OK, with the government shutdown that kicked in today at midnight, it should come as no surprise that we have a highly dysfunctional Congress. Still, when Congressional gridlock derails a good, sensible, popular bill on energy efficiency in a country that harnesses less than half of the energy we produce and loses almost 30 percent* due to inefficiencies, at least some attention should be paid.

The bill in question is the Shaheen-Portman energy efficiency bill [pdf]. Initially introduced in 2011 and reintroduced this year first in April as S.761 then in July as S. 1392 [pdf], the bipartisan Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act is designed to address the lowest of the lowest hanging fruit in our nation’s quest for energy security: energy efficiency by “promot[ing]