Billionaire real estate investor and legendary tax evader Leona Helmsley famously said: “Only the little people pay taxes.” It turns out Helmsley was all too right.

Last month’s discovery that GE paid zero in taxes in 2010 has exploded across the news. But GE is not alone. Rainforest Action Network reviewed the top four banks, oil and coal companies in the country, and found that all of them are gaming the system. In fact, Bank of America, Citi, Massey Energy and Chevron have also all paid zero in federal income taxes this year or in year’s past.

We reviewed 12 of the dirtiest corporate tax dodgers: Bank of America, Citi, JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, Chevron, BP, Shell, Exxon, Massey Energy, Alpha Natural Resources, Peabody Energy and Arch Coal. These 12 banks, oil and coal companies are responsible for foreclosing on millions of people’s homes and polluting our air, water and climate. At the same time, we found that they pay next to nothing into a tax system that provides the very services that protect the homeless, the sick and our environment.

As the graphic below shows, banks, oil and coal companies are making billions in profits annually and paying much less than their fair share in taxes. In fact, the top four oil companies in the country made $1.26 trillion in gross revenues and paid a shocking 2.04% average tax rate.

Click here to see graphic at full size

If just the top banks, oil and coal companies actually paid the IRS corporate tax rate of 35%, they would be giving back $62 billion this tax season. That is almost double the current $38 billion proposed federal budget cuts.

To add insult to injury, while these multi-billion dollar industries are raking in the profits and evading their taxes they were also paying millions in CEO compensation and lobby dollars. These corporations are happy to pay large sums to manipulate our democracy but aren’t so interested in paying to support that democracy.

So, let’s get one thing straight: America is not broke, and these dirty corporations don’t need any more handouts, bailouts, or subsidies. We don’t have a money problem, we have a priorities problem. We’re slashing billions from our budget, much of which will come out of social services and environmental protections, while allowing corporate giants to slip ever-increasing profits into offshore accounts.

By reversing years of tax giveaways to the largest corporations, Congress could raise trillions in revenue not only covering our budget deficit but also enhancing education, health and environmental programs that safeguard our families and our future.

Pissed off? You should be. It’s time corporate tax dodgers pay their fair share. You can get involved with RAN’s campaigns to hold Wall Street, King Coal and Big Oil accountable. And US Uncut is leading actions on Tax Day to call out corporate tax dodgers – get involved!

Photo by Tyler March

I’ve spent the past week in Salt Lake City, UT – supporting the local group Peaceful Uprising, and my friend Tim DeChristopher. For those that aren’t familiar with Tim – he gained notoriety in 2008 when he went to a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) auction of oil and gas leases, and he raised his Bidder #70 paddle to win 22,000 acres, at a cost of $1.8 million dollars. Not surprisingly, he didn’t have $1.8 million dollars. What he did have was the courage and conviction to take creative direct action to prevent this land from being sold off for the short-term profit of oil companies who care nothing about the justice, ecology, or a livable future.

This afternoon, Tim goes to trial for disrupting the auction. Despite the fact that the BLM auction was later invalidated under the Obama administration (the BLM violated its own rules and rushed the auction through at the behest of the oil industry), Tim is still facing up to 10 years in jail, and a $750,000 fine.

A reasonable person would realize that since the government ruled that the auctions were invalid to begin with – Tim clearly prevented a greater crime from happening. And a reasonable person should also see that the dangerous policies of destroying wild lands to continue our addiction to fossil fuels is a far greater crime than anything Tim might have done. But the judge in this case has blocked attempts by Tim’s lawyers to introduce arguments about the dire threats of climate change, and refused to let the jury hear Tim’s motivations and reasons for doing what he did.

Dozens of bidders in the past have not paid on their bids – but not a single one has been prosecuted. Why not? Because their motivations for bidding and not paying were rooted in the pursuit of profit. Tim chose to bid and not pay due to a motive of morality. And apparently in our legal and political system – people motivated by altruism and justice are far more dangerous and criminal than those motivated by ruthless profit.

