For sure! This thread is definitely a joint venture and one of the things that sets FR apart from everywhere else. When you figure everything that is going on here its a great place to be.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2868838/posts
Join this conversation and add what you can:
....And Environmental Justice For All, Comrade
My Brain, | 4/6/12 | Alan Levy
Posted on Friday, April 06, 2012 4:00:30 AM by Absolutely Nobama
Hey, take a look at what I found on the EPA’s website (Yes, I have a life. Really. I do. Promise.):
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“Environmental Justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. Fair treatment means that no group of people should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, governmental and commercial operations or policies. Meaningful involvement means that: (1) people have an opportunity to participate in decisions about activities that may affect their environment and/or health; (2) the publics contribution can influence the regulatory agency’s decision; (3) their concerns will be considered in the decision making process; and (4) the decision makers seek out and facilitate the involvement of those potentially affected.”
http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/basics/ejbackground.html
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Hmmmm....environmental justice....environmental justice.....where did hear that before....? Dang, the 90’s were such a blur...Oh, wait, now I remember!
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“Mother Jones: Can you briefly explain what ‘environmental justice’ means to you?
Van Jones: Environmental justice is the movement to ensure that no community suffers disproportionate environmental burdens or goes without enjoying fair environmental benefits.”
http://motherjones.com/environment/2008/10/qa-van-jones
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Yep, that’s the same Maoist who served as Chairman Obama’s “Green Jobs Czar”. (’till Glenn Beck exposed him, and the Big Mommy Regime quietly fired him over the weekend. Ah....the days when Glenn Beck was still cool....No bizarre attacks on Newt Gingrich.....Ah, those were the days, weren’t they ?)
No, really, the guy is a Maoist:
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“Recalling his brief incarceration, Jones says: ‘I met all these young radical people of color. I mean really radical: communists and anarchists. And it was, like, ‘This is what I need to be a part of.’ I spent the next ten years of my life working with a lot of those people I met in jail, trying to be a revolutionary.’
After leaving Yale in 1993, Jones relocated to San Francisco, where he helped establish Bay Area Police Watch, a hotline and lawyer-referral service that began as a project of LCCR and specialized in demonizing local police. In 1996 he founded the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, which, claiming that the American criminal-justice system was infested with racism, sought to promote alternatives to incarceration. Jones headed the Baker Center from 1996 to 2007. Between 1999 and 2009, the Baker Center received more than $1 million from.......”
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=2406
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From..from...c’mon, take a guess......Yep. That’s right. The Fuhrer himself, George $oros.
Needless to say, Van the Maoist is very big on the whole concept of environmental justice. In fact he said this in 2008: (For craps and giggles, I’m going to add emphasis to certain words. Maybe we’ll see a pattern of some sort emerge.)
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“MJ: What’s the relationship between environmental justice and sustainability ?
VJ: Well, the only reason that we have the unsustainable accounting that we have right now is because incinerators, dumping grounds, and sacrifice zones were put where poor people live. It would never have been allowed if you had to put all the incinerators and nasty stuff in rich people’s neighborhoods; we’d have had a sustainable economy a long time ago. We’d have had a clean and green economy a long time ago. It’s the environmental racism that allowed the powerful people in society to turn a blind eye for decades to the downsides of the industrial system that got us to this point. So there’s a direct relationship between environmental racism and the lack of sustainability of society as a whole. We were the canaries in the coal mines, crying for relief. Now finally the consequences are affecting everyone, with global warming and everything else. The other thing is that the environmental justice agenda is also changing. Before, it was much stronger on demanding equal protection from environmental bad. Now we are also demanding equal opportunity and equal access to environmental good. We don’t want to be first and worst with all the toxins and all the negative effects of global warming, and then benefit last and least from all the breakthroughs in solar, wind energy, organic food, all the positives. We want an equal share, an equitable share, of the work wealth and the benefits of the transition to a green economy.”
http://motherjones.com/environment/2008/10/qa-van-jones
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Wanna see something really weird ? Let’s go back to the EPA’s website. Again, because I’m a “racist, homophobic, climate change denying, Zionist war-mongering Right Wing nutjob”, I’m going to add emphasis to some words:
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“How Did the Environmental Justice Movement Arise? The environmental justice movement was started by individuals, primarily people of color, who sought to address the inequity of environmental protection in their communities. Grounded in the struggles of the 1960’s Civil Rights Movement, this movement sounded the alarm about the public health dangers for their families, their communities and themselves.
Early in 1990, the Congressional Black Caucus, a bipartisan coalition of academic, social scientists and political activists met with EPA officials to discuss their findings that environmental risk was higher for minority and low-income populations. They alleged that EPA’s inspections were not addressing their communities’ needs. In response, the EPA Administrator created the Environmental Equity Workgroup in July 1990 to address the allegation that ‘racial minority and low-income populations bear a higher environmental risk burden than the general population.’ The Workgroup produced a report, ‘Reducing Risk in All Communities’, in June 1992 that supported the allegation and made ten recommendations for addressing the problem. One of the recommendations was to create an office to address these inequities. Thus, the Office of Environmental Equity was established [Not by a bill passed in CONgress and signed into law at some lame ceremony at the White Hut, FYI] November 1992. The name was changed to Office of Environmental Justice (OEJ) in 1994.
