by Bridget Johnson
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) suggested that some proponents of
climate-change action are going through their own denials — thinking that
there’s really a viable alternative for replacing fossil fuels.
“We still depend on coal. We can do it better. We have done it
better, cleaned up the atmosphere and the climate more in the last two decades
than ever before. We can even do more if the government will work with us,”
Manchin told Fox. “They need what we have. We want to produce and provide what
they have. And with that being said, we should be working together.”
Manchin stressed that he wants Senate votes on energy issues such
as the approval of the Keystone XL pipeline and support of coal-mining areas.
“I said, Harry, I came here to vote. I’m OK. I can take any tough
vote. I can explain myself. I can go home and look every West Virginian in the
eye and tell them, with the facts I had in front of me, this is what I voted
for that would help our country and our state. I can do that,” he said of
Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).
“And I’m asking him to open that process up. There’s other reasons
behind the scene maybe we don’t know about. But him and Mitch need to get
together and work and move forward, as leaders are supposed to do.”
Reid’s excuse, Manchin said, is that “it’s a moving target. He
makes one deal, and they change to another deal.”
The West Virginia Dem then gave his opinion on climate change.
“I believe that seven billion human beings on Mother Earth here
have affected the environment, and we’re responsible for that. With that being
said, you got to find the balance. So, I’m not a denier,” said Manchin. “On the
other hand, I ask my friends from really the far left, if they will, are you a
denier? Are you denying that this country can continue to provide affordable,
reliable energy without using fossil or coal or any of that?”
“It’s going to take all of us working together. So, deniers on
both sides are wrong. And you don’t get anything accomplished by just pointing
fingers and saying, this person is wrong, we can go along. If we go through
another polar vortex that we went through this winter and they take off the
fossil fuel basically reliability of 10,000 megawatts of power, we’re going to
have people that possibility is — their life is in danger and many people will
die.”
“We shouldn’t let that happen,” he continued. “Reliability is the
name of the game, reliability, affordability, what we can provide in this
country to keep us competitive. And it’s going to take everything. I don’t want
to be reliant on foreign oil anymore. And we don’t need to be.”
Bridget Johnson is a career journalist whose news articles and
opinion columns have run in dozens of news outlets across the globe. Bridget
first came to Washington to be online editor at The Hill, where she wrote The
World from The Hill column on foreign policy. Previously she was an opinion
writer and editorial board member at the Rocky Mountain News and nation/world
news columnist at the Los Angeles Daily News. She has contributed to USA Today,
The Wall Street Journal, National Review Online, Politico and more, and has
myriad television and radio credits as a commentator. Bridget is Washington
Editor for PJ Media.
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