It’s clear that the reason for Tim’s prosecution is not about the single action he took, and it’s not about the oil and gas leases. It’s about sending a message to those that believe that sometimes to fight for justice you have to do what’s right, and what is right isn’t necessarily always legal. This trial is meant to intimidate those who find inspiration from people like Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Rosa Parks, Emma Goldman – and the countless others who dared to take action for justice. But we know the power of taking action, we know that EVERY successful movement has used civil disobedience to bring about change. We watching the people’s movements in the Middle East, and in Wisonsin right now – where people are acting from their hearts and hopes, not their fears or their couches.

One of the central themes of the Countdown to Uprising summit this past weekend, and the march and rally today is “joy and resolve”. People from across the country (from Greenpeace, 350.org, Ruckus Society, Rainforest Action Network and dozens more organizations) have joined us in Salt Lake City this weekend. And thousands more across the country are holding solidarity events, and spreading the word to their communities. We are here to stand in solidarity with Tim, and to show that we will not be silenced or intimidated by Tim’s trial.

We know the urgency, and seriousness of the climate crisis. While our movement continues to ask itself “what must we do” to confront this challenge –  Tim’s courage provides inspiration that we must do more than merely speak truth to power. We must act on our own commitments to justice and be willing to sacrifice for a better world. The cost of acting on our conscience may appear high at some times, but we know that the cost of NOT acting is far greater.

During Tim’s keynote speech at the Summit this weekend– he reflected on the daunting sound of “United States v Tim DeChristopher”. As Tim put it – “300 million to 1 is a little intimidating – those aren’t good odds”. But we know those numbers aren’t true. Millions of people support what Tim did, and support a world based on justice and sustainability. Millions of people are demanding we confront the climate crisis. And most importantly, Tim isn’t alone.

While he admitted confronting the climate crisis is daunting, Tim said he realized that through the past 2 years of telling his story; of organizing with Peaceful Uprising; and working with the international climate movement; – he wasn’t alone. He realized how many people supported what he did. He realized how the movement for climate justice has been taking action, and shutting down coal plants, and winning victories for people and planet.  He saw how the movement grows every time we share our stories, every time we show another person our joy and resolve, and most importantly – every time we take an action in the name of justice.

As he closed his speech – he made the simple, but telling observation: “Every day, our odds are getting better”. Truer words have not been spoken.

Calling themselves Climb Against Coal - these self-proclaimed Mountain Momma’s summited the 14,411 feet of the mountain in support of the Coal Free Washington campaign.

Their goal was to raise awareness about the need to end our reliance on coal, and specifically to call for the closure of Washington State’s only remaining coal-fired power plant in Centralia, operated by Transalta. This power plant is the single largest source of global warming pollution in the state, and a major cause of respiratory diseases and premature deaths.

As the summit team was coming back down the mountain,  a support team laid out a nearly 75,000 square foot “No Coal” banner on the Inner Glacier – which is believed to be the largest banner in the history of the movement! The banner was viewable from nearby peaks nearly a mile away from the Glacier.  The nearly 2-acre banner took 15 volunteers all morning to layout, using several thousand feet of landscaping fabric. 

Back down below on solid land, friends and families of the climbers gathered to show their support. Dozens of parents, children, grandparents, and friends cheered on the climbers and the banner, and helped educate passing hikers and climbers to these important issues.

To learn more about the campaign – visit www.ClimbAgainstCoal.org

See more photos on Flickr:

Carbon offsets often do not deliver promised results. Offsets from forest projects are especially unreliable because the deforestation they are supposed to stop in one area can easily move elsewhere. The use of these sorts of offsets would not only give big polluters a giant loophole, it could actually increase global warming pollution.

