Fouling the Clean Air Act

[marmar]

from truthdig:



Fouling the Clean Air Act

Posted on Mar 3, 2011
By Dan Becker and James Gerstenzang


In a largely hidden component of its attack on the federal budget, the House of Representatives has approved a key Republican campaign promise to big business: protecting it from what the new majority calls the handcuffs of environmental safeguards. The Republicans would cuff the Environmental Protection Agency instead.

If the Republicans prevail in the Senate and overcome a White House veto, they would hobble the Clean Air Act, probably the most successful U.S. law protecting health and the environment, and threaten the authority of California and several other states to use it to fight pollution and global warming.

The Clean Air Act has meant fewer hospitalizations and missed workdays, and would save a projected $2 trillion in 2020 alone by reducing asthma, chronic bronchitis and premature deaths from lung disease. Now, having been given the go-ahead by the Supreme Court, the EPA is using it to cut back on carbon dioxide pollution, the prime culprit behind our changing climate.

Think of the law as the legal weapon—passed by an overwhelming bipartisan congressional majority, signed by President Richard M. Nixon, approved by the highest court—that has allowed every president beginning with Nixon to fight some of the nation’s most difficult health and environmental challenges. Using the law to reduce carbon dioxide will bring us solutions that people like: hybrid and other high-tech, gas-sipping cars that cut our gasoline bills by more than the costs of the improved technology. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/fouling_the_clean_air_act_20110303/

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[marmar]

2. Yawn.

:boring:

[eppur_se_muova]

3. Handcuffs? I thought they were cufflinks. nt

[txlibdem]

5. The nice shiny stainless steel kind... n/t

[txlibdem]

4. Too late to rec but here's a kick

Thanks for posting this. Handcuffs? Just like a murderer should ware I'd say. When you pollute the air, water and land you are killing someone you've never met, perhaps someone who hasn't yet been born. Isn't murder a crime? Negligent homicide, perhaps?