Bushies announce anti-environment agenda

[Jim]

Well this didn't take long.

 

G.O.P. Plans to Give Environment Rules a Free-Market Tilt

By FELICITY BARRINGER and MICHAEL JANOFSKY

 

Published: November 8, 2004

 

 

ASHINGTON, Nov. 7 - With the elections over, Congress and the Bush administration are moving ahead with ambitious environmental agendas that include revamping signature laws on air pollution and endangered species and reviving a moribund energy bill that would open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to energy exploration.

 

The groundwork for the push was laid down in the past four years even as environmental groups, Congressional moderates and the courts put the brakes on major changes. But the election returns that gave Mr. Bush a clear victory and expanded the Republicans' majorities in Congress have emboldened those determined to hard-wire free-market principles into all environmental policy.

 

"The election is a validation of our philosophy and agenda," Michael O. Leavitt, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, said in an interview. "We will make more progress in less time while maintaining economic competitiveness for the country. That is my mission."

 

Representative Joe L. Barton of Texas, chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, said he was eager to get the process started and encouraged the environmental groups and Democrats who typically oppose Republican initiatives "to come out of the trenches and meet me halfway."

 

But with industry groups anticipating relaxed regulations and environmental groups fighting to retain stiff regulations, the environmental debate over the next four years could be contentious.

 

"What you're going to see is an administration focused on setting broad goals and then letting states and companies and individuals work to achieve those, within an economic framework," said Charles Wehland, a lawyer for Jones Day in Chicago who represents clients like the OGE Energy Corporation and the Great Lakes Chemical Corporation. But Phil Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust, a nonprofit group, warned the White House and Congressional leadership that it would be risky to further push the agenda of the last four years.

 

"George Bush doesn't have to run again, but Republican lawmakers do," Mr. Clapp said. "They know there is a cost to their political association with rolling back environmental laws."

 

Nationally, the environment was a sleeper issue that never awoke. But concern for environmental and conservation issues was sometimes visible at the local level. Montana voters, for instance, rejected an initiative to overturn a ban on a form of mining cyanide, effectively blocking a large new mine on the Blackfoot River.

 

Bush administration officials say that among the first measures moving toward enactment will be those that govern air pollution levels. The administration initiative known as Clear Skies, which generated lukewarm support in Congress during Mr. Bush's first term, is about to come out of mothballs. Will Hart, a spokesman for Senator James M. Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican who is chairman of the Committee on Environment and Public Works, said it was Mr. Imhofe's "No. 1 environmental issue."

 

Clear Skies establishes lower emission standards for pollutants like nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide and mercury, but environmental groups complain that it does not reduce them as much or as soon as levels set forth in a competing bill or by enforcement of the Clean Air Act.

 

Senator James M. Jeffords, the Vermont independent who is the ranking minority member of the committee and a co-sponsor of the competing bill, said it saddened him that Mr. Bush was leading efforts to undermine air standards that his father, the first President Bush, supported. Citing the new alignment in the Senate - 55 Republicans, 44 Democrats and himself - Mr. Jeffords said, "We have the power to block any measure detrimental to the environment."

[specialed]

That's awesome. We don't need roadless areas, wild salmon, or old growth forests anyway. They just stand in the way of PROGRESS. Plus God created all the animals and plants for humans to consume anyway.

[iain]

Why keep old growth around when you can make perfectly new trees?

 

I heard bin laden was hiding out in a spotted owl nest in the coast range. He's training marbeled murrelets to carpet bomb innocent children with gay rights paraphernalia

[catbirdseat]

If Congress is unable to change the law, there is always the possibility of rendering existing laws as unconstitutional. Bush will likely be appointing several Supreme Court justices. People worry that these men will overturn Roe versus Wade, but that is unlikely given current public opinion. What is much more likely is that the court will overturn what has been termed the "regulatory state" that has held sway since the New Deal and the Warren Court. Under the "Constitution in Exile" scenario Bush will appoint judges who believe that Congress only has the authority to regulate Interstate Commerce. It wouldn't be able to be able to regulate worker health and safety, protect the environment, endangered species, prevent discrimination. The Endangered Species Act could well be ruled unconstitutional. This law is a popular one and chances are that as in Roe v. Wade the court would be averse to going strongly against public opinion. But there are judges that don't really care about public opinion.

 

How the Election Affects the Court- Article in The New Republic

[barkernews]

Oh Canada...

Anyone got a place I can crash in Sqaumish... PERMANENTLY?!?!?

[willstrickland]

Trees are the leading cause of forest fires.

[Camilo]

Trees combined with oxygen cause forest fires. Cut them down, eliminate both problems