In addition, as carbon credits are paid for and traded under a new cap and trade system, low-quality offsets threaten to corrupt those new markets. Cheap offsets could literally act as “sub-prime” carbon credits, creating huge financial risks. This risk was demonstrated yet again this week when the U.N. actually shut down SGS UK, one of the world’s leading carbon offset accreditation firms, after it was unable to show that its staff had thoroughly vetted offset projects.

The SGS embarrassment was a blow to backers of offset schemes and it should be a wake up call to policymakers as they work to craft new climate agreements both here and internationally. The ACES bill that cleared the House earlier this year has up to 2 billion tons of offsets available per year.

Because the situation is so ridiculous, Greenpeace had a bit of fun and developed CROC, a fake government agency that confers the benefits of carbon offsets to the average citizen. Users can get credit for doing some good for the environment, which they can use to do some thing bad to it, just like corporate polluters do. Check out the PSA above and follow CROC on Twitter!

The banner was hung just to the side of Lincoln’s head – and read “America Honors Leaders – Not Politicians: Stop Global Warming”. Concurrently in Italy, over 100 Greenpeace activists currently occupied FIVE coal-fired power plants across the country. At least one of these Italian actions is from aa US/Canadian team – and activists from 18 countries are involved in the protests that intend to last the duration of the G8 meeting.

With our best scientists stressing the urgency of the climate crisis – we cannot afford compromises or pandering to dirty industries – we need dramatic action that reflects the best climate science -  not political convenience. This is the type of bold action that is needed to bring about real action to solve the climate crisis. Whether you believe him or not – Obama often has good rhetoric around the need to address climate change. But we need to take heed from the famous words of Franklin Roosevelt – “I agree with you, I want to do it, now make me do it.”

At the disappointing G8 summit in  Italy, an announcement was made of a new commitment to keeping global temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius – a target already endorsed by over 100 nations. While this is certainly a worthy goal, President Obama and the other G8 leaders did not commit to short-term greenhouse gas emissions reductions necessary to achieving this long-term target. Despite promising to “restore science to its rightful place” in the administration – Obama has been conveniently sliding around emissions targets, and arbitrarily pushing baseline dates for emissions reductions from 1990 levels (where most climate science has been based) to 2005 levels. The G8 statement for emissions targets read a fuzzy….“of 1990 or more later years”.

The actions at Rushmore and across Italy are meant  to put some heat on Obama and world leaders – and create political space and broader awareness to the urgency and seriousness of the climate crisis. Already, we were the #4 story on  CNN, the lead story on Yahoo.com, and featured in Newsweek, Guardian UK, Fox, NBC, Washington Post, ABC, Daily Kos, Huffington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Christian Science Monitor, and hundreds of more major media outlets. In addition to doing traditional media work – we also had streaming video and photos from multiple perspectives being watched live on the Greenpeace website – with thousands of viewers watching the action in real time. (Yes, we had helmet cams). We were live-blogging while on the ropes, as well as using Twitter and other social networking forums to make sure the world saw our message. All of you were vital in helping this story gain such a huge audience – from posting it on Facebook, telling your friends, and re-Tweeting the story.

You can see further photos, video, and press release on the action at Greenpeace.org More updates still to come!

Today, a story in the Washington Times (admittedly, not the most objective paper) ran which called out an exemption in the bill for Duke Energy and other utilities that have coal power plants already permitted or under construction. While ACES has some regulation around new coal plants (requiring retrofits by 2015 with an unproven CCS technology that doesn’t exist yet) – these exemptions would effectively grandfather in two Duke Energy plants currently proposed  – Cliffside in North Carolina and Edwardsport in Indiana.  Not coincidentally, Duke Energy has had a strong role in shaping the ACESA bill, from helping draft the US-CAP blueprint that provided the basis for ACESA, to having CEO Jim Rogers testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee hearings on the bill.

