Bush Administration Solution to High Gas Prices? Cut Mass Transit Funding. August 14, 2008

The Department of Transportation is a little upset that Americans are driving less.  You see, they promised money to a number of states for road upkeep and when people started driving less, and thus consuming less gasoline, gasoline tax revenues declined. 

So, Secretary of Transportation Mary E. Peters, proposes that the slack be taken up by taking money from the MASS TRANSIT BUDGET [NY Times].  This, of course, at a time when much mass transit is pushed to the limit as former drivers look for more affordable ways to get to work. 

Way to get to the root of our nation’s transportation issues and do the best for the people, Secretary Powers!

Bush Administration vs. Endangered Species August 12, 2008

According to the Washington Post,

The Bush administration yesterday proposed a regulatory overhaul of the Endangered Species Act to allow federal agencies to decide whether protected species would be imperiled by agency projects, eliminating the independent scientific reviews that have been required for more than three decades.

The rule change would mean that agencies, most of which have no biologists on staff, would be making decisions about how their projects affected endangered species.  Hmm, maybe while we’re at it, we should just let the chemical companies decide how much pollution is okay to dump in rivers, and let pharmaceutical companies decide if their drugs are safe…why bother with the whole FDA?

I’m not saying this is bad because the Department of Transportation, or any other agency, would purposely harm endangered species.  But their job is to get THEIR projects done, not to understand the biology and ecology of endangered species and act to protect them.  So if they reach a point where their actions may harm an endangered species, and they are being evaluated and funded based on their completion of projects, do you think that the completion of the project or the endangered species is going to win out? 

Those in the Bush Administration seem to live in a world where the relationships of humans with their environment is based completely on humans being able to extract as much benefit from the environment without any sort of stewardship.  This has never been sustainable. 

Think about farmers.  Farmers realize that if they try to extract the maximum yield from their land in one year, they will soon have completely useless land.  They realize that they must rotate crops, or leave lands fallow, often enough for the soil to replenish the nutrients needed to maximize plant growth.  They realize that they must irrigate their lands in a way that does not wash all the topsoil away, or erode parts of their land.  They manage for maximum plant yield over the LONG TERM.

Look at hunting groups, like Ducks Unlimited.  Ducks Unlimited realizes that to be able to hunt waterfowl, there must be suitable habitat for those waterfowl.  Their actions have been integral in preserving wetlands and undeveloped spaces.  Although hunting might be seen as a one-way, extractive sport, these hunters have realized that they must respect the land and the ecological needs of the animals in order to hunt them sustainably. 

We can keep extracting natural resources and using the landscape solely for our own needs, but it is not a sustainable policy.  It will leave an undiverse, naked landscape for our children or grandchildren.  This move again marks the Bush administration as short-sighted.

BTW, EPA Believes Global Warming a Health Threat July 18, 2008

The EPA has released a report, according to the LA Times, which asserts that global warming is a health threat and details the ways in which global warming can harm the US population and its resources.  This is the same EPA that last week put off the regulation of greenhouse gases.  Umm, hello?

 ”There was a general belief that moving forward with a challenge and establishing a precedent in channeling regulation would serve the country better than leaving the challenge to the next administration,” [Former EPA Deputy Associate Administrator Jason] Burnett said in the interview, according to a transcript obtained by the Washington Post. “The chief of staff’s office then appears to have changed its mind.”

How can the administration ignore such a drastic problem?

EPA spokesman Jonathan Shradar said there was no conflict between the warnings in the report and the agency’s conclusion last week that regulation should be put off.

The problem, he said, is that the agency is still searching for the correct way to address the issue.

“Climate change is a serious problem that our nation needs to address. But we need to address it correctly,” Shradar said.

So basically, when there is questionable evidence that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destructions and Iraq’s ties to Al Queda are smaller than those of neighboring nations, it is okay to make a costly (in economic terms but importantly in terms of human lives) decision to go to war.  No thinking through, with years of research and public comment, whether this is the correct way to act.  But when the IPCC has demonstrated with sound science many of the causes and effects of global warming, when most other developed nations have accepted the moral imperative to act to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and when the economic costs and human costs of failing to act will be far greater than any suffered in the ‘war’ on terror, the administration wants time to think it over????  Pathetic.

