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John McCain can talk a good line on American energy independence and the need to focus our efforts on alternative energy, but he has never turned up to vote for the most important legislation in the Senate that addresses that issue. The law I am taking about is The Jobs, Energy, Families, and Disaster Relief Act of 2008 (S.3335)- A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to extend certain expiring provisions, and for other purposes.

McCain makes a use of wind turbines, solar panels, and soundbites about how the Us needs to focus on energy independence in several of his ads (all photos in this post are from his current and recent ads) but he is sticking with the majority Republican party line and letting his absenteeism act as Nay votes for legislation that would further the goals he espouses in his TV and web based ads.  If you feel a tickling sensation in your nether regions while watching his ads, its nothing to be concerned about.  It’s just John McCain blowing smoke up your ass.

US Senate Votes on S. 3335

As Thomas L. Friedman pointed out in The New York Times, McCain has missed every single one of the votes on this bill. Sometimes he was out campaigning, but on at least one occasion he was in his Senate office and just could not be bothered to go vote. A no show like that counts as a Nay and McCain clearly knows that.

Eight Strikes and You’re Out

Senator McCain did not show up for the crucial vote on July 30, and the renewable energy bill was defeated for the eighth time. In fact, John McCain has a perfect record on this renewable energy legislation. He has missed all eight votes over the last year — which effectively counts as a no vote each time. Once, he was even in the Senate and wouldn’t leave his office to vote.

“McCain did not show up on any votes,” said Scott Sklar, president of The Stella Group, which tracks clean-technology legislation. Despite that, McCain’s campaign commercial running during the Olympics shows a bunch of spinning wind turbines — the very wind turbines that he would not cast a vote to subsidize, even though he supports big subsidies for nuclear power.

Barack Obama did not vote on July 30 either — which is equally inexcusable in my book — but he did vote on three previous occasions in favor of the solar and wind credits.

The fact that Congress has failed eight times to renew them is largely because of a hard core of Republican senators who either don’t want to give Democrats such a victory in an election year or simply don’t believe in renewable energy.

This bill is crucially important for anyone who feels we need to transition our energy needs away from fossil fuels and over to cleaner, more sustainable sources of power.

In addition to addressing alternative energy issues the bill also makes permanent the authority for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) disclosure of tax information relating to terrorist activities and IRS undercover operations. McCain also claims to be the best candidate when it comes to the War on Terror so you’d think he’d show up to vote on that aspect of the bill at least.

The bulk of the bill extends the tax credit for producing electricity from wind facilities through 2009 and the tax credit for closed and open-loop biomass, geothermal, small irrigation, hydropower, landfill gas, and trash combustion facilities through 2011.

It includes marine and hydrokinetic renewable energy as a renewable resource for purposes of tax credits. It also extends the energy tax credit for solar energy and the residential energy efficient property tax credit through 2016 and extends the energy tax credits for fuel cell and microturbine property through 2017. The bill creates a new investment tax credit for combined heat and power system property. In addition, the bill provides funding for new clean renewable energy bonds to finance electricity production from certain renewable resources and for qualified energy conservation bonds.