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Beware Bushies Bearing "Environmental" Proposals

By pharrell

It looks like Bush may veto the bill raising American auto-mileage standards to 35 miles per gallon because unless it specifies that the Department of Transportation--not the Environmental Protection Agency--has primarily responsibility for regulating tailpipe emissions. For Democrats, this issue--though arcane--is worth fighting over; in fact, the Bush proposal may be worse than no law at all.

The Bush proposal would effectively overrule provisions in the Clean Air Act that the Supreme Court relied on last spring when it found that the E.P.A. has the authority to regulate tailpipe emissions and, given the threat of global warming, an obligation to do so. Essentially, Bush wants to trade the environmental community's tremendous victory in the courts, a victory that granted E.P.A. the the long-term power to combat global warming, for a modest one-off environmental law that would also prevent a future president from using E.P.A. to impose tougher tailpipe standards--and let's face it, 35 m.p.g., while a definite improvement on our current abysmal standards, it isn't nearly enough to save the planet in the long run.

Of course, preventing a future president from enacting tougher regulations is Bush's precise goal. An unnamed "administration official" gave the game away in today's Times.

"What we saying is that we?d like to have D.O.T. and E.P.A. consult on both vehicle economy and greenhouse gases and set a standard and that should be it.... Not that [the standard] should be it until something or someone else comes along.

In other words, "What we're saying is, we want to prevent an Obama or Clinton Administration from pushing through some rules that might really have an impact on global warming." Given that all the Democratic presidential candidates, and even a couple of the Republicans, support much stronger anti-global warming laws than the one currently on the table, it just isn't worth trading long-term regulatory power for a modest, sort-term gain.

Full post as published by Harrell Blog on December 11, 2007 (boomark / email).