Mitt Antagonists

Which environmental policies reflect the real Mitt Romney? Those he displayed as Massachusetts governor, or the ones that the Republican Party is asking him to embrace as a presidential candidate?

How Romney responds to the Republican National Committee's (RNC) request to denounce a United Nations non-binding environmental protection action plan should go a long way towards telling us which direction he is ultimately headed. The U.N. plan, which also calls for the eradication of poverty, was denigrated by the RNC in a resolution issued at its annual winter meeting in January. RNC officials dismissed the action plan as a thinly veiled attempt to usurp our sovereignty and absorb us into a U.N.-orchestrated world government. The RNC is the central policy arm of the Republican Party and clearly has little use for the U.N. One wonders whether Romney shares that dim view. If so, he certainly did not exhibit that sentiment as governor. Would he now be willing to consider reducing our financial contribution or even severing ties to the U.N., courses of action that would be cheered in some Republican quarters?

In its resolution, the RNC demonized U.N.-recommended "sustainable development" and "smart growth" land use planning as "extreme environmentalism" and "social engineering" threatening America's core value of private property ownership.

One of the cornerstone's of Romney's administration while Governor of Massachusetts was a sustainable development program rooted in the concept of smart growth. The state encouraged clustered high density multi-family housing where development already existed and public transit was nearby. In 2003, the Governor told Commonwealth Magazine "I very much believe in the concept known as smart growth or sustainable development... We don't want to deplete green space, air, water, in the rush to grow."

The RNC also singled out the U.N. plan's advocacy of "green" and "alternative energy" projects as a blatant example of anti-capitalist social engineering.

Romney, on the other hand, had no political reservations about green technology when presiding over Massachusetts. He established a 15 million dollar Green Energy Fund and authorized state subsidies for solar energy expansion.

In its resolution distributed to all Republican candidates from the presidential nominee on down (with full expectation of concurrence), the RNC issued a blanket indictment of the U.N. Action Plan, calling its principles "destructive and insidious". Just how bad were they? Among those U.N. "menacing" principles was the concept that environmental protection should be integral to economic development. Another principle was that a solid framework of environmental regulation needed to be in place. A third urged that environmental impact statements be prepared prior to approval of projects in ecologically sensitive areas.

It is very unlikely that Romney as Massachusetts Governor would have had a problem with any of the aforementioned principles. After all, while in the State House, he implemented stringent anti-air pollution standards and strengthened environmental enforcement by 54 percent.

So the question boils down to whether Romney, the presidential candidate, has undergone a transformation from Romney, the governor, and will acquiesce to the RNC'S conspiratorial vision of internationally-endorsed environmental protection?

The voters are entitled to know.

 

 

 

Follow Edward Flattau on Twitter: www.twitter.com/greenmorality

Comments

[Karl Hegbloom]

10:00 AM on 05/30/2012

I think that the LDS Word of Wisdom necessarily extends to our treatment of the planetary ecosystem (http://karlhegbloom.blogspot.com/2012/04/mitt-romney-law-of-tithing-and-words-of.html). Mitt should stand by those principles, and reject any demand to deny Rule of Law, including at the International level. It's illegal to pollute. If you burn something nasty and the smoke crosses from your property to mine, or if you dump crud in the stream and it floats into my property, that's not alright. Your land use rights do not extend to that. You would be infringing upon my rights, and upon those of Mother Earth, Our Living Planet.

[KatK]

10:37 PM on 05/27/2012

Q: 'Which environmental policies reflect the real Mitt Romney?"

A: Which ever ones the Koch Brothers want (Hint: The ones that are good for their wallets and bad for everyone else.)

[Jim Milks]

01:08 PM on 05/24/2012

Looks like the RNC has gone off the deep end into conspiracy theorist land. The real questions are 1) Whether or not Republican candidates will follow their party leaders into looney land or not and 2) Why what had been a fringe philosophy based on far-out conspiracy theories has taken over a major political party and now endangers the entire country with irrational views entirely based on the lack of actual evidence.

[pssdov]

11:43 AM on 05/24/2012

Mitt's just waiting for directions from Rove so he knows what to say if it comes up.

[JADJAD]

10:50 AM on 05/24/2012

Can the RNC be anymore backward in their policies? Do they not understand that all natural resources have a limited life expectancy? Based on RNC values, we should use our natural resources to extinction and then figure out what to do next. For a party that is so concerned about our children's burden of government debt, they don't show the same concerns and fears with what will be our future energy source's in the future. They are the party of "have your cake and eat it too ".