[Update: 10/20/08 4:00pm]

The WSJ chimed in this morning attacking Jason Grumet and the Obama campaign for making these statements. Among other accusations, the Journal suggests that an Obama administration would be politicizing the EPA by ordering it to regulate greenhouse gases:

Well, well. For years, Democrats — including Senator Obama — have been howling about the “politicization” of the EPA, which has nominally been part of the Bush Administration. The complaint has been that the White House blocked EPA bureaucrats from making the so-called “endangerment finding” on carbon. Now it turns out that a President Obama would himself wield such a finding as a political bludgeon. He plans to issue an ultimatum to Congress: Either impose new taxes and limits on carbon that he finds amenable, or the EPA carbon police will be let loose to ravage the countryside.

All of this sounds terrifying, except that the Supreme Court of the United States (a Court lead by a Bush appointee no less) also agreed, in Massachusetts v. EPA (2007), that the EPA under the Bush Administration has been derelict by failing to make an endangerment finding with regards to carbon dioxide. In this ruling the Justices compelled the EPA to investigate and determine whether greenhouse gases pose a threat to human health, holding that if the Agency finds they do pose a threat then it must, under the Clean Air Act, take regulatory action to control them.

That the WSJ would attack Obama for pledging to do just this would be shocking, if it weren’t so predictable. It is utterly ridiculous to suggest that the next president, whoever he is, would be politicizing the EPA by complying with the Supreme Court’s ruling. The fact that Grumet said a President Obama would give Congress 18 months to develop its own climate legislation clearly suggests Obama is interested in having Congressional consensus before developing a regulatory approach to global warming, but failing this action the President is still bound by the Supreme Court’s ruling to take action on its own. The point made below still stands — both presidential candidates should be committing themselves to immediately ordering the EPA to make the endangerment finding and then regulating greenhouse gases accordingly.

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Encouraging news from the Obama campaign (courtesy of Bloomberg):

Barack Obama will classify carbon dioxide as a dangerous pollutant that can be regulated should he win the presidential election on Nov. 4, opening the way for new rules on greenhouse gas emissions.

The Democratic senator from Illinois will tell the Environmental Protection Agency that it may use the 1990 Clean Air Act to set emissions limits on power plants and manufacturers, his energy adviser, Jason Grumet, said in an interview. President George W. Bush declined to curb CO2 emissions under the law even after the Supreme Court ruled in 2007 that the government may do so.

If elected, Obama would be the first president to group emissions blamed for global warming into a category of pollutants that includes lead and carbon monoxide. Obama’s rival in the presidential race, Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona, has not said how he would treat CO2 under the act.

Grumet added that if elected, Obama would give Congress 18 months to pass its own comprehensive climate bill, stating “if there’s no action by Congress in those 18 months, I think any responsible president would want to have the regulatory approach.”

Hats off to Senator Obama for making this pledge, and here’s calling on Senator McCain to do the same.