The ‘Inflation Reduction Act’: The Green New Deal’s New Look?

News Analysis

Although our legacy media have dutifully described the Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.)/Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) climate bill as the “Inflation Reduction Act,” it’s no stretch to call that a misnomer.

After all, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said the legislation would have a “negligible effect on inflation.”

Yet, even before the bill passed the Senate on Aug. 8, another name for it took hold: the new Green New Deal.

The left’s “Inflation Reduction Act” is just a Trojan Horse for their socialist agenda – $370B for the Green New Deal, $64B for Obamacare, and $313B in taxes on small businesses.

I’m here in Washington fighting back against this. pic.twitter.com/zyVSoQVXFj

— Sen. Marsha Blackburn (@MarshaBlackburn) August 7, 2022

Only Democrats would have the audacity to introduce a bill with $800 billion in new spending on Green New Deal crap and then call it the “Inflation Reduction Act.”

— Rep. Lauren Boebert (@RepBoebert) July 28, 2022

Liberal commentator Matthew Yglesias titled his blog post on the legislation, “How the Green New Deal became the Inflation Reduction Act.” Yet, he argued that the Schumer-Manchin bill is not all that similar to the Green New Deal, claiming that its focus on technology investments means it “looks a lot more like ecomodernism than like a Green New Deal.”

“I do think it is fundamentally dangerous to ignore the extent to which this was an elite-driven policy consensus that flew in the face of the public’s views about priorities,” he added. Yglesias cited Gallup polling that shows climate is far less important to voters than inflation, fuel prices, or the economy in general.

Meanwhile, far-left critics have lamented that the bill does not go nearly far enough.

By contrast, on a recent episode of EpochTV’s “Crossroads” program, free-market economist Thomas DiLorenzo agreed with Philipp