While many people saw ACESA as a good first step but needing improvements – the bill seems to be getting worse and worse, rather than better.  When the loudest voice from the “environmental community” is from the Duke/industry-led US-CAP – it’s time our movement rolls up its sleeves and starts pushing back to ensure meaningful legislation that will stop the climate crisis, and build a just economy based on clean energy. Right now we are being outplayed by industry – and it’s nothing less than our future at stake.

EXCLUSIVE: Lobbyists help Dems draft climate change bill

Lawmakers bristle at Bush parallel

By Tom LoBianco Monday, May 4, 2009

Democratic lawmakers who spent much of the Bush administration blasting officials for letting energy lobbyists write national policy have turned to a coalition of business and environmental groups to help draft their own sweeping climate bill.

And one little-noticed provision of the draft bill would give one of the coalition’s co-founders a lucrative exemption on a coal-fired project it is building.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman, both of California, were among the Democrats — then in the minority — who slammed Vice President Dick Cheney for holding closed-door meetings to draft energy policy early in the Bush administration.

Republicans “invited energy lobbyists to write the energy bill that gouges consumers with big payoffs to Big Gas and Big Oil,” Mrs. Pelosi said in 2005. “They have turned Washington, D.C., into an oil and gas town when it is supposed to be the city of innovation, of new, of fresh ideas about our energy policy.”

But the sweeping climate bill Mr. Waxman and Rep. Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts Democrat and chairman of the panel’s key environmental subcommittee, introduced at the end of March includes a provision that benefits Duke Energy Corp., a founding member of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP), whose climate plan released in January the lawmakers have frequently called a “blueprint” for their climate legislation.

The exemption would save Duke Energy — along with other firms now building new coal power plants — from having to spend millions of dollars outfitting its Cliffside, N.C., power plant currently under construction with “clean coal” technology.

“The USCAP companies must be delirious over the freebies that they’ve received after writing the blueprint for [the House draft bill],” said Larry Neal, deputy Republican staff director for the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

At the kickoff to hearings last week on the massive climate bill, Myron Ebell, climate and energy policy director for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told lawmakers, “The authors of the draft bill have invited the beneficiaries of what could turn out to be the biggest transfer of wealth from consumers to special interests in American history to write the rules for this legalized plunder.”

A spokeswoman for Mr. Waxman rejected any parallel with the previous administration.

“It’s just not a fair comparison,” said Karen Lightfoot, spokeswoman for Mr. Waxman, saying the process for the climate bill had been far more transparent.

Members of the Cheney energy task force crafted energy policy in secret in 2001, and Democratic lawmakers spent months battling the Bush administration to release records of the meetings, she said.

By contrast, Mr. Waxman’s committee has held dozens of hearings on the topic of climate change, and USCAP’s blueprint has been publicly touted since its January release, Ms. Lightfoot said.

It was USCAP that provided language to the Waxman-Market draft that effectively bars construction of new coal-fired projects for 10 to 15 years, until “clean coal” technology is developed. The draft bill has language that effectively shields Duke and few other energy companies from the restrictions for unfinished plants already well along in the permitting process.

Mr. Waxman and Mr. Markey have said they used USCAP’s climate-change proposal as a “blueprint” for the broad-based legislation they outlined in late March and are starting to put into final form.

At a January hearing, Mr. Waxman promised the USCAP ideas would be written into climate legislation.

USCAP’s members include environmental advocacy groups such as the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Defense Fund and corporate giants such as PepsiCo Inc. and Ford Motor Co., in addition to many of the nation’s top energy providers.

Critics say the little-noticed provision affecting the Duke Energy coal plant is a prime illustration of the close links between industry and environmental lobbies and the bill’s authors.

Supporters of the exemption say it would protect energy companies from having to scrap coal projects well under way. Critics say the provision amounts to the same type of handout Democrats accused Republicans of approving eight years ago.

Duke Energy spokesman Tom Williams would not disclose whether his company requested the language, but said an exemption makes sense.

