At least, that’s what the Republicans and Bush are saying:
Bush Guts Environmental Law, Part 178
We’ve been mentioning Bush’s pre-emptive war on the environment over the last couple of shows, and like clockwork it happened again: on Monday the Bush administration quietly shelved a proposal to ban MTBE a gasoline additive that contaminates drinking water in many communities, Oh, and by the by, the MBTE industry has donated more than $1 million to Republicans. While everyone is focused on drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the Bush administration is undoing rule after rule to favor industry over the environment — exempting power plants from having to install new, cleaner technologies; allowing mountain-topping in West Virginia; reversing a law to permit logging in the Tongass National Forest in Alaska; clubbing bald eagle chicks. …Okay, I made the last one up.
When it comes to the environment, Republicans aren’t just in bed with industry; they’re sweeping all the shit off the desk so they can do it right there in the Senate office. They’re a whore on the floor of a taxi cab. And I get so riled up about this because the environment is just different: if your tax cuts are making things worse, you can re-write the tax law. You can re-write a spending bill. But with the environment, once you lose that open space, it’s gone. Once you pave over that wetland, it’s gone. Once that species is gone, only the magic of Steven Speilberg can bring it back.
According to most polls that ask voters which issues will be the most important to them in November, the environment usually doesn’t even rank on the list. For most of us, the river behind our house has to catch on fire before we start to care about the environment.
Isn’t this one of these issues that’s on us?
Remember, vote Bush out in 2004!
Leave a Reply