I'm proud to represent #IL06, the district once represented by Henry Hyde. And I'm delighted to see @POTUS proposing a budget that finally gets rid of my predecessor's anti-choice legacy. politico.com/news/2021/05/2…
1/ The data is unambiguous: reducing access to abortions doesn't reduce the incidence of abortions. It just reduces their safety. Take away the access to safe procedures and women die.
2/ The Hyde Amendment, therefore has the practical effect only of compromising the health of lower income women who depend on government-provided healthcare. It is evil and inhumane.
3/ Meanwhile, we know how to reduce abortions: reduce unwanted pregnancies. Provide access to contraception and full women's health services.
4/ So let's do what works. And end Hyde. Thank you for your leadership @POTUS. /fin
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Enough clean gen in the queue to get half way to a zero-carbon grid (e.g., developers want to build them) but held back by delays in grid-interconnection rules.
If we want clean energy... if we want cheap energy, we have to fix the barriers imposed by a system and governance process that is overwhelmingly biased to preserve the status quo.
This morning, I woke up to a story about an antisemitic act in IL06. We had received no calls from constituents, nor were we able to confirm it occurred. I am not going to re-tweet it, but it is cause for a brief discussion of Israel, Palestine and social media disinformation
1/ First, there is no conflict between being pro-Israel and being committed to human rights for everyone living in Gaza and the West Bank.
2/ If that is your view as well, the cycle of attacks and counter attacks every 3 - 7 years is the irreducible problem. Our goal must be to ensure that we aren't having this same conversation 5 years from now.
A brief thread on what happened on the floor today. Because you all need to understand the Q-Knucklehead caucus and the utter failure of leadership that is @GOPLeader:
1/ I'm not naming them because they don't deserve the attention. But you know who they are.
2/ The House physician has advised that members who are vaccinated no longer need wear masks. But because so many members of the House (exclusively, in the Q-Knucklehead caucus) are not vaccinated, we are still asked to wear masks on the floor. wral.com/list-house-mem…
This is a jaw-dropping report from the IEA; partly because of their conclusion, but also because of who they are. Time for an overdue #energytwitter nerd thread on transitions: nytimes.com/2021/05/18/cli…
1/ First, if you read this and think "making the kind of transitions that IEA recommends would be massively disruptive", you're right.
2/ Rapidly phasing out gasoline vehicles has huge impacts on manufacturing & maintenance chains. Blocking new oil & gas leases impacts everyone mid-career and earlier in that sector. Debt and equity holders would see massive write-offs of capital that hasn't yet been amortized
This is a sad, but necessary read. So often when I talk with climate scientists they tell me that they are reluctant to disclose all that they have learned because they don't want people to lose hope. nytimes.com/2021/05/14/opi…
To be clear, don't lose hope! This is a massive challenge that will require all of us working together. Promising nothing more than blood, toil, tears and sweat should never be cause for giving up.
But do know that in a world informed only by facts, the debate would be about how to maintain optimism in the face of terrible odds. How to be inspired to exceed ourselves. And we would succeed.
This is unfair, Chris. While it's true that SOME Democrats have understood and articulated the win/win opportunity innate to cleaner, cheaper energy it's been far from universal. And never so forcefully and consistently from the President in a SOTU speech.
In my professional and political experience, people have evaluated climate policy not by whether it is does what is necessary but by how close it gets to the limits of what conventional wisdom says is the limit of political possibility.
In other words, we elect people based on their stated capacity for leadership and then allow them to get away with saying "well, the voters just aren't there yet." That ain't leadership, and leaves climate policy constrained primarily by our collective ambition.