More reporting on this story in the Washington Post.

What a Waste July 12, 2008

In the LA Times today, James Gerstenzang and Janet Wilson wrote an in-depth article on the failure of the Bush administration to act on EPA scientific findings regarding greenhouse gas issues.  Not only does this further support the position of critics of the administration who argue that Bush et al. are putting business (especially oil) interests ahead of global health and ethical behavior, it shows economic irresponsibility.  The job of the EPA, and other scientific/regulatory arms of the federal government, to perform scientifically sound analyses of issues of importance to the American people.  This research is costly to perform. 

There are many factors that contribute to the immense costs of such research.  The scientists involved are highly trained, and are therefore paid relatively high salaries for government employees.  Much scientific research, especially the type that needs to be done to tackle questions on climate, requires replication (or repetition) over long time periods and large spatial areas to assure that results from just one area or time period aren’t the result of a fluke or mistake.  Research on the atmosphere and on pollutants often requires the processing of samples using expensive machinery.  And scientific research in a government branch requires a lot of support staff, to handle everything from budgets to cleaning the lab to organizing travel.  Even research by the EPA that just involves collecting and analyzing past research by others on the topic takes a lot of man-hours.  So when the government chooses to investigate a scientific question, it seems like the sensible follow-up to the completion of that research would be to use the data to make timely, responsible government policy.  

The Bush administration, however, is wasting taxpayer money by ignoring the findings of the EPA research on the dangers posed by greenhouse gases by failing to act on the knowledge gained.  At a time when the average American is spending more money to feed their family and to drive to their job where they likely have not gotten a raise this year, the administration thinks nothing of basically throwing out a banquet of knowledge.  This is insulting enough, to the American people and to the scientists and other workers at EPA, but when you factor in that the consequences of ignoring the research go far beyond the health of American people today, it is one of the most morally reprehensible acts of this administration (and that, unfortunately, is saying a lot).  Neglecting to stop the growth of our CO2 emissions, nevermind reduce them, contributes to the destruction of animal and plant populations, to the increase in diseases, to decreases in food availability, and to destruction of coastal habitat–just to list a few.  The consequences of global warming play out much more dramatically on the poorest of the world, who are least able to do anything about the emission of greenhouse gases. 

So what can we do?  There are a number of options.  But the first is to raise awareness of the complete lack of respect the administration has shown for global human and ecosystem health and other concerns by publicizing this action.  You can write a letter to the editor in your local paper.  You can blog about it.  You can just bring it up in conversation with friends an co-workers.  But you can also participate in the public comment period on the EPA findings, write to your legislators, demand action at a state or local level, and contribute to organizations using the legistlative and legal system to act on the scientific findings.  Just don’t sit back and relax and wait for the next guy to deal with the problem, because then you will be just as bad as the Bush administration.

Goodbye…TO the world’s biggest polluter July 12, 2008

As reported in The Telegraph, President George W. Bush ’shocked’ his fellow G-8 leaders with a childish and unfunny sign-off at the recent meeting of select world leaders.  Despite joining the other leaders in a pledge to reduce carbon emissions, Bush clearly felt no seriousness towards the manner.  Without extraordinary leadership in enacting, not just just pledging, reductions on greenhouse gas emissions, climate change is going to continue to be a growing problem, not just a continuing problem.  It is insulting enough to the citizens of the world that these leaders failed to back up their pledge with binding promises and clear-cut plans of actions, but for a leader to joke about it to the others is particularly wretched.

President Bush’s failure to comprehend, or even try to comprehend through discussions with scientists on all sides of the climate change ‘debate,’ the seriousness of the greenhouse gas problem and the urgency for solutions to be found is a national embarassment.  If our leaders cannot carefully consider almost universally accepted problems of any nature, there is no chance for mistakes to be reversed or for progress to be made.  I find it a further embarassment that the American people, the media, and other branches of government accept this behavior by a leader.  Although I see glaring problems with both of the major-party candidates for president, at least both of them show a willingness to educate themselves on issues and to listen to viewpoints contrary to their own.