posted in alo, Anchor, FF, GE, LG, ONA, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Saudi Arabia’s US-Backed Air War in Yemen May Have Committed War Crimes—Again

Obama’s power plant rules could cut your electricity bill

by FeliciaStill Posted on July 24, 2015

Obama’s power plant rules could cut your electricity bill

By on 24 Jul 2015commentsShare

What will happen to your electric bill after the Obama administration starts limiting CO2 emissions from power plants? It could come down quite a bit, a new report finds — if your state leaders are smart.

Republican lawmakers have claimed that residential electricity bills will rise by up to $200 annually under Obama’s Clean Power Plan, based on a study put out in May 2014 by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. While the study has been widely discredited, opponents of Obama’s plan continue to cite it.

Now, a report by consulting firm Synapse Energy Economics suggests that state compliance with the plan — paired with investment in renewables and energy efficiency initiatives — could actually lead to big reductions in what Americans pay for power. The key? Early action.

Two of the report’s authors lay out the logic in EcoWatch:

By investing in high levels of clean energy and energy efficiency, every state can see significant savings with a total of $40 billion saved nationwide in 2030 … However, consumers will typically see the largest savings in states that build renewable resources early. Under the Clean Power Plan, these first movers will profit by becoming net exporters of electricity to states that are slower to respond. States that keep operating coal plants well into the future will tend to become importers after those plants retire, and energy consumers in those states will miss out on substantial benefits of clean energy and energy efficiency.

According to the report, if two-thirds of consumers participate in energy efficiency programs, electricity bills could be $35 cheaper per month than a “business-as-usual” scenario would predict for 2030. In fact, bills would be cheaper than they were in 2012, write the authors. The firm projects that the $35 savings would leave household electric bills at an average of $91 per month in 2030. (The EPA also expects household electric bills to drop under the plan, but the agency estimates they would be $8 lower per month.)

Keep in mind, though, that Synapse’s $35 figure is averaged across the U.S. as a whole. Since electricity prices already vary widely around the country, and the Clean Power Plan will be implemented differently by different states, the projected savings are subject to some massive variance. North Dakota residents, for example, could save $94 per month if their leaders are aggressive with renewable energy and efficiency.

But so far six governors have said they won’t draw up strategies for implementing the Clean Power Plan — so don’t expect early action from their states. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) wrote an op-ed in March calling for states to defy the Obama administration over the power plant rules.

While the Synapse report wasn’t funded by a group with an obvious financial interest in the outcome (like, say, the corporate-backed Chamber of Commerce), it was supported by a group with a viewpoint: the Energy Foundation, “a partnership of major foundations with a mission to promote the transition to a sustainable energy future.” Which is something we can get behind.

Source:
A Clean Energy Future: Why It Pays to Get There First

, EcoWatch.

Climate rule to bring lower energy bills, report says

, The Hill.

Share

Please

enable JavaScript

to view the comments.

Find this article interesting?

Donate now to support our work. A Grist Special Series

Meat: What’s smart, what’s right, what’s next

Get Grist in your inbox

View original:  

Obama’s power plant rules could cut your electricity bill

Posted in alo, Anchor, FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Radius, sustainable energy, Uncategorized, wind power | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Obama’s power plant rules could cut your electricity bill

America’s Largest Health Care Company Tells Supreme Court That Anti-Obamacare Argument Is "Absurd"

by KatheriPohlman Posted on February 10, 2015

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

If getting rid of Obamacare is such a good idea, why isn’t corporate America getting behind King v. Burwell, the Supreme Court case designed to demolish the Affordable Care Act? More than 52 different parties have weighed in with briefs in advance of oral arguments on March 4. Of those, 21 have been filed on behalf of the plaintiffs, who claim millions of Obamacare consumers are receiving illegal health insurance subsidies. The groups filing these briefs include libertarian think tanks, pro-life organizations, Christian legal shops, and some conservative Republican legislators. But not a single business group—not the US Chamber of Commerce, not any of the health industry companies and trade groups that opposed the law when it was being drafted—has presented a brief endorsing this lawsuit.

Meet the Unusual Plaintiffs Behind the Supreme Court Case That Could Destroy Obamacare

These outfits are either backing the Obama administration’s attempt to defeat the suit or sitting out this case. Briefs in the case help explain why: Obamacare is working. There’s no better evidence of this than a brief filed on behalf of the government in King by the Hospital Corporation of America, better known as HCA, the largest health care provider in the country (once run by Obamacare foe Florida Gov. Rick Scott). HCA argues that the legal theory advanced by the plaintiffs is “absurd,” but, more importantly, it presents detailed data drawn from its own operations that demonstrate that the health care law is helping patients and the company itself.

