Trump and Environmental Collapse

Here is a well-made video outlining the seven major ways in which Donald Trump has worked to accelerate the rate of climate change and expand the damage that it’s causing.

Yes, he has:

• Ignored and buried the report on climate change that experts had invested four years into compiling, which showed clearly that the consequences of inaction would be both environmental and economic collapse.

• Dismantled the Endangered Species Act which had effectively slowed the extinction over the previous 45 years; this has enabled Trump to convert wildlife habitat into oil and gas exploration fields.

• Sold off mass amounts of public land to the fossil fuel industry, including the 19 million acre Arctic Wildlife Refuge, by cutting the review time and expediting the process for moving lands into the possession of those who would exploit it for personal profit.

• Replacing the Clean Power Plan with a dirty one, slashing regulation and removing the incentive for the states to invest in renewable energy, as well as extending the lives of the dirtiest coal-fired power plants that are causing sickness and death across the country.

• Slapping a 30% tariff on solar panels, resulting in the cancellation or postponement of $8 billion of solar projects and the loss of thousands of American jobs.

• Appointed a coal lobbyist to run the Environmental Protection Agency, who has rolled back numerous environmental protections, diminished the role of science at the EPA, and attacked clean cars and trucks–a move that, if successful, would cause Americans to spend an average of $250 more at the pump annually, and would contribute to a significant rise in CO2 and pollution.

• Aggressively withdrawn the U.S. from its leadership position in environmental responsibility.

Indeed, all this is true.  But here’s something to consider:

The “Trump phenomenon” has little to do with Trump himself; he’s more the symptom than the cause of the disease.  There are enormous numbers of Americans who are so ignorant that they believe that their own personal lives are made better by environmental degradation. Huge swaths of America think that climate change and renewable energy are concepts foisted upon them by liberals who are actively undermining U.S. competitiveness in the global marketplace.

As long as this is the case, America has no chance of recovering its standing as a leader, or even a follower, in environmental stewardship.