“When you’re building a plant, it’s not good practice to have legislation that somehow retroactively hinders the permit,” Mr. Williams said. “You can’t operate a business that way.”

The House draft bill says any coal plant that obtains final construction approval after Jan. 1, 2009, must meet the stringent pollution control rules. Duke Energy has two new coal projects under way, both of which obtained their permits in January 2008.

Duke Energy Chief Executive Officer Jim Rogers has been an influential voice in the Hill debate over climate change. When he testified last month on a panel of USCAP members, he did not mention the provision, which directly affects the Cliffside plant.

The exemption would benefit 45 other coal facilities that are under construction or have received permits (including a second Duke Energy project in Indiana), but Duke Energy is the only affected company that belongs to USCAP.

Many environmentalists have chafed at new coal plant construction, calling the term “clean coal” a “dirty lie.” More than 40 environmental activists were arrested outside the Cliffside plant protesting the coal project late last month.

“It is just the most blatant hypocrisy,” Jim Warren, executive director of North Carolina Waste Awareness and Reduction Network and one of the 44 protesters arrested, said of Mr. Rogers’ environmental proclamations.

Mr. Rogers told North Carolina public officials in 2007 that he would actively lobby to exempt the Cliffside plant from stricter pollution standards.

“So you’re going to be lobbying in Congress essentially to have Cliffside be grandfathered?” Gudrun Thompson, a lawyer for the Southern Environmental Law Center, asked during a January 2007 hearing on the project.

Mr. Rogers said he thought the plant would be grandfathered “because it’s perceived by the government as we perceive it, as a clean coal plant.”

Committee staff confirmed that the provision exempting the Duke coal project was drawn from the USCAP blueprint.

“We’ve been very clear that we do not advocate for any provision or recommendation, we advocate for the document as a whole,” USCAP spokeswoman Katie Mandes said.

“USCAP felt it was important to include a proposal for emissions standards going forward, that’s why it was included in the blueprint,” Ms. Mandes said.

Mr. Williams said it is not certain that the Cliffside plant would be exempted from the new requirement, because of a question whether a pending legal challenge to the project would affect its permit status.

The provision in the Waxman-Markey bill would effectively ban construction of new coal plants for the next decade by requiring them to install “clean coal” technology that captures and stores carbon emissions to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

The climate bill introduced in the previous Congress by House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman John D. Dingell, Michigan Democrat, and energy and air quality subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher, Virginia Democrat in October included a similar exemption for coal-fired plants.

Duke Energy donated $11,000 to Mr. Dingell and $10,000 to Mr. Boucher during the 2008 election cycle. Mr. Dingell and Mr. Boucher still held their respective chairmanships at that time.

Duke’s North Carolina project would face major hurdles without the exemption. Although the company could retrofit the plant to capture carbon emissions, it would have to pipe the carbon dioxide out of the state because no good geological storage sites are nearby.

The second Duke Energy coal-powered project under construction, a coal gasification plant in Indiana, also would be exempted by the provision, but would have less trouble retrofitting with “clean coal” technology.

Members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will take up the climate bill again this week in subcommittee. Mr. Waxman and Mr. Markey have said they want the full bill to be reported to the House floor by Memorial Day.

The action unfolded just before leaders from the worlds most polluting countries gathered for the Major Economies Forum at the State Department. While the MEF was started by Bush to undermine the Kyoto process, Obama recently announced a continuation of the meeting – recognizing the need for the world’s major economies to address climate change in the lead-up to Copenhagen. Hillary Clinton was addressing the crowd at the State Department, while Obama himself was speaking next door at the National Academy of Sciences.

