Judgment

“If we are to guard against ignorance and remain free, it is the responsibility of every American to be informed.”  Thomas Jefferson

Last week, by split decision, the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) reported its decision on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Clean Power Plan, also termed the 111(d) Rule. The Supreme Court granted a stay of the EPA’s final rule, the “Carbon Pollution Emission Guidelines for Existing Stationary Sources: Electric Utility Generating Units.” The state of Missouri and 26 other states have joined suit against the EPA claiming that the Rule is unconstitutional and would cause “irreparable harm” to the states. The case will go back to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Washington, D.C., Circuit. Michael Nasi, an attorney involved in the case, said that the SCOTUS opinion reflected two conclusions: first that the Rule would indeed cause irreparable harm and second that the plaintiff (the 27 states) had a high likelihood of winning the case against the EPA.

With this stay, Missourians are now less likely to suffer unnecessary increases in electricity costs just to enrich liberal special interest groups. These “renewable energy” groups stand to make millions by forcing utilities to become electricity brokers instead of generators. Missouri electricity is about 80 percent coal-generated, providing us with electricity costs that are below those of most states. The EPA knew that its Clean Power Plan was unattainable by our clean-coal generators and would force Missouri utilities to switch to more expensive electricity from wind, solar and natural gas fired generation, increasing Missouri’s cost of electricity by hundreds of millions of dollars per year. The average citizen always loses when “government-knows-best” bureaucracies are unbridled.

The global-warming crowd is frantic and hysterical claiming in one article that “The sheer magnitude of the catastrophe will rival any tragedy that has faced humanity since the Book of Genesis.” The good news, however, is that since before 1982, over 30 years ago, when they began making such predictions of global annihilation, not a single prediction has materialized. On the other hand, those who denied the alarmists’ predictions have been validated in virtually every prediction. Given the record, why is much of the general public still uninformed, you might ask? The most feasible answer is that the media promotes the alarmist theories and rejects the science of the opposition.

For example, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), whose studies are foundational to the global warming activists, has been exposed for its manipulation of data and deliberate climatology misrepresentations. Additionally, the “climate change models” have been consistently unreliable, and further, modeling advocates refuse to submit their models to History-Matching, a standard process used to validate computer modeling.

The long and the short of it is that SCOTUS has acted to protect Missourians from unconstitutional and irreparable harm. By Court action, Missouri’s electricity prices and reliability (at least for now) will not be compromised by an arbitrary and capricious rule of the EPA. You may be bombarded with doomsday predictions, but the good news is that of all similar predictions since the 1980s, not one has materialized. I would say that the odds and good judgment are with the skeptics.

You can contact my office at (573) 751-2108 if you have any questions. Thank you and we welcome your prayers for the proper application of state government.