One of Congress’ goals in passing the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was to cut down on the number of uninsured people using expensive emergency rooms for medical care that would be better delivered in an ordinary doctor’s office. HCA notes in its brief that its data from 15 states that use the federal Obamacare exchange show this is exactly what’s happening. The company says that in 2014, uninsured patients visited the ER in its facilities 10 times for every one admission to the hospital—a sign that most of those ER visits weren’t emergencies. People insured through the exchange are visiting the ER three times for every one admission. HCA estimates that “uninsured patients are 300% more likely than Exchange patients to rely on ER care.”

Moreover, the data shows that a person who has obtained insurance through the federal Obamacare exchange is nearly twice as likely to use outpatient care—an indication that they are taking better care of themselves and obtaining care in a much less expensive fashion than those without insurance. “Thus, at the same time that Exchange patients are relying less on the ER, they are receiving more outpatient care than the uninsured, including care (such as chemotherapy) that is typically unavailable in the ER,” HCA says in its brief. “That care is being provided in more appropriate and cost-effective settings.”

DV.load(“//www.documentcloud.org/documents/1658126-hca-amicus-aca.js”, width: 630, height: 500, sidebar: false, container: “#DV-viewer-1658126-hca-amicus-aca” ); HCA Amicus Brief Filed in Supreme Court (PDF)
HCA Amicus Brief Filed in Supreme Court (Text)

HCA’s data also note that women are benefiting immensely from the Obamacare exchanges. The company reports that 53 percent of its uninsured patients are female. But 65 percent of its patients receiving exchange insurance are women. And many of them are using this insurance coverage to obtain cancer treatment.

Seventy-seven percent of the oncology treatments HCA provided to its exchange-based patients went to women. The ACA has, according to HCA, made breast cancer treatment vastly more available to women. Its federal exchange patients are more than three times more likely than uninsured women to get an ultrasound for a breast lump or abnormal mammogram.

HCA has an obvious interest in this case, for the plaintiffs in King are threatening the company’s sizable bottom line, as well as the grand bargain promised by the Obama administration and the law’s drafters in the effort to get it passed. In its brief, HCA says that Obamacare has already cost it more than $600 million in revenues between 2010 and 2014—and that’s just in the 15 states that haven’t created their own exchanges and where HCA has at least one facility. The decreases were part of the deal forged by the drafters of the ACA. The plan was for hospitals to agree to cuts in federal reimbursement for treating the uninsured, but in exchange they would benefit from an influx of newly insured patients.

HCA says that it has only recently begun to see new revenue come in. (Of the roughly 134,000 patients with federal exchange-based insurance who visited an HCA facility last year, 62 percent had never been there before. This suggests that the new insurance program was definitely driving business to HCA’s hospitals and clinics.) If the Supreme Court kills off the Obamacare subsidies, HCA says it will have to absorb about $350 million in initial losses and far more in the future.

In effect, HCA is telling the court that Obamacare is good for both corporate America and individual Americans getting insured through it.

An HCA lawyer didn’t return a call for comment, but that argument—emphasized by HCA in its brief, which mentions the lack of business community support for the King plaintiffs—may be aimed squarely at Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. Lawyers for the King plaintiffs have publicly opined that the conservative justices on the court will relish this opportunity to kill the ACA. But these attorneys may be miscalculating when it comes to Roberts, who provided the fifth critical vote to save Obamacare the last time the ACA faced a major challenge in the Supreme Court.

Roberts is a conservative, but he’s also a former corporate lawyer. During his tenure, he has consistently sided with corporate America and the Chamber of Commerce in all sorts of cases. An ideologically driven case like King might provide good fare for the court’s conservatives—but Roberts may draw the line at ruling in these plaintiffs’ favor when they are threatening the profits of big business. At least, that’s what one of the nation’s biggest health care companies is now hoping for.

Read More: 

America’s Largest Health Care Company Tells Supreme Court That Anti-Obamacare Argument Is "Absurd"

Posted in Anchor, FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on America’s Largest Health Care Company Tells Supreme Court That Anti-Obamacare Argument Is "Absurd"

Could the GOP-controlled Congress actually raise the gas tax?

by Jonathan Davidson Posted on January 6, 2015

Could the GOP-controlled Congress actually raise the gas tax?