The climbers and the banner were up for several hours, in full view of  Hillary and Obama’s motorcades, thousands of DC residents, the international delegates to the meeting, and international press. Already, the action has been covered in the Washington Post, CNN, the Guardian UK, Wall Street Journal. and Associated Press

And of course, this action builds on the growing momentum of the global climate justice movement, including the recent events such as the thousands risking arrest at the Capitol Climate Action in March, to  Cliffside in North Carolina last week, to the waves of actions trying to save Coal River Mountain, to the mass mobilzations at the UK climate camp. Our movement is growing, our actions are escalating – and together, we will fight for climate justice!

WASHINGTON – April 27 – Greenpeace today urged government ministers from the world’s 17 biggest greenhouse polluters (1) to “Stop Global Warming” and “Rescue the Planet” from the devastating effects of climate change. The international environmental group greeted the ministers with the banner message hung from a construction crane near the State Department as they assembled in Washington D.C. for climate talks under the Major Economies Forum (MEF) process.

“Time is running out. This meeting is an opportunity to fast-track discussions on avoiding catastrophic warming and inject some much needed urgency and cooperation into the ongoing UN climate talks, which are dragging on at a snail’s pace,” said Karen Sack, Greenpeace International Political Director.

“President Obama has said that the US is ready to lead on global warming,” said Carroll Muffett, Greenpeace USA Deputy Campaign Director. “Now we need the President to move from words to deeds and engage leaders in Congress and the world’s governments to lead them toward climate solutions.”

A peak in global emissions by 2015 followed by a rapid decline to as close to zero as possible by 2050 is crucial to protect the climate. The industrialized world must commit to deeper cuts in emissions and provide financial and technical assistance to developing countries to enable them to switch to clean energy, stop deforestation and adapt to those climate impacts that are now unavoidable.

“Greenpeace is calling on world leaders to take personal responsibility for guaranteeing a strong, legally binding and fair agreement at the UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen, in December. That means they must be there in person,” said Sack.

This week, climate will be on the agenda at both ends of Pennsylvania Ave. While nations gather at the State Department, members of Congress will be discussing the Waxman-Markey draft legislation, a good first step in cutting emissions, but a bill that needs to be strengthened by the removal of government giveaways to the coal industry and the removal of greenhouse gas reduction shortcuts in the form of off-sets.

Last month, Greenpeace released its roadmap for slowing climate change, the Energy [R]evolution, which shows that the US can cut emissions 25 percent by 2020 while creating millions of jobs in the renewable energy sector and avoiding taxpayer subsidies to the coal and nuclear industries.

To read the full-report, visit: http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/press-center/reports4/energy-r-evolution-a-bluepr

Visuals of the banner are available at: http://usaphoto.greenpeace.org/20090427emitters/

Is “Washington” Winning?

By Ted Glick

It was a couple of weeks before the historic March 2nd shutdown action at the coal-fired Capitol Power Plant on Capitol Hill in D.C. A national leader of an important climate group came up to me in the hallway at a conference we were both attending to express concern about the action. She had heard from Nancy Pelosi’s office, which was not happy that the action was happening. I asked, “what are the specific concerns?” and wasn’t able to get a clear answer.

And this was a national leader of a climate group that has been among the strongest when it comes to calling for serious, substantial and science-based reductions of dangerous greenhouse gas emissions, a minimum of 25-40% below 1990 levels by 2020 for countries like the U.S.

From my vantage point, I see this same thing happening with way too many inside-the-beltway environmental and climate groups since Obama won the Presidency and the Democrats strengthened their hold on Congress. Groups are moderating their tactics and their demands, scaling them back to gain access to high-level White House and Congressional leaders, who themselves are being impacted by Republican intransigence and fossil fuel supporting Democrats. It’s an old, familiar story which has played out innumerable times on other issues in the past. And it’s a very big problem for the low-income people of the world, most of them people of color, who are most vulnerable to the more destructive storms, floods, droughts, wildfires, famines and sea level rise that we’re already seeing as the atmosphere heats up.

