Is the President Green Enough?

New fuel-efficiency rules are a start, but Obama must take political risks for climate change

Kevin Lamarque / Reuters

Obama brokers a deal on gas mileage.

As he stood in the rose garden on May 19 with state governors and auto executives to announce a new deal that tightens automobile fuel-efficiency standards, Barack Obama took note of the glorious weather. "The sun is out because good things are happening," he said.

Many environmentalists — who spent the eight years of the Bush Administration in the cold — would agree. Obama announced tough new national standards for automobile emissions and fuel efficiency that essentially settled a long-running battle between environmentalists and the car industry in favor of the greens. Under the proposed rules, which would begin to take...

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