HOME
Message Board
CURRENT COLUMNS
- Editor's Corner
- Blogfest 2005
- Commentary
- Commentary Too
- Down The Middle
- Faulking Around
- Global Warning
- This guy walks into a bar...
- Investing 101
- Faulking Opinions
- Off The Rail
- Words
ARCHIVES
LINKS
CONTACT US
 | |||
Global Warning - Dec 8, 2004 - Printable Version
- Who Let the Dogs Out?
by Robin Buckallew
Over the past four years, I have had the uneasy feeling that there is a pack of wild dogs at the door. These dogs are there for a purpose. They want treats. In fact, they come with an entire wish list of treats that they want. And since these dogs have given massive amounts of money to ensconce the head of the pack in the White House, they expect to get their treats. From time to time, the administration throws them a bone. In fact, the administration throws them a lot of bones. And now, with the recent election “mandate”, the administration stands poised to throw them the entire carcass of the body of environmental regulations. Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge? No problem. Just because it violates international treaty is no reason to hold back. Snowmobiles in Yellowstone? Great idea. Fire the scientists who keep telling us it will do irreparable harm, hire more friendly scientists, and we’ve got it made. Mountaintop removal mining? That won’t be a bit of a problem. Of course, we’ll have to change the definition of what is removed from “waste” to “fill”, but then it will no longer be subject to those pesky regulations. You want to drill WHERE? Shouldn’t be too hard to arrange. Just give Dick Cheney a day or two. For those of you who are protesting that not all this could possibly happen in a mere four years, I have news for you. With the exception of drilling in the Arctic, it has already happened. In only four years. And now there are four more years, and the dogs are at the door. They are wanting more than just bones. They are now here for blood. Many of the items on their wish list amount to no less than a total gutting of the environmental regulations that protect our air, our water and our food supply. In all likelihood, they will get what they want. Because someone let the dogs out.
Over the past few decades, these things have come up again and again, ad infinitum, ad nauseum. The most egregious usurpations of power have often been halted. During the Reagan years, the wish list was kept under control by Congress and the courts. During the Clinton years, the Congress under Newt Gingrich attempted to gut the environmental regulations, only to meet with a howl of anger from their constituents. They backed off, licking their wounds, to plan a new strategy. Enter George W. Bush. Only Bush has also been held in check (somewhat). Congress has repeatedly denied his request to drill in the Arctic. No matter how many times it is added as a rider to a popular bill. And the courts have acted as a brake on many environmental outrages. So what stands between the environment and the administration now? Congress – hmmmm. Nope, I don’t think so. We’ve lost Congress. While the Senate is hardly filibuster proof, it is not often that they utilize the filibuster provisions to protect environmental regulations. I can practically see the drilling rigs on the tundra as I write these words. But there are always the courts. Throughout the last several decades, environmentalists have been protecting the environment through the courts, winning a high percentage of cases. In the 1980s, this shifted somewhat as the Reagan and Bush administration packed the courts with their antiregulatory fundamentalists, but retirements allowed Clinton to appoint a number of moderates to the bench. Environmental groups will continue to take cases to the courts. Surely they will continue to win. Five to four, of course.
Now that the election is over, everyone is talking about the courts. Dubya has already appointed a large number of justices to the federal courts. It is likely that in the next four years he will have the opportunity to appoint one to several Supreme Court Justices. Everyone seems concerned about Roe v. Wade. THE litmus test. Or is it? Perhaps it is the red herring. Or just A litmus test. You see, there are other common threads seen in the typical Dubya court appointment. And while Congress goes off on fishing expeditions about abortion issues strategically designed to paint Democrats as anti-life, Dubya sneaks onto the courts some of the most virulent anti-environmental justices that have ever sat on the high courts. When a filibuster or some other pesky little trick of the petty whiny little Democrats keeps a favored appointment off the bench, Dubya does what any sensible pollutocrat would do. He makes an interim appointment during Congressional recess. Once the judge is on the bench, it is rather unlikely he will be kicked off after his year is up. And even if he is, once a decision is made and written into the law, it is damned hard to get rid of it again. You see, it becomes legal precedent. And we must honor precedent.
So, let’s look at what we are likely to see in a judge favored by the current administration. One of the nominated judges, William Haynes II, is a real environmental sweetheart – he definitely wants to do the right thing by the tree huggers. After all, when military bombing practice was threatening several bird species with a future on the endangered species list, he went right to the heart of the matter. He argued in court for the government that this was actually a good thing. After all, when a bird becomes rare, it is more of a treat for the bird watchers who spot one. So, bombing birds into near extinction is a great way to boost the excitement level of the average bird watcher. By the way, the court was unable to stomach this argument, dismissing it as trivial. The bird watchers won. But his name has been brought up as a great candidate for federal appeals court judge. I have to hope this fellow manages to get his appointment. Perhaps I’ll get out my birdwatching book and go out looking for rare birds. Like robins, sparrows or starlings.
As colorful as Haynes is, he certainly isn’t the only antienvironmental ideologue that Bush has selected for the United States court system. He may not even be the most colorful. In fact, many of the judges have been hand selected by industry, and most of them have actually come from a career working as industry lawyers seeking loopholes to skirt the provisions of the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act, and other of these extremist, radical left wing subversive regulations. After all, what could be more subversive than the idea that our children have the right to grow up breathing air that won’t kill them? While many Americans may be aware of the justices that get appointed to the Supreme Court, few of these cases make it that far. How many of us can name the judges on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals? How many of us care? Yet this is where your future lies...your future, mine, and the future of all the people and other species you care about. It is here that the vast majority of the environmental cases get their final hearing. And this court has been referred to as a court of last resort for industry seeking to avoid environmental regulations. Be afraid. Be very afraid. Things you take for granted today may become precious commodities tomorrow (air, water, safe food).
So, what can be done? Sometimes it seems hopeless. The Senate Committee on Public Works and the Environment is being chaired by James Inhofe (R, OK), who was selected for his noted hostility to environmental protections and his disdain for science. The House of Representatives is firmly disciplined and controlled by the iron fist of Tom DeLay (R, TX), an exterminator who ran for office because he was angry about government regulation of hazardous pesticides. If the courts go, who will be our line of defense against rapacious industry? I urge you, all of you who are lucky enough to reside in a state with Democrats or moderate Republicans in your U.S. Senate delegation (Oklahomans and Texans need not apply), write to your senators. Urge them to prevent the packing of the federal courts with right wing ideologues. Remember, the Senate is not yet filibuster-proof. And forget about looking forward to 2008. Think about 2006, instead. In the next two years, we have a lot of work to do. We must show our leaders we are interested in keeping poisons out of our air and our water, interested in protecting our children and our endangered species. We must show them that money is not the only green that matters. Electing environmentally friendly representatives needs to be our goal. Don’t sit back and wait for bad news. Work for the future today.
Voice your opinion on our message board (you don't have to sign up to post).