Lou Dobbs: 'Who The Hell Does The President Think He Is?'
2:17 December 02, 2009
News & Politics
climatebrad
http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2009/12/02/dobbs-rips-obamas-copenhagen-commitment-who-the-hell-does-this-president-think-he-is/ 12/1/2009: Lou Dobbs and Inhofe want to make sure people know Obama isn't a king.
Inhofe: Let's look at the big picture. We have the Copenhagen meeting coming up in the middle of December. We now have learned the president has changed his mind again and President Obama will be attending around the 9th of December. It's my understanding that he will make the statement that he will commit ourselves to the emission standards that were in the Markey bill that passed the House of Representatives. I'm sure you've talked about that because that was several weeks ago. That's a 17% reduction in CO2 by the year 2020.
Dobbs: From 2005 levels.
Inhofe: Yes, that's correct. He can't do that. I just had an interview with a station in Copenhagen, in Denmark --
Dobbs: [laughter]
Inhofe: -- that they were all under the assumption the president could unilaterally do that. No, that's not true. In fact, one of my good friends, a Democrat senator, Jim Webb from Virginia has sent a letter to the president and I'm quoting a sentence out of it now: "As you well know from your time in the Senate, only specific legislation agreed upon in the Congress, or a treaty ratified by the Senate, could actually create such a commitment on behalf of our country."
So, we need to make sure -- and that's the main reason I was going to go to Copenhagen was to, if Barbara Boxer and John Kerry went there and made some kind of a commitment that we were going to do something, I wanted to make sure that countries were fully informed that we are not going to be passing legislation that will accomplish what President Obama I believe is going to tell on the 9th.
Dobbs: Senator, this begs the question if I may put it forward right now: Who the hell does this president think he is?
Inhofe: I dont know, because you can't do that. And I think it's certainly disingenuous to mislead countries into thinking that a president . . . You know, this is not a kingdom. He's not able to do that.
Dobbs: Not yet!
Inhofe: And we want to be sure that people realize that he cannot do that.
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