That’s why it is so important that there be continuing, visible and aggressive nonviolent direct actions by groups and activists who understand that our role in 2009 is not to go along to get along but to escalate the political pressure, to make the need for strong action on climate a fundamental moral issue. It cannot, absolutely cannot, be the political science on Capitol Hill or in Washington that determines our tactics and demands; they must be determined by the urgent climate science.

What could this mean specifically?

One example is what happened at the Second World Coal-to-Liquids Conference last Thursday afternoon. A newly-formed D.C. Rising Tide group thoroughly and nonviolently disrupted this conference, engaging in a “people’s filibuster” for almost half an hour. Activists stood in the audience and loudly presented speeches to refute the statements of coal and oil executives from Chevron, World Coal Institute, World Petroleum Council and Consol Energy.  The advocates of clean energy called for an end to the use of fossil fuels and for adoption of clean, renewable, community-based energy sources. Protesters deployed banners in the conference to highlight that “Coal kills” and “Coal Takes Lives” and we need “Renewable energy now.”

“Pound for pound coal produces more CO2 than almost any other form of energy production. If we’re serious about tackling climate change, we absolutely must stop mining and burning coal. Coal to liquids technology is a step in the wrong direction for our air, water and climate.” said Michael Weber of Rising Tide in a press release issued afterwards. The carbon emissions from the production and burning of coal-to-liquids fuel is twice as much as the production and burning of gasoline.

How did the civil rights movement break the back of legal segregation? It didn’t happen by concentrating the vast bulk of its resources and energies on Capitol Hill. It happened through heroic action at local levels all across the country, by confronting racist voter registration and other racist practices, putting the defenders of the status quo on the defensive and taking the moral high ground which, in turn, led to a political crisis for the political and economic establishment.

We need to do the same on the climate issue, and we need to do it now, right now, in the spring of 2009. We need to build off of the power of the 12,000-young-people strong PowerShift09 conference and the many-thousands-strong Capitol Power Plant action a month ago and keep upping the ante, not get caught up in Washington political games, even as we escalate the pressure on our Congressional representatives.

We need more and more, a steady stream, of local nonviolent direct actions directed against the coal and fossil fuels industry. We need similar actions directed against the politicians who are paying back their fossil fuel industry contributors by their regressive actions on Capitol Hill. We need people willing to engage in long hunger strikes as a way of underlining the urgency. And what we really should be talking about is thousands of students and others descending on Washington after the schools let out in early May for a people’s lobby action, not for a day but for day after day after day, refusing to go away, being a visible presence that cannot be forgotten.

As I write this, we’re days away from the release by the House Energy and Commerce Committee of draft legislation to put a steadily declining cap and a price on carbon emissions. Indications are that it’s not going to come close to the 25-40%-by-2020 reduction targets, compared to 1990 levels, called for both by the science as well as the world’s climate negotiators who are trying to pass a stronger treaty by the end of this year at a major U.N conference in Copenhagen.

Once again, it’s the political science of corporate lobbyist-dominated Capitol Hill that seems to be driving what our federal government does, not the needs of threatened humanity and all living species.

I have hope that President Obama is concerned about all this. As a former community organizer and a very smart person who, to his credit, made his best appointments in the climate field (as distinct from his national security and economic appointments), there are grounds for hope that, with a visible and active movement pushing him and others toward stronger positions, putting the fossil fools on the defensive, he might find the strength to take the risks, to give the leadership he needs to be giving.

It was encouraging to see Obama, just a few days ago, making the connections between the Red River floods and global warming, doing something I’ve seen few in the mass media doing. According to the Scientific American website, President Obama says [on March 23rd] potentially historic flood levels in North Dakota are a clear example of why steps need to be taken to stop global warming. If you look at the flooding that’s going on right now in North Dakota and you say to yourself, If you see an increase of two degrees, what does that do, in terms of the situation there? Obama told reporters at the White House Monday. That indicates the degree to which we have to take this seriously.”

It’s time for a spring climate offensive.