By on 6 Jan 2015commentsShare

Thanks to low gasoline prices, the average American family is expected to spend at least $550 less on gasoline this year than in 2014. Meanwhile, our country’s transportation infrastructure is crumbling after years of underfunding. Why not use some of Americans’ savings on gas to make repairs to the roads they’re using that cheap gas to drive on?

That’s the idea behind raising the federal gas tax, a concept being cautiously floated by a few politicians of both parties and a number of advocacy groups on the left and right. America hasn’t raised it since 1993, when it was set at 18.4 cents a gallon and not pegged to inflation. The tax is supposed to fund the U.S. Highway Trust Fund, but it isn’t bringing in enough money, so general treasury funds have been used to partially plug the hole while tens of billions of dollars of needed maintenance work has gone undone. Right now, infrastructure is funded through a short-term fix, implemented last summer, which expires in May.

Republican Sen. Bob Corker (Tenn.) is proposing to increase the tax by 12 cents a gallon over two years, and then index it to inflation. The tax hike would be offset by a decrease in income taxes, or some other means to make the change “revenue-neutral.” Sen. Jim Thune (R-S.D.) told Fox News Sunday that he’s open to at least considering the idea: “I don’t favor increasing any tax. But I think we have to look at all options. … It is important that we fund infrastructure.”

Many business-friendly groups, like the conservative U.S. Chamber of Commerce, favor a gas-tax increase to pay for infrastructure. The Chamber’s Janet Kavinoky told The New York Times that many in Congress are closeted supporters of the tax, but fear retribution if they come out and support the policy publicly.

As New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman put it last month, raising the gas tax would be “a hard political choice” but “a win for the climate, our country and our kids.” There’s increasing talk about raising gas taxes at the state level too.

The president isn’t anxious to raise the federal gas tax, though, as USA Today reports:

The White House is declining to endorse calls for gas tax hikes to pay for new road and bridge construction, but will look at anything Congress approves.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest says the administration wants to stick with its original plan to finance new infrastructure spending with revenue to be gained by closing tax loopholes that favor the wealthy.

And some politicians on the right continue to vehemently oppose a gas-tax hike, whether it’s offset or not. They say it would be fine to let the Highway Trust Fund go bankrupt, arguing that infrastructure maintenance should be left up to state and local governments, not the feds.

So a gas-tax increase might be more likely now than it was a few months ago, but not a lot more likely.

Share

Please

enable JavaScript

to view the comments.

Find this article interesting?

Donate now to support our work.

Get stories like this in your inbox

AdvertisementAdvertisement

Read more: 

Could the GOP-controlled Congress actually raise the gas tax?

Posted in alo, Anchor, FF, GE, LG, ONA, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Could the GOP-controlled Congress actually raise the gas tax?

GOP Rebel Justin Amash Just Beat a Guy Who Called Him “Al Qaeda’s Best Friend”

by botai3dkwu Posted on August 6, 2014

Mother Jones

The GOP’s business establishment talked openly about making conservative hardliners pay for pushing Washington toward a debt ceiling crisis last fall. But that wave of Chamber of Commerce-funded primary challengers to conservative incumbents never materialized. The Chamber settled on trying to take out Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.), a second term congressman and Ron Paul disciple famous for voting on no on pretty much everything—even the Paul Ryan budget—and for cobbling together a bipartisan coalition to rein in the NSA’s domestic surveillance programs. It was the first part that drew the ire of business interests in his district, and the second part that made him the villain in one of the year’s nastiest campaign ads. Amash, challenger Brian Ellis warned, was “Al Qaeda’s best friend” in Congress.

Ellis received a rare primary endorsement from an incumbent member of Amash’s Michigan delegation, GOP Rep. Mike Rogers, an NSA defender. But we’re not in 2002 anymore; it turns out Amash’s civil libertarianism plays pretty well in the western Michigan district that gave America Gerald Ford. Boosted by deep-pocketed donors of his own (including the DeVos family), Amash eased past Ellis, making him a sure-thing to win a third term in November.

View post: 

GOP Rebel Justin Amash Just Beat a Guy Who Called Him “Al Qaeda’s Best Friend”

Posted in Anchor, FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, PUR, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on GOP Rebel Justin Amash Just Beat a Guy Who Called Him “Al Qaeda’s Best Friend”