Juliet Eilperin is a decent reporter, so when she says that the climate and energy bill has almost no hope for passage in the Senate, you can bet it’s at least somewhat informed. Really you need only look at the difficulties to find the necessary votes on health care, realize that cap and trade is more controversial inside the Democratic caucus, add the fact that reconciliation is not an option, and then recognize the paucity of meaningful and sustained activist action on the issue compared to health care, to come to the same conclusion.

Eilperin adds that Democrats are trying to basically buy the support of skeptics with a handout to the nuclear power industry. And one Senator figures prominently in that deal.

So Democratic leaders, with the support of the Obama administration, are trying to sway at least half a dozen Republicans by offering amendments to speed along their top priority: building nuclear power plants.

Graham has suggested provisions on nuclear power and offshore oil drilling that could win his support for a cap-and-trade climate bill. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) has established a bipartisan working group of 17 Senate offices that is close to producing a detailed amendment aimed at hurrying the construction of U.S. nuclear reactors [...]

“There is nowhere near 60 votes for a nuclear power bill on its own. There’s not 60 votes for a cap-and-trade bill as it’s currently constructed,” Graham said in an interview. He said combining the two measures is “the only way you’ll get to 60 votes.”

Environmentalists don’t merely reject nuclear because of the public safety and radioactive waste issues, but because it’s prohibitively expensive. It costs three times current US electricity rates to generate the same amount from nuclear power. Plant construction and other capital costs are extremely inflated relative to renewables. The only way to speed construction of nuclear reactors is to hand over bushels of money. And Joe Lieberman, the man so worried about deficits in the context of health care, is the one putting together this hefty bribe for cap and trade.

Lieberman said over the weekend that doing nothing would be better than passing a health care bill with a public option, misrepresented the budget cost and the cost to individuals from that measure, and claimed nobody is willing to debate him on the merits. Well, it’s worth debating the Senator on this point: How can anyone worry about the budget deficit in one context, while preparing to hand out hundreds of billions of dollars to the most expensive power-generating industry you can find in another context?