Ted Glick is the Policy Director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (www.chesapeakeclimate.org). Past columns and other information can be found at www.tedglick.com, and he can be reached at indpol@igc.org.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid just made an announcement moments ago – calling to switch the Capitol Power Plant entirely off of coal! Just 4 days before thousands of people are mobilizing at the facility for the largest act of civil disobedience in US history for the climate – this statement shows the power of grassroots action!

The Capitol Power Plant has been controversial for years – as an antiquated, inefficient facility that is the largest source of  pollution in Washington DC. While efforts to clean up the plant and switch off it’s usage of coal have been attempted for years (including by Pelosi and the Greening the Capitol Initiative), powerful coal state interests (namely Senators Mitch McConnell and Robert Byrd) have blocked attempts to end it’s usage of coal. This plant symbolizes the stranglehold coal has over our climate, our environment, our communities, and our political process.

In the past 2 weeks, the Capitol Climate Action Coalition (made up of over 100 organizations from across the country) sent letters to Congress, informing them of our intent for peaceful action March 2nd at the Capitol Power Plant that is  reflecting the urgency and seriousness of the climate crisis.  And as the media buzz and public interest grows for this historic mobilization – we are flexing out political muscles, showing that people are demanding real change in our climate and energy policies.

As Pelosi and Reid accurately noted today:

Taking this major step toward cleaning up the Capitol Power Plant’s emissions would be an important demonstration of Congress’ willingness to deal with the enormous challenges of global warming, energy independence and our inefficient use of finite fossil fuels. We strongly encourage you to move forward aggressively with us on a comprehensive set of policies for the entire Capitol complex and the entire Legislative Branch to quickly reduce emissions and petroleum consumption through energy efficiency, renewable energy, and clean alternative fuels.

This statement today by Pelosi and Reid shows the power of grassroots movements to spur our leaders into action. Years of letter writing, lobbying, and organizing have been vital in building the case about this plant – but it has taken the mass mobilization of thousands of people to push our leaders to more substantial action. As Congressional leaders are recognizing that better solutions exist for their own backyard – we must keep the pressure up to ensure that coal is phased out across the country, and replaced with clean, renewable, just solutions that solve the climate crisis, and support our communities.

In a press statement by the Capitol Climate Action in response, Mike Tidwell from Chesapeake Climate Action Network said:

“Speaker Pelosi and Leader Reid today showed the power of grassroots action. That grassroots action is going to continue until Congress passes legislation that solves the climate crisis.”

Thousands of you are already planning to join us March 2nd in DC – to make sure that our message is not simply about cleaning up one facility – but about climate justice for all.  We still have non-violence trainings  all weekend, and for people choosing to peacefully engage in civil disobedience or participate in the support rally -you can still  join us in keeping this momentum up!

Says Sarandon:

“Gandhi. Martin Luther King. They were willing to stand up for what’s right, even if it meant peacefully breaking the law. Civil disobedience can overcome great challenges. And global warming is the greatest challenge of our time.”

This video brings another nationally respected voice to America’s call for urgent action to address the climate crisis. Supported by James Hansen, Bill McKibben Wendell Berry, Reverend Lennox Yearwood, and more than 60 environmental, faith, social justice, and community groups – the Capitol Climate Action aims to turn a new corner for the climate movement. 

Background
The Capitol Power Plant, which is owned by Congress and sits just blocks from the American seat of power, burns coal to heat and cool numerous buildings on Capitol Hill. The facility no longer generates electricity but its reliance on coal has made it the focus of political controversy and a powerful symbol of coal’s impact on the environment and public health. The Capitol Plant is a symbol of the country’s dangerous reliance on coal-fired power plants–the biggest source of global warming pollution in the U.S.

On March 2nd, thousands of people from across the country will join together for a peaceful civil disobedience and rally, reflecting the urgency and seriousness of the climate crisis. You can be a part of this historic event.

Learn more, at www.CapitolClimateAction.org