On Feb 11, 1994, President Bill Clinton signed Executive Order 12898, Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations, to focus federal attention on the environmental and human health conditions of minority and low-income populations with the goal of achieving environmental protection for all communities. The Order directed federal agencies to develop environmental justice strategies to help federal agencies address disproportionately high and adverse human health or environmental effects of their programs on minority and low-income populations. The order is also intended to promote nondiscrimination in federal programs that affect human health and the environment. It aims to provide minority and low-income communities access to public information and public participation in matters relating to human health and the environment. The Presidential Memorandum accompanying the order underscores certain provisions of existing law that can help ensure that all communities and persons across the nation live in a safe and healthy environment.”
http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/basics/ejbackground.html
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Yep. The “fundamental tranformation” of America didn’t start with Chairman Obama. It started under Bill Caligula. Now, if I remember right, Bill had a Vice President named Al Snore, who, by sheer coincidence of course, would stand to make billions from this madness. You know what else ? Bill Caligula was also married to this woman, who, once again, this is just coincidence mind you, just happened to have a mentor named Saul Alinsky. Yep, it’s just Crazytown how that all worked out, huh ?
Creating a Marxist-Leninist command and control Soviet style economy isn’t easy. (Just ask “Republican” Presidential Candidate Mitt Trotsky. Look how it blew up in his face in Taxachusetts.) You gotta have a plan, Comrade. You can’t just come in and slaugher the bourgeoisie all Che Guevara-like. That’s soooo late Twentieth Century. First, you have to have a cadre ready. For example, a person like this would be very helpful. True Believer, I’d like you to meet Nia Robinson. Ms. Robinson is member of the National Environmental Justice Advisory Council at the EPA (AKA—the Empire Protection Agency.)
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“Robinson, Nia Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative
Ms. Robinson is the Director of the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative (EJCC) in Washington, D.C. She was a 2003 Climate Justice Corps Fellow prior to joining EJCC. She was also an organizer and labor relations representative with Service Employees International Union [emphasis added] and a program organizer with the Earth Tomorrow Program of the National Wildlife Federation. Ms. Robinson co-authored the July 2008 report, A Climate of Change: African Americans, Global Warming, and a Just Climate Policy for the U.S.”
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Not only do you need the right people to help out, you also need the political will to pull it off. (It also doesn’t hurt when you’re a rogue federal agency like the EPA that doesn’t have to answer to those pesky voters and you get to make “regulations” that carry the same weight as laws.) Emphasis added where appropriate:
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“Dear Colleagues:
Expanding the conversation on environmentalism and working for environmental justice are among my top priorities for our work at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. All too often, low-income, minority and tribal Americans live in the shadows of the worst pollution, facing disproportionate health impacts and greater obstacles to economic growth in communities that cannot attract businesses and new jobs.
In 1994, President Bill Clinton issued an executive order directing all federal agencies to participate in a governmentwide effort to address environmental justice issues. To strengthen our efforts in anticipation of the 20th anniversary of that directive and to ensure that the EPA is setting a standard for all other agencies, I am pleased to share our comprehensive environmental justice strategy Plan EJ 2014.
Plan EJ 2014 builds on the solid foundation we have established at the EPA to expand the conversation on environmentalism. Since my first days as Administrator, I have traveled the country to meet with diverse communities and listen to their concerns. And I am committed to making environmental justice an essential part of our decision making. Plan EJ 2014 offers a road map that will enable us to better integrate environmental justice and civil rights into our programs, policies and daily work. The plan focuses on agencywide areas critical to advancing environmental justice, including rulemaking, permitting, compliance and enforcement, community-based programs and our work with other federal agencies. It also establishes specific milestones to help us meet the needs of overburdened neighborhoods through our decision making, scientific analysis and rulemaking. Every American deserves clean air, water and land in the places where they live, work, play and learn.
Through our implementation of Plan EJ 2014, the EPA will be leading by example in expanding the conversation on environmentalism and working for environmental justice – now and into the future. I am proud to be a part of this effort and ask you to join me as we strengthen our mission to protect the health of all Americans.
Sincerely,
Lisa P. Jackson [EPA Administrator]”
http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/resources/policy/plan-ej-2014/plan-ej-overview.pdf
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All kidding aside:
We are on the edge of complete and total economic, political, and social disaster.
I can’t gussy it up.
I can’t make it sound palatable.
God help us all.
(This coulmn is written is dedicated to the memory of Andrew Breitbart. Words can’t express how much I appreciated his work when he was here and they can’t express how much his work will be missed.)