The Inflation Reduction Act a New Lease on US Climate Policy: Let’s Not Screw It Up
Greek and Roman tragedy writers relied on a device known as Deus ex Machina to resolve seemingly unresolvable predicaments. The Latin phrase is translated as “god from the machine.” At the point of production when all seems lost, the hero-god or goddess would be lowered to the stage by a crane to make all things well. Sound familiar?
The device has been used throughout the ages in plays, modern graphic novels, and movies. Diana, princess of the Amazon and daughter of Zeus, arrives on the battlefield just in the nick of time to save the world from inevitable disaster.
Politics, too, is theater. Not long ago, it appeared that the Democrats would fail to parlay their slim Senate and House majorities into the broad federal energy and environmental legislation President Biden had promised. The need for legislation has been made all the more critical by the recent Supreme Court decision in West Virginia v. EPA.