Posted on 12/12/2003 11:21:06 AM PST by .cnI redruM
The latest example of the media standing on its head regarding George W. Bush's environmental policies is the treatment accorded the White House announcement, last week, that Bush would impose a substantial reduction in emissions from Midwestern power plants. Did you even know this happened? Of course not, because news organizations either buried the story or twisted it to make it sound negative.
Here's the picture. Front-page treatment after front-page treatment has been accorded Bush's decision to relax the "new-source review" standard that mainly governs repairs at Midwestern power plants. Bush's NSR decision has been depicted--by beat reporters, Democratic presidential candidates, The New York Times editorial page and Eliot Spitzer, among others--as an astonishing, super-ultra horror, though total emissions from Midwest power plants have declined by 40 percent in the last two decades, and though the worst-case reading of the Bush NSR standard is that it will slow the rate of future declines.
Next, Bush has been widely ridiculed for proposing a "Clear Skies" bill that would require power plants to cut emissions, except greenhouse gas, by about 70 percent. Democrats in the Senate, plus quasi-Democrat James Jeffords, have fought Clear Skies with blazing fury, while editorial cartoonists have scoffed. Why are Democrats opposed to a 70 percent reduction in pollution? Because passage of the bill would give Bush an environmental victory before the 2004 election; Bush-bashing, not air quality, is the essence of the issue. Besides, Democrats know that all forms of air pollution except greenhouse gas are already declining anyway, so the harm done by power plants just isn't that great--though for posturing purposes, Democrats and enviros pretend it is a super-ultra-mega calamity.
It's true that the goals of Bush's Clear Skies legislation are approximately the same as existing targets of the Clean Air Act, so some moderates worry that if the bill passed, Bush would get credit as an environmentalist for essentially maintaining the status quo. The rub is that existing Clean Air Act power-plant regulations and "state implementation plans," which govern overall airshed quality, have led to runaway litigation, with the typical Clean Air Act rule taking ten years of legal proceedings to finalize, according to a study by Steve Hayward of the American Enterprise Institute.
Bush's Clear Skies bill would scrap the litigation-based system and substitute the "cap and trade" approach that has been spectacularly successful at reducing acid rain. Caps under the Bush bill are mandatory, and the bill regulates power-plant mercury emissions for the first time, imposing a mandatory two-thirds reduction; by using a cap-and-trade approach, Bush's approach would achieve Clean Air Act goals at lower cost and without lawsuit uncertainty. To top it off, if Clear Skies were enacted, it would bind the power plants governed by the "new source rule" controversy, mooting that whole issue and ending the dispute.
But then, ending disputes is not what Washington is about, is it?
Now we come to last week's action. Because Democrats and Jeffords have thrown their bodies in front of Clear Skies, it cannot pass in the current session of Congress. Recognizing that, the Environmental Protection Agency and Bush's Council on Environmental Quality wrote a series of administrative rules that impose most Clear Skies goals without legislation. Power-plant emissions, including mercury, will be capped at an almost 70 percent reduction over current levels; industry will be required to spend billions of dollars for new pollution-control equipment.
The administrative approach chosen by Bush isn't as good as Clear Skies, because administrative rule-making must use the litigation-prone language of the Clean Air Act. Energy companies may sue to block Bush's rules as too strict, while enviros may sue to block the rules so that they can continue charging that the president is doing nothing against pollution. If, however, Bush's administrative changes announced last week are allowed by judges to go into force, power-plant pollution blowing from the Midwest to the East Coast will decline substantially; airborne mercury will be restricted for the first time; air quality will improve enough that all but a few counties in the Northeast will come into compliance with the Clean Air Act.
All in all, Bush's announcement sounds progressive and important. So how did the media play it? The New York Times, which has had the incredible, super-ultra menace of Midwest power plants on page one perhaps a dozen times since Bush took office, put the plan to end the problem on page A24. The Times story was a small box cryptically headlined. "E.P.A. Drafts New Rules for Emissions From Power Plants." The Washington Post put the story on page two but under the headline, "E.P.A. Aims to Change Pollution Rules," suggesting something ominous, adding the subhead, "Utilities Could Buy Credits From Cleaner-Operating Power Plants," neglecting to add that credits could be purchased only if the result was an overall decline in pollution.
The proper placement for this story was page one--where the anti-Bush environmental stories always run--and the proper headline was, BUSH ORDERS DRAMATIC POLLUTION REDUCTION. But you didn't see that, did you?
Someone tell business and conservative money get off your duff and explain yourself to the public, everyday just like the wackos are doing!!
Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from this list.
I don't get offended if you want to be removed.
There are practical problems- like maintenance, keeping salt water out of the turbogenerators, etc., but it's nothing that can't be solved.
I hate it when that happens.
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