Representative Michele Bachmann kicked off her presidential campaign this week, and it didn't take her long to take an extreme position: Bachmann, a Tea Party favorite, called for the abolition of the Environmental Protection Agency and labeled it "a job killing federal agency." This fringe position shows how willing she is to ignore the facts.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been protecting public health and the environment since its inception forty years ago under President Nixon. By providing realistic safeguards for our health, it helps us be more productive and suffer less illness. That means a stronger economy with fewer days of work lost. That's real money. For example, the Clean Air Act has prevented an estimated160,000 deaths in 2010 alone, and the benefits reach approximately $2 trillion in 2020.
The public understands the importance of the EPA's work: More than 77 percent of Americans -- including 61 percent of Republicans -- say "Congress should let the EPA do its job."
According to the American Lung Association, Bachmann's home county has an ozone grade of "C," and there are more than 4,200 children suffering from asthma, and more than 7,400 people suffering from chronic bronchitis. These are people hurt by the pollutants that the EPA is working to reduce, and it's still got more work to do.
It bears noting that one of the country's most polluting power plants is in her district, and it has been linked to air pollution, water pollution, and illness. This air pollution affects local communities, and USA Today has useful data on the local schools' poor air quality.
Contrary to what Rep. Bachmann suggests, putting proper pollution controls in place saves lives and creates jobs.
When I see a politician making decisions that are bad for their constituents, I always go to look at their donors. Turns out that Rep. Bachmann has received donations from the PACs of Xcel Energy (which owns that dirty power plant), Koch Industries, and Exxon Mobil.
It's unfortunate that Rep. Bachmann's presidential campaign is off to such a wrong-headed start. I hope she's able to reexamine her position and start making better decisions in the days ahead.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cm16dBXn5u0
http://tiny.cc/mb2011
They could get all the fluoride out of our water as their own scientists recommend.
http://www.holisticmed.com/fluoride/epa.html
They could get all the GMO crops out of our food supply.
And they could stop the real environmental holocaust that is geo-engineering/chemtrails.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jf0khstYDLA
Instead, they've concerned themselves with claiming CO2 is a pollutant when it is not.
She seems to have some level of intelligence and it is just crazy that she has taken this position. Crazy or power/money hungry more like it.
We would spend summers in Wisconsin and when we returned in the fall for school in the Chicago land area you could not breath the air since it was think and full of god knows what.
Where's the EPA on this one?
What is the evidence for this? Do you have info on chemical analysis of soils? by depth? Bear in mind that since these "reflector dust" remain airborne for months they are distributed all over the world, at least the hemisphere. Are there analyses from many dispersed sites around the world to corroborate? or just the Pacific coast? If only there, be wary, very wary. You must practice good science, you know.
From what I see, there are only suggestions that geo-engineering CAN be done, and be effective. That's not proof, it's conspiracy theory.
And who, pray tell, would benefit most in such a conspiracy? the government? that doles out subsidies to oil and coal companies? or the coal and oil companies who derive the benefit from pumping CO2 into the air? Simple questions with obviously very simple answers.
So if what you assert is true. Then 1) CO2 effects ARE far worse than you believe by by your junkscience faith and 2) the organizations that drive you to incessantly call AGW a hoax are THE culprits that you should despise. Not the Jim Hansen's of the world.
But imagine leaving this program in the private sector only to be bought off and compromised with under the table and backdoor dealings to turn a blindeye so corporations and biz can get away with damaging the environment even more so in which we and bachmann live in! Its obvious that a company that is willing to let a few birth defects and/or death of people or its workers over the action of chasing the mighty dollars is a sign of the wrong priorities!
Bachmann and the biz she supports by eliminating the EPA bite don't care because their homes, family and schools are nowhere near the areas effected.
It's not as simple as NIMBY: this is part of a coordinated effort to eliminate every law that in any way infringes on the growing rights of our billionaire masters.
Our economy is dependant on a source of energy that is often controlled by people who are enemies, who hike the price up, and force us to pay it, then use that revenue to build better bombs to blow our troops up...This, when we have energy sources available within our control, but are blocked by the EPA.
Crude sources in Alaska- in Colorado- could be enough to supply our own demands and force the price per galon of gas DOWN as the price for a barrel of oil drops....therefore dropping prices for food and other services...and even creating more jobs if we began rsearching the use of coal burning and mining...states heavy hit economicaly such as West Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania would benefit incredibly. But the EPA says no. Who is behind these decisions and what do they gain from it? It isnt economic growth. The original reason the EPA was established has been corrupted, and Michele and others know this.
My eyes use to burn like crazy about half the time. The EPA has done a lot of good.
contributes more to unemployment in this country then any other entity.
Like what jobs are lost? Is the EPA sending our jobs overseas?
How does it contribute to unemployment? Does the EPA cause people to not want to look for work?
You know.........the basics of an argument?
Assuming that is true, job is NOW ALREADY DONE.
So EPA that was neccessary is NOW REDUNDANT.
Why don't EPA "just clean up" the volcanic ash from Chili now floating around the globe?
They can't.
Why don't EPA reduce the CO2 in the air as if reduction is neccessary. They can't.
(Plants created by God does that).
Bachmann is right. EPA is not about the environment. It is NOW just an organisation that is simply taking away our freedom.
We can't use a "simple light bulb" but must use the "the mercury poisoned FL tube"?
So EPA
works so well, right?
you like your freedom to drink mercury and lead laden water and inhale poisonous air and have toxic chemicals dumped in your neighborhood just like the old days when we were "free" to be poisoned
What EPA is now doing is outside it's authority. e.g. CAP & TRADE never passed the house nor the senate and never signed by POTUS.
That's why this " EPA" should be abolished. If it is about polution a written book is enough.
I am a chemist/biochemist and I know what I am talking about.
I don't drink nor smoke. I don't need an EPA that violates the constitution.