Posted: 09/15/2004
Kennedy Pollutes the Truth about Bush Environment Record
September 15, 2004 – Environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is currently promoting a new book, Crimes Against Nature: How George W. Bush and His Corporate Pals are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy. Kennedy argues that the Bush administration is rolling back decades of environmental laws and regulations. Yet according to the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA), this accusation is patently untrue.
“While it is true the Bush administration is not trying to ram through a host of new environmental regulations, it is absurd to suggest they are rolling anything back,� said NCPA Senior Fellow H. Sterling Burnett.
According to Jonathan Adler, an assistant professor of law at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law, no major environmental statute has been revised and there have been no serious legislative proposals to scale back existing environmental laws. In an article for National Review Online, Adler points out that:
- The federal air-quality standards all metropolitan areas are required to meet are intact.
- Limits to pollution discharges into rivers and streams put in place by the Clean Water Act are the same now as they were when Bush took office.
- There have been no changes to the restrictions on private property imposed on landowners under the Endangered Species Act.
- The drinking-water standards imposed under the Safe Drinking Water Act have not been touched.
- The regulatory requirements imposed on the transportation, storage and disposal of hazardous waste under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act remain in effect.
In addition, on a recent appearance joint appearance with Adler on National Public Radio, Kennedy claimed the Bush Administration is promoting “takings� legislation that would provide “constitutional protection to the right to pollute.� Adler notes that once again, Kennedy’s rhetoric is at odds with reality. Such legislation has not been seriously debated in Congress for over six years. And even then, these bills would not have the impact Kennedy suggests since they include exceptions that make clear landowners are not entitled to compensation when federal regulations prevented them from engaging in polluting activities.
The NCPA also noted that the Bush administration has approved several new regulations, including:
- A regulation limiting lead in drinking water;
- A regulation increasing the efficiency of home appliances;
- And they have pushed to impose restrictions of emissions of certain air pollutants, including a first-time restriction on the emission of mercury from power plants.