Republicans Hate Clean Air And Water

It has become obvious in the last few weeks to anyone with half a brain that the Republicans in Congress have abandoned ordinary Americans to insure that the rich and the corporations can continue hogging the wealth and income of this country. While giving massive tax breaks to the rich and protecting enormous subsidies for corporations, these Republicans have proposed cuts to programs that help ordinary Americans -- the poor, the elderly, the children, the sick and disabled, the unemployed, and even the struggling middle class.

They have made a decision that corporate profits and fat bank accounts for the richest Americans are far more important than government programs that help ordinary Americans in need. But this is not the only area in which the Republicans have ignored the well-being of most Americans to protect their rich buddies. They also oppose any efforts to make corporations and other businesses stop polluting the environment and poisoning the air and water. They choose to fatten corporate profits instead of protecting the health and safety of American citizens.

It is bad enough that they have fought any efforts to stop global climate change, which is already beginning to have serious effects worldwide. But these Republicans want to go even further. They want to destroy the very organization created to protect the environment and assure that all Americans have clean air to breathe and clean water to drink -- the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Republicans have fought the efforts of the EPA to protect ordinary Americans for many years. During the Bush administration, they cut funding for the agency and restricted the reach of its function (like refusing to allow it to make rules regarding greenhouse gases). Now they want to go even further.

We are now starting to see just how far they will go to protect corporations while throwing ordinary American under the bus. Recently, Republican presidential candidate came out in favor of completely abolishing the EPA, and several members of the House Republican caucus have voiced their support for this idea.

Some of you might find it hard to believe most congressional Republicans would support such a radical idea. But all you have to do is look at a vote taken in the House yesterday. At least 250 House members (almost exclusively Republicans) passed an amendment to the government funding bill that would ban the EPA from regulating toxic air emissions of industry.

Let me make that clear. They voted to ban the EPA from performing one of its most important functions -- one of the reasons it was founded -- to regulate toxic emissions and assure that Americans have clean air to breathe. And the reason they did that was to protect corporate profits, to keep these businesses from having to clean up the poisons they are dumping into the air we all must breathe.

The EPA is the last line of defense in the battle for clean air and water. States cannot be counted on to perform this vital function. Take my own state of Texas for instance. Republican leadership in that state has allowed it to be the largest polluter of any state in the Union. In fact, only six countries in the world produce more air pollution than Texas does, and oil & natural gas production is poisoning much of the state's groundwater.

It is only the EPA, not state agencies, that is demanding the state clean up its act. Without the EPA, Texas would foul not only its own air and water (it has placed a radioactive waste dump over an aquifer that feeds 8 states), but also that of many other states.

Republicans are using the excuse of cutting the budget to justify this unwarranted and inexcusable attack on the EPA. But as we have already seen, this is not true. If they truly wanted to cut the deficit, they would not be giving massive tax breaks to the rich and subsidies to the corporations, and they would be slashing the bloated budget of the Defense Department. Since they aren't, it becomes obvious they are attacking the EPA just to fatten corporate coffers.

But they are not fooling the American public. While a large majority of Americans want the deficit to be reduced, they don't want it done at the expense of hurting the EPA's ability to mandate clean air and water. This is shown in a survey done for the American Lung Association, which was conducted February 7th through 14th. Note the following from the survey:

ARE YOU CONSERVATIVE, MODERATE, OR LIBERAL?
liberal...............18%
moderate...............37%
conservative...............41%
don't know/refused...............3%

DO YOU THINK CONGRESS SHOULD STOP THE EPA FROM UPDATING AIR POLLUTION STANDARDS?
no...............68%
yes...............28%
don't know...............4%

DO YOU THINK CONGRESS SHOULD STOP THE EPA FROM UPDATING CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSION STANDARDS?
no...............64%
yes...............30%
don't know...............5%

SHOULD THE EPA IMPOSE STRICTER LIMITS ON THE AMOUNT OF MERCURY THAT POWER PLANTS AND INDUSTRIAL FACILITIES CAN RELEASE?
yes...............79%
no...............18%
don't know...............3%

SHOULD THE EPA IMPOSE STRICTER LIMITS ON THE AMOUNT OF SMOG THAT POWER PLANTS, OIL REFINERIES, AND OTHER INDUSTRIES CAN RELEASE?
yes...............77%
no...............21%
don't know...............2%

Cutting funds for the EPA, or abolishing it (which is what the Republicans really want), might help corporate America to increase their already record-breaking profits, but it will seriously damage the health of most Americans by poisoning the air and the water. The people know this, and so does the Congress. The only logical conclusion is that the Republicans just don't care about clean air and water.