Sen. Mark Udall has done a functional job in his first term as Colorado’s senior Senator. Far from leveraging his huge bases of support in the Denver-Boulder metro area, Sen. Udall has made more effort to reach across the aisle to the psychotic Cons of the 111th Congress who have ground the U.S. Senate to a near halt. I have argued in numerous posts in plain and simple terms why this is such a bad idea. To date, and in extreme summary form, we have a half-assed Stimulus Bill, a Health Care Insurance Bill Giveaway, a Wall St. Reform Scott Free Bill and no Climate and Energy Bill. This situation largely exists because people like Sen. Udall and President Obama want to spend more time chasing the Holy Bipartisan Grail than passing powerful progressive legislation that might actually move this country forward in this 21st century. To be clear, I do not consider either man to be a progressive; nor did I consider them to be so prior to the 2008 election. The place I’m arguing from is that this country badly needs progressive legislation and we’re ill-served by the current crop of politicians who don’t care that the Senate is broken.
Recently, Sen. Udall announced that he really, really badly wants a National 25% Renewable Energy Standard by 2025 bill passed during this session of Congress. That’s fair enough, I suppose. Sen. Udall did establish some credentials as an environmental advocate in the state of Colorado and during his time as 2nd district Representative in the House. But, as I’ve also argued in numerous posts, the U.S. Senate is where good legislation goes to die. By moving from his base of support and joining the Quest for the Holy Bipartisan Grail in the Senate, I challenge the Senator on his calls for an RES. If he’s not serious about truly enacting such a policy, or if he wants to give utilities policies they support in return for weakening the RES in any way, I’m not interested in listening to his announcements.
