Supreme Court to hear Bush environment case

Yahoo News ^ | June 26, 2006 | Associated Press

[CedarDave]

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court agreed Monday to consider whether the Bush administration must regulate carbon dioxide to combat global warming, setting up what could be one of the court's most important decisions on the environment.

The decision means the court will address whether the administration's decision to rely on voluntary measures to combat climate change are legal under federal clean air laws.

"This is the whole ball of wax. This will determine whether the Environmental Protection Agency is to regulate greenhouse gases from cars and whether EPA can regulate carbon dioxide from power plants," said David Bookbinder, an attorney for the Sierra Club.

Bookbinder said if the court upholds the administration's argument it also could jeopardize plans by California and 10 other states, including most of the Northeast, to require reductions in carbon dioxide emissions from motor vehicles.

There was no immediate comment from either the EPA or White House on the court's action.

"Fundamentally, we don't think carbon dioxide is a pollutant, and so we don't think these attempts are a good idea," said John Felmy, chief economist of the American Petroleum Institute, a trade group representing oil and gas producers.

[CedarDave]

Everytime you exhale, you "pollute" the atmosphere. And trees require CO2 for photosynthesis and to make lifegiving oxygen. So once you start setting limits on a gas that is naturally generated as a byproduct of simply living, things have gotten out of control.

[CedarDave]

Bookbinder said if the court upholds the administration's argument it also could jeopardize plans by California and 10 other states, including most of the Northeast, to require reductions in carbon dioxide emissions from motor vehicles.

Because CO2 is a byproduct of any type of fossil fuel combustion, the enviro-weenies essentially want to limit your access to automobiles for work and travel, and require you to use electric vehicles if any at all.

[samtheman]

So forget elections, right? It's whatever the court says.

[Finalapproach29er]

Bush wants to lose this, I suspect.

He's a closet greeny.

[Jacquerie]

So forget elections, right? It's whatever the court says.

The courts regularly order legislatures to raise taxes; it's a small step to order the administration to reorder our modern way of life.

[R.W.Ratikal]

In a hundred billion eons or so
Or maybe tomorrow, for all we know.
where will environmentalists go
When Sol begins its dying-sun Glow?

When oceans begin to boil away
What will tree-huggers do?
When everything is Gone With the Astral Wind,
The Old Growth as well as the new.

Who will care what happens to
The Whales or Snails who Dart
When our sun finally goes Nova
And blows itself, and us, apart.

So much for the Ecko-Freaks cause
When all around us float
The dust of everything that was,
But now is just a mote.

So use and enjoy nature's gifts
For Earth's final fate
Is to be mere cinder bits
Drifting around in frozen space.