Tag Archives: environment

Your Congress at Work

The Congressional GOP is running the show in Washington, and clearly feeling its oats.  They aren’t even embarrassed about moving quickly to pollute the environment and remove rules intended to protect Americans from a variety of threats, physical and financial.

As Vox reports,

With everything that Republicans want to do — repeal Obamacare, overhaul the tax code — it might seem odd that one of Congress’ very first acts would be to kill an obscure Obama-era regulation that restricts coal companies from dumping mining waste into streams and waterways.

But that is indeed what’s going on. On Thursday, the Senate voted 54-45 to repeal the so-called “stream protection rule” — using a regulation-killing tool known as the Congressional Review Act. The House took a similar vote yesterday, and if President Trump agrees, the stream protection rule will be dead. Coal companies will now have a freer hand in dumping mining debris in streams.

NPR has more not-good news:

On Thursday the GOP-controlled House voted to overturn an Obama administration rule designed to keep firearms out of the hands of some people deemed mentally ill.

The action was the latest move by congressional Republicans to undo several of President Obama’s regulations on issues such as gun control and the environment through an arcane law called the Congressional Review Act..The National Rifle Association had pushed for the repeal, and Republicans argued it infringed upon Second Amendment rights by denying due process.

Evidently, the GOP’s allegiance to the NRA trumps (pardon the phrase) its pious concern for “right to life” –at least when that right is asserted by those of us who are already born..

Meanwhile, Investment News explains Trump’s assault on fiduciary responsibility and Dodd-Frank.

President Donald J. Trump today will halt a Labor Department regulation that requires advisers on retirement accounts to work in the best interests of their clients. Mr. Trump’s order will give the new administration time to review the change, known as the fiduciary rule.

He will also order a sweeping review of the Dodd-Frank Act rules enacted in response to the 2008 financial crisis, a White House official said, signing an executive action designed to significantly scale back the regulatory system put in place in 2010.

Taken together, the actions are designed to lay down the Trump administration’s approach to financial markets, with an emphasis on removing regulatory burdens and opening up investor options, said the White House official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity.

The orders are the most aggressive steps yet by Mr. Trump to loosen regulations in the financial services industry and come after he has sought to stock his administration with veterans of the industry in key positions.

I’m sure that all those Trump voters who claim that they weren’t voting for his bigotry, his misogyny or his xenophobia, but because they believed his promise to “drain the swamp,” will be so pleased….

At least we can all see clearly now just who the Trump/GOP’s real constituents are.

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Sarkozy’s Good Idea

One of the most worrisome outcomes of the 2016 election is the likely “U turn” on efforts to protect the environment. As Vox recently reported,

Unified Republican control of the federal government over the next two years augurs a sea change in US environmental policy like nothing since the late 1960s and ’70s, when America’s landmark environmental laws were first passed.

If Donald Trump and the GOP actually follow through on what they’ve promised, this time around will be a lurch in the opposite direction. Federal climate policy will all but disappear; participation in international environmental or climate treaties will end; pollution regulations will be reversed, frozen in place, or not enforced; clean energy research, development, and deployment assistance will decline; protections for sensitive areas and ecosystems will be lifted; federal leasing of fossil fuels will expand and accelerate; new Supreme Court appointees will crack down on EPA discretion.

Given the rate at which the planet is warming, Trump’s promise to pull America out of the Paris Accords is a prescription for disaster. Local efforts to reduce America’s carbon footprint will be important, but those efforts won’t be universal and they won’t be sufficient.

So I was really heartened by Nicolas Sarkozy’s proposed response.

Sarkozy told the French television channel TF1 that he would “demand that Europe put in place a carbon tax of 1 to 3 percent for all products coming from the United States” if the U.S. refuses to apply the environmental rules that France and other nations are imposing on their companies under the accords.

This seems eminently reasonable to me. Why should companies that are complying with measures intended to reduce a global threat be disadvantaged in the marketplace? The environmental rules benefit the entire planet; companies operating everywhere on the planet ought to share the costs of compliance.

Among the enormous number of things Donald Trump obviously hasn’t learned and doesn’t understand is that actions have consequences.

Foreign countries will retaliate when the U.S. acts in ways that threaten their interests. Senators and Congressmen will balk when a President–even one of their own party–expects them to support measures that they know will be deeply unpopular with their constituents. The Constitution limits a President’s ability to restrain the media or single out citizens for disparate treatment. Etc.

Governing is complex, and Chief Executives in democratic regimes–unlike CEOs–can’t simply issue orders and fire those who refuse to obey them.

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Guns, Gays and Greenhouse Gases…Welcome to Indiana’s Legislature

I don’t know about the rest of you, but when Indiana’s (mercifully part-time) legislature is in session, I tend to break out in hives. Thanks to our massively gerrymandered election map, a number of people who get elected to that august body tend to advocate measures that don’t reflect the opinions of most Hoosiers.

It’s hard to escape the conclusion that, in many cases, Indiana’s lawmakers’ actual constituencies are the special interests–the NRA and gun manufacturers, the Christian Right, Big Agriculture….

A quick look at some of the bills being considered this year may illustrate the point:

Let’s start with guns. Every year, guns kill some 33,000 Americans. The Indiana General Assembly isn’t deterred by that number, or by repeated massacres of children and innocents. No siree. This year, bills have been introduced 1) to get rid of Indiana’s requirement of a license to carry a handgun, 2) to allow guns at public universities and state office buildings, and 3) to make it easier for repeat alcohol offenders to get a handgun license.

What could possibly go wrong?

