Pacific Spirit Marine Institute
Monday, July 14, 2008
No, you don’t have to love Oklahoma, in fact it’s one of my least favorite states.
I judge a state by the tenor of the representatives they elect. James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma) thinks the EPA has hatched an “economically destructive scheme” which he calls “ironic”. That’s the pot calling the kettle black!
Inhofe also said, “Big Brother is alive and well in the career ranks at the EPA.” Apparently irony is one thing the U.S. isn’t running short on.
Irony is a renewable resource.
This coming from the party that never met a wiretap it didn’t like. Big brother is alive and well, but he isn’t living at the EPA. Warrantless wiretaps, and immunity for those engaged in the massive illegal wiretapping for the past 7 years has all the odor of ‘big brother’.
There are actual scientists working at the EPA. Career scientists. Hard to imagine. Inhofe is a career politician who has been running for some kind of office since 1978.
The economic destruction severed up, in heaping portions, isn’t coming from the EPA’s lunch lady’s ladle either. The next president will inherit, at best, a $400 Billion dollar Bush legacy deficit. This administration had to burn through the huge, $127 Billion dollar surplus the Clinton was kind enough to leave. Now there’s a piece of real irony.
The EPA couldn’t spend enough money to clean-up the amount of trace metals lurking in certain portions of the career politicians anatomy. They certainly wouldn’t have to waste any money looking for brass balls.
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Meanwhile…
Brad Miller (D-NC) says, “The White House has effectively blocked the EPA from posting new health assessments of hazardous chemicals…” Miller is chairman of the House Committee on Science and Technology’s subcommittee on Investigation and Oversight.
The EPA maintains a data base called the IRIS, Integrated Risk Information System. This data base is critical tool for individuals, private companies, local and state authorities to respond quickly to toxic chemicals found in air, water or soil.
The pipe has dried up on the flow of crucial facts that should be flowing into the IRIS. The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) are not required to disclose details of meetings that take place with industry lobbyists.
What do they lobby for? Pardon me; for what do they lobby?
The OMB ‘reviews’. The OMB prevents agency rules from ‘going final’ before it has approved them.
Trichloroethylene (TCE) will have been waiting for an assessment some 21 years after the EPA began its assessment. Miller is asking if “getting the science right” has less to do with protecting the public health than “a pretext for obstruction…”.
The Government Accountability Office has testified that the new ‘review process’ revealed by the OMB provides for even more secrecy and delay.
Before 2004 there were 10 steps a chemical needed to pass through before it was entered into the IRIS data base. The new review process would take a toxic chemical on a meandering 25 step path before it might be handed off to the EPA to post the final assessment on the IRIS database. Keep in mind, this step follows the OMB giving it’s ‘REVISED ASSESSMENT’
Miller states the obvious, “People will have been exposed to a known toxic substance for decades, for a generation, while the government engages in study after study…”
IRIS is just the first step in protecting the public. The real work begins after a toxin reaches the IRIS. That would be the same point the culprits using, releasing or dumping the toxins on to the environment and the public would have to ‘regroup’.
Who wants to regroup when the old group is so cozy?
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Since it isn’t economically beneficial for anyone to find a cure for cancer and most of us don’t have the training to even attempt, I propose a radical solution.
How about we the people, the piss ants, the captains of common wisdom, cure what is causing cancer?
Labels: Brad Miller, Bush, EPA, Environment, Speak no Evil, Trichloroethylene
© 2009, Pacific Spirit Marine Institute.
Ya gotta love Oklahoma. There’s even a musical.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
It’s all voodoo science until somebody gets an eye put out.
California’s Republican Governor Schwarzenegger says the Bush administration failed to counter global warming emissions. As if that were some sort of new revelation. What is new is the rift opening up in the tight knit collars of the Republican party.
Schwarzenegger makes the nefarious actions of the Bush administrations stance on climate change sound like a play ground ‘nah ney nah ney’.
I’m not going to do it if Mikey isn’t gong to do it too.
Schwarzenegger said the Bush administration didn’t believe they should do anything about it (global warming emissions) since China is not doing anything about it and since India is not willing to do anything why should we?
Way to lead the free world!
Schwarzenegger also said “We don’t wait for other countries to do the same thing. That’s what makes America number one…”
Here’s a little news; most people on the planet noticed a long time ago The U.S. stopped leading and for the past several decades took up the tedious job of mostly pillaging the free world.
Since the EPA decided not to take further actions to stave-off global warming while the lame-duck finishes his term in office, Schwarzenegger said in an interview with George Stephanopoulos that will be aired July 13th, “Well, to be honest with you, if they would have done something this year, I would have thought it was bogus anyway,” (have to love a Republican governor that can use the word ‘bogus’ correctly in a sentence)
California has been on the front lines of the envirmental issues for decades because if it’s unique problems. These problems forced California to take aggressive and costly actions to clean-up the air, water, and agriculture among other problems. For decades the rest of the nation categorized California as tree hugging fruits and nuts, and on the lighter side generally alarmists.
Another one’s collar has begun warming…
Answering a question about climate change asked by one reporter on a flight to Australia, Pope Benedict said, “We have to give impulse to rediscovering our responsibility and to finding an ethical way to change our way of life.” He wants to “wake up consciences”.
The Pope said politicians and experts must be “capable of responding to the great ecological challenge and to be up to the task of this challenge.” “We have our responsibilities toward Creation”.
I am loathed to see politicians and experts used in the same sentence and frankly find ‘give impulse to rediscovering our responsibility and to finding an ethical way to change our way of life’ a statement that is filled with more than a little irony in light of the past behaviour
of the so many authorities in the Pope’s flock, but I digress. If the head of an organization, 1 billion strong, can come up with ‘one quotable’ that fits all questions…he’s worth his weight in gold.
Meanwhile…
California is burning like a wicker cabinet. Raging fires are one of those recurring challenges they’ve had to deal with for decades.
The lame-duck President plans a visit to survey the damage. The last thing California needs right now is more hot air blowing in, but in light of Schwarzenegger’s comments about the Bush administration, the visit might be an icy one which could chill the atmosphere. Fire and ice might too contribute some much needed moisture in the air there.
The White House did not say where Bush would go to get his briefing on Thursday, but it’s always nice to kill two birds with one stone…Bush is scheduled to attend a private Republican fundraising event in the Wine Barrel of the state, Napa.
Multitasking, one quote fits all…we should all be able to rest well knowing there are so many wise captains at the helms.
Photo: NASA’s Terra Satellite…only a small portion of the California fires are shown.
Labels: Bush, Climate Change, EPA, Global Warming, Pope, Schwarzenegger
© 2009, Pacific Spirit Marine Institute.
Global warming is making some Republican’s hot under the collar.
