change of heart…?

I’m guessing before he leaves, George Bush will do more harm than good, regarding his environmental policy. But he will do some good.

ONE of the George W. Bush’s final acts as US president could be to create the largest marine conservation area in the world. White House officials say that Bush is considering a proposal to turn up to 2.3 million square kilometres of tropical waters, coral reefs and remote island atolls in the Pacific Ocean into US National Monuments (see map).

“As bad as his environmental record has been, he could, as one individual, protect more of the Earth’s surface than anyone else in history,” says Lance Morgan of the US Marine Conservation Biology Institute.

The article goes on to say that Presidents have the authority to designated any part of U.S. land as protected.

For every sand spit and coral reef jutting above the water line, the US retains exclusive rights to the surrounding waters for 370 kilometres in all directions. It is in these areas that Morgan has been working with the White House on a deal to secure permanent “no-take zones” for fishing and mineral extraction. This also includes the Mariana trench, the planet’s deepest ocean canyon.

It will be interesting to see how this transpires. However, maybe we will still lose. Between the changes in the Clean Air Act all the way to the leniencies in water contamination to mining to lead poisoning, will protecting this area be helpful? Or will it be an overall net negative policy?

The article can be found HERE, via NewScientist.

and now a word from our (current) sponsor

Oh George…..

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced Tuesday that over 359,000 acres of public lands in Utah will be up for lease in December, some of which have “wilderness characteristics” or are “in the vicinity of national parks or monuments.”

This opens the land for drilling….

another one bite the dust

While you all were getting your fill of High Fructose Corn Syrup disguised as a tasty treat, George W. Bush was poisoning your water supply.

Thousands of factory farms will be exempt from needing permits that limit water pollution thanks to a new Bush Administration rule signed today. In addition, the Environmental Protection Agency did not adopt improved controls for bacteria and other pathogens that can pose risks to human health and wildlife.

The new rule:

– Creates a loophole allowing facility operators to avoid permits by claiming they won’t have a discharge.
– Adopts a scheme that allows facilities to avoid certain environmental enforcement. For instance, if an operator certifies that the facility won’t have a discharge, environmental authorities will ignore enforcement action, even if the facility discharges to the nation’s waters.
– Rejects improvements in technology that would reduce harmful bacteria and other pathogens contained in animal waste, missing an opportunity to prevent water pollution and threats to public health.

Look… the Bush Administration is not stupid. They understand that by signing these policies into law it is going to take a lot of effort by the next administration to overturn them, assuming they will care. He just allowed for your water to be polluted for years and years.

Human rights violation? anyone?

you can read the whole press release from the NRDC, HERE.

As you read this, Bush is doing it again…

I don’t know how better to say what happened today. Bush and his people are giving the middle finger to the environment, once again.

Parts of the Endangered Species Act may soon be extinct. The Bush administration wants federal agencies to decide for themselves whether highways, dams, mines and other construction projects might harm endangered animals and plants.

New regulations, which don’t require the approval of Congress, would reduce the mandatory, independent reviews government scientists have been performing for 35 years, according to a draft first obtained by The Associated Press.

It was originally announced in August that the administration was going to reevaluate the law, and fortunately 100,000-200,000 plus letters were sent opposing the decision. Over the next four, eight hour days, 15 people are going to peruse these letters and determine if they have any chance of changing his mind.

Let me put it this way… if you are a praying kind of person… this might be something to include.

You can get a summary from a CNN article from August HERE. And you can get some information about the letters HERE and HERE.

Would it surprise you?

Would you be shocked and awed to find out that Bush made an 11th hour decision that allows for even more environmental destruction?

I think… um, NO!

click HERE for the article from The Daily Green. You can go HERE, too, for a more comprehensive look at oil shale.

“The lifting of the limitation paves the way for the Bush administration to finalize its draft regulations for leasing. Unfortunately, the regulations — as proposed before the limitation was ever lifted — could be extremely costly for both the environment and the American taxpayer.”

Didn’t we leave England because of “taxation without representation”? I’m starting to feel it again. Hey… look at that! History DOES repeat itself!