Coal-Hearted Bastards

Looks like the House GOP is making good on their threat to kill all funding for President Obama's new EPA pollution rules for coal plants.

House appropriators on Tuesday approved a $30 billion spending bill designed to block a host of looming Environmental Protection Agency regulations viewed by the GOP as exceeding the agency’s authority.

Republicans on the Appropriations Committee pushed through the Interior and environment funding bill, sending it to the House floor over the objections of Democrats who described it as full of “veto bait” and handouts to big business.

The panel advanced the measure — the seventh, and potentially last for the year, of the 12 annual appropriations bills Congress is supposed to pass — by a 29–19 vote. Even if approved by the House, the bill is unlikely to become law. The Senate has yet to act on a single appropriations bill, and President Obama would likely refuse to sign it.

Still, the bill has become another battleground for the GOP’s escalating assault on Obama’s regulatory agenda. It contains myriad provisions designed to dial back or altogether block a wide range of EPA regulations.

House Republicans are betting that the Senate will pass and the President will sign the bill rather than shutting down the entire Department of the Interior, including national parks, monuments, and memorials.  Of course, the last time the House GOP shut down national parks, it didn't go so well for them.  It looks like they're willing to do it again in order to gum up the EPA's coal plant rules however.

We'll see how far this gets, but yes, I would fully expect another shutdown battle this fall.