I’ve posted previously about the reluctance of our lawmakers to just bite the bullet and admit that LGBT folks are citizens and taxpayers entitled to the same civil rights protections that apply to women, racial minorities and religious folks. (Although it has been sort of enjoyable to watch the discomfort of legislators who are used to doing the bidding of both the Religious Right and business interests—constituencies that are on opposite sides of this issue.)

Survey research has uniformly found a solid majority of Hoosiers favor adding “four words and a comma” to the state civil rights statute. Employers large and small are lobbying for that approach, and significant numbers of clergy and other representatives of faith communities have come out to support it–but our lawmakers have thus far been reluctant to incur the wrath of the small (but shrill and intensely homophobic) Christian Right.

Then there’s HB 1082, authored by Representative David Wolkins. Dubbed the “no more stringent than” bill, it would forbid Indiana agencies from making or enforcing any environmental rule that is more stringent than those established by the federal government. As the Palladium-Item noted

Indiana consistently ranks near the bottom of the states regarding environmental quality. If State Rep. David Wolkins, R-Winona Lake, has his way, Indiana will stay there.

As the Hoosier Environmental Council points out, the situation in Flint illustrates precisely those gaps in federal regulation that Indiana would be prevented from addressing under HB 1082: For example, under federal regulations, drinking water systems can continue to deliver lead-tainted water to households and businesses for up to 24 months while a variety of fixes are attempted. In 24 months, children’s health and cognitive abilities can be permanently damaged.

In fact, there are a number of areas where EPA regulations are considered weak, among them pollution from fracking, factory farm manure pits, and outdoor wood boilers. There are probably others.

Why would we want to prevent Indiana from addressing areas where federal regulations may prove to be inadequate for our needs? It isn’t as if the absence of a “no more stringent” bill would require the state to act. Why tie the hands of those charged with citizens’ public health and safety?

I’m sure a closer examination of the bills that have been introduced would uncover still others belonging to the category that I call “good god, what were they thinking?”

Maybe I should just drink until they go home….

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And You Thought Our Legislature Couldn’t Get More Embarrassing…

When you see a Senate Resolution citing the authority of the 10th Amendment, you can pretty well guess that what follows will be an indignant rant about the right of the state to do what it damn well pleases and screw the federal government.

(I do count myself among those who feel that both the 9th and 10th Amendments have gotten a wholly unwarranted short shrift from the Court, but that’s a more nuanced discussion for another day…)

Indiana State Senator Kruse has proposed a Resolution “urging rejection in the State of Indiana of all unnecessary regulations imposed by the United States Environmental Protection Agency and asserting that the Indiana Department of Environmental Management will provide environmental protections for the citizens of Indiana.”

There’s a sterling example of legislative drafting for you…

Perhaps ALEC or the Koch Brothers or one of Indiana’s coal companies will be so kind as to let us know which federal environmental regulations are “unnecessary”?

And perhaps the Indiana Department of Environmental Management will erect a barrier around the perimeter of the state, to protect us from polluted air and water from elsewhere? (Maybe we can have our own “border security”?)

Now, I realize this is a Resolution, with no legal effect. It’s just the legislative equivalent of a foot-stamping hissy-fit. But really–can’t the General Assembly take a few minutes out of its busy schedule of embarrassing the state to do something about jobs, education, child welfare….something that might actually benefit the citizens who elected them?

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If You Know What You’re Talking About–You’re Out of Order

When does the General Assembly go home? It can’t be soon enough.

Not content with ethical lapses, efforts to control women’s bodies and protect homophobia   (aka “religious liberty”) and bring public education to its knees, the eager beavers at the Statehouse have filed three (count them–three!) bills intended to disable any efforts to protect Hoosier air and water, and to keep those smarty-pants scientific “experts” from making environmental rules.

SJR 12 would amend the Indiana Constitution (these guys just love to screw around with the Constitution) to add a guaranteed right to “employ effective agricultural technology and livestock production and ranching practices.” I’m sure you are as touched as I am by this proposal to give the same sacred protection to livestock production practices as we human animals have with our right to vote and freedoms of speech and religion, and I’m also sure it’s just coincidental that passage of this nonsense will make it very hard for state regulators to protect Hoosiers from factory farm pollution.

Then there’s SB 249. That little gem would prohibit local government from passing ordinances that would control or stop new construction or expansion of livestock operations, factory farms and their accompanying hazards and irritations. The bill is a handy reminder that in Indiana, the General Assembly gets to make the rules for cities and counties. We sure don’t have home rule or anything remotely like it.

Those two bills are bad enough, but the real OMG measure is HB 1351, which will be heard on Tuesday, February 3rd.  The Hoosier Environmental Council calls HB 1351 “arguably the most sweeping effort ever to weaken Indiana’s ability to act in protecting our environment.”

It would void any existing state regulations — whether environmental-related or not — that are not considered to be explicitly authorized by federal or state law. It would make it illegal for regulators (whether environmental regulators or not) from enacting any new regulation unless explicitly authorized by federal or state law. This eliminates the multi-decade discretionary authority that executive agencies have long had….

Stripping away the ability of Indiana’s environmental agency (IDEM) to deal with serious issues is irresponsible and leaves Indiana vulnerable to not being able to timely act to protect its citizens when the legislature is not in session. HB 1351 could have the added effect of paralyzing IDEM in carrying out its existing responsibilities under certain EPA programs out of fear of being sued for going beyond what those federal programs require.

The idea that adopting new environmental safeguards, through respected, technically trained regulatory boards, could hurt Indiana’s economy is also misplaced because there are existing laws that already prevent state agencies, including IDEM, from acting irresponsibly in crafting new regulations. And the Indiana legislature can always repeal or modify regulations that the legislature thinks pose a threat to Indiana’s economy.

I think I remember why Harrison Ullmann used to refer to the Indiana General Assembly as “The World’s Worst Legislature.”

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