[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 8]
[Senate]
[Pages 11775-11776]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       CLIMATE CHANGE LEGISLATION

  Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I rise to address an environmental issue, 
an economic issue, and a moral issue. Future generations will look back 
on global warming as the defining issue of our time. Our children, 
their children, and their children will look back on this issue and 
judge us on how we confronted it.

[[Page 11776]]

  If we treat global warming politically, as so many of the other side 
of the aisle did today, if we abdicate our responsibility, if we ignore 
reality, if we twiddle our thumbs as the destructive effects of global 
warming intensify, we will lose our chance to shape the future because, 
simply put, we will be squandering it.
  I applaud Senator Boxer, the chairwoman of the Environment and Public 
Works Committee, a tireless advocate for clean air, safe drinking 
water, and healthy families.
  This was not an easy vote. This entire week I have listened to the 
speeches on the Senate floor, and I have listened to my colleagues 
speak eloquently on the need for global climate change legislation. I 
fully agree with the environmental goals of this bill--mandatory caps, 
the science-based timeline. This, as I said, is the moral question of 
our generation. I have the utmost respect for my colleagues who have 
worked so long and so hard to craft this historic legislation and for 
environmental advocates in Ohio and across the country. I am 100 
percent committed to passing a robust, mandatory cap-and-trade policy. 
However, while we have been debating climate policy, Ohioans have been 
getting bad news.
  This has been a particularly tough week for my State. In the last 7 
days, Ohioans learned that our State may soon lose another 10,000 jobs. 
Those are not just jobs. They are the building blocks, the foundation 
for individual achievement, family security, and community 
survivability. They are about health care, they are about opportunity, 
they are about sending kids to college, they are about admission to the 
middle class.
  Now that foundation is crumbling--10,000 good-paying jobs in 1 week. 
Since 2001, Ohio has lost more than 200,000 manufacturing jobs.
  We have, to be sure, a moral obligation to our planet. For me, that 
obligation stems from Scripture which makes each of us a steward of our 
planet, of this Earth. We also have an opportunity and obligation to 
Ohioans and to all Americans. We have the opportunity and the 
obligation to write global warming policy that is sustainable, 
equitable, beneficial, both domestically and globally, both 
environmentally and economically. We can do that. We can write a bill 
to do that. We can write a law to do that or we can settle for a work 
that I believe is still in progress.
  I cannot settle and could not settle a moment ago in my vote for this 
legislation because it needlessly may hurt my State because it fails to 
protect against what could be a policy that exports emissions rather 
than eliminating emissions.
  I submitted five amendments to this bill that were designed to 
produce a final bill that would combat global warming without 
undermining American families, without hurting families from Galion to 
Gallipolis, from Cincinnati to Ashtabula. Unfortunately, after today's 
cloture vote, there was no opportunity to debate and vote on those 
amendments. Given the chance, I would have fought to redistribute the 
financial burden imposed by this bill so Ohio would receive a fair 
share, rather than the short end of the stick.
  I would have fought to provide sufficient transition assistance for 
energy-intensive manufacturing so our Nation does not lose those 
crucial national-security oriented, in many cases, crucial jobs. I 
would have fought to ensure domestic manufacturers a level playing 
field with companies from countries without global warming 
requirements.
  A plant shuts down in Steubenville or Lima, OH, a plant that has 
followed Ohio and national environmental law over the years, and moves 
to China. We lose our jobs, and emissions get even greater because the 
Chinese do not have the environmental laws we do. That is part of the 
problem with U.S. trade policy. That is another time for another speech 
and another day. But if we don't take this right step to ensure 
domestic manufacturers a level playing field with companies from 
countries without global warming requirements, we might as well throw a 
going-away party for the steel industry, the cement industry, the glass 
industry, aluminum industry, the chemical industry, for foundry after 
foundry after foundry in Ravenna, Chillicothe, Mansfield, and Marion. 
We might as well pray for a miracle when it comes to global warming 
because as we export those jobs to countries that have weak 
environmental laws, we will be exporting emissions so they come in 
quantities of twice as much from smokestacks in China than they come 
from smokestacks in Ohio.
  I would have fought for greater capital investment in emerging green 
businesses and manufacturing. We need to go green to achieve our goals. 
We need to rebuild our manufacturing sector to remain a self-sufficient 
nation and the strongest economy on the planet.
  We can pass legislation that can be a jobs legislation, energy 
legislation, environmental legislation if we do the right thing and 
encourage our companies and our investors to build solar panels and 
solar cells, to build fuel cells, to build wind turbines, to move 
forward on all the kinds of biomass energy production that we know how 
to do in this country.
  Why wouldn't we invest in the research, infrastructure, job training, 
and the commercialization needed to secure our independence from 
foreign oil, to fight global warming, to revitalize our economy? Mr. 
President, why wouldn't we?
  I would have fought for resources to help coal communities diversify 
their economies. If we ignore these communities, we breed poverty. Go 
with me to southeast Ohio and look at the number of people who are 
lining up in food pantries, lining up for food to get through the week, 
to get through the month, to get through the winter and now the spring, 
as most people in those families hold jobs, often full time, often part 
time. They don't pay enough because of what has happened to coal miners 
and what has happened to industry in southeast Ohio.
  We, in moral terms and practical terms, cannot let that happen. If we 
ignore these communities, as I said, we breed more poverty. That is not 
a prediction, that is a fact.
  I was not given the opportunity to offer my amendments. I will have 
the opportunity to push for legislation that capitalizes on our 
Nation's strengths, that leaves a legacy of which we can be proud for 
future generations.
  We can do it, we must do it, and with Senator Boxer's leadership, we 
will do it.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Pennsylvania.

                          ____________________