What Global Warming? Finding New Ways to Ignore Climate Change

The news that the Bush administration will do nothing to regulate greenhouse gas emissions probably comes as no surprise to New Jerseyans, from Governor Corzine on down, who are working to reduce the effects of global warming.

But the way the White House has conducted itself is surprising, even appalling. It has defied the Supreme Court, Environmental Protection Agency scientists and states, including New Jersey, trying to protect the health of their citizens.

Last year, in a ruling sought by a group of states that included this one, the Supreme Court ordered the EPA to find out if emissions from cars and trucks contribute to global warming and threaten public health. If the answer is yes, the court said, under the Clean Air Act the EPA must take steps to reduce them.

The answer is a resounding yes, as the EPA reported late last week. It described the heat waves, wildfires, disease and smog that will be caused by global warming in coming decades. Human health as well as the planet’s supplies of food, water and energy will be affected. The agency concluded that lowering emissions would greatly benefit public health.

But the White House didn’t want to hear it. First the Bush administration tried to dilute the EPA report, and then it tried to ignore it. Apparent strong-arming by Vice President Dick Cheney’s office had already succeeded in getting bad news out of a global warming report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

When EPA scientists finally e-mailed their draft report to the White House, Bush aides reportedly refused to open it. The purported reasoning which borders on the absurd was that if it wasn’t opened, the president and his staff wouldn’t have to read it. And they wouldn’t have to acknowledge the effects of global warming or obey the court’s order to reduce emissions.

Eventually, the White House came up with the best cop-out yet. The EPA administrator announced the public comment period on reducing greenhouse gas emissions would be extended most likely until after Bush leaves office.

So the White House is off the hook. But the rest of us aren’t. Time is of the essence, and the United States has forfeited whatever leadership role it could have played in a crisis now recognized worldwide.

Meanwhile, some states have tried to fill in the gap. New Jersey has taken the first step in reducing pollution by passing a law that mandates a reduction in global-warming emissions by 20 percent by 2020 and 80 percent by 2050.

But the federal government has also said states cannot act alone. That decision is being challenged by New Jersey, California and others.

Given the administration’s abysmal environmental record over the last eight years, this latest example of dereliction of duty is no shock. But the brazen way it was handled is.

(c) 2008 Record, The; Bergen County, N.J.. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.