Erosion of Environmental Regulations in a World that Has Ceased to Make Sense

Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of the new anti-regulatory environment in Washington is that it’s so amazingly arbitrary and capricious.  Life in America today more closely resembles being asleep than awake; it’s as if we’re making our way through a world that Lewis Carroll crafted for us.

From Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland: Execute him, then examine the evidence.

There are specific actions that have been taken along these lines, like the Interior Department’s opening up vast areas of the Atlantic, the Pacific, and the Arctic to oil and gas exploration, when the vast majority of Americans and nearly 100% of people elsewhere around the globe vehemently object to this full-on assault against the environment.

Similarly, most people find other specific decisions upsetting, e.g., the EPA’s lifting of bans on a broad array of toxic chemicals.

But it’s probably the general guidelines that uproot regulations deigned to protect our health and environment that are the most troubling, and most blatantly Kafkaesque. Here’s one that raises one’s eyebrows: per Trump’s Executive Order 13771, “Reducing Regulation and Controlling Regulatory Costs,” for every new regulation, two existing regulations must be removed.

If this sounds like a joke, good for you; that means you can still think. Sadly, it’s not a joke at all, but the deadly serious policies of a government, at the behest of industry giants, that is thumbing its nose at what it’s put in place to do: protect us.

Here’s a list of laws, all of which (not coincidentally) were both a) made more stringent during the Obama administration, and b) are eroded by EO 13771:

• Motor Vehicle Safety and Motor Carrier Safety Act
• Occupational Safety and Health Act
• Mine Safety and Health Act
• Toxic Substance Control Act
• Hazardous Materials Transportation Act
• Federal Railroad Safety Act
• Federal Water Pollution Control Act
• Energy Policy and Conservation Act
• Endangered Species Act
• Clean Air Act

Let’s look at toxic substances as a good example.  Environmental chemists are is constantly finding compounds in the things we eat, drink, breathe, wear, and rub on our bodies that cause disease.  Until the advent of this administration, such substances were immediately banned before they could cause more harm.  Now, the EPA is rolling back restrictions on toxins–even those that have been identified and confirmed with its own research, like  that Lorsban.

But it’s the “two for one” feature of the Trump administration that makes life in The States truly Orwellian.  Now, before it proposes a ban, the scientific community must calculate the effects it will cause when it is forced to lift two other bans.  In order words, a scientist’s discovery of a toxic substance is no longer a guarantee of healthier living conditions for us and our children; in fact, if the situation is not fully thought through, it could be mean the precise opposite.

All this, of course, leaves people like you and me scratching our heads. How did this absolute insanity happen? Here’s an explanation that we come across frequently; perhaps this will make some sense: Trump was elected as a populist, but betrayed his supporters, most of whom are ill-equipped to see what’s actually happening, and governs as a plutocrat, protecting and expanding the wealth of the very few at the top of the economic food chain–in this case, the chemical industry.

A bold statement to be sure, but want proof?  Just think for yourself. How many Trump supporters voted for a president knowing that he didn’t care a whit about the health and safety of their kids? Zero. So what’s informing Trump’s policies?  Money. Lots of it, like that raining down in torrents from corporations whose only obligation is increasing shareholder value.

Does some farmer, or coal miner or auto mechanic feel good if the stock price of Dow, Monsanto and DuPont rises and his little daughter comes into the world with a preventable birth defect or develops a neurological or immunity disorder in her early childhood?

In very short order, we’ve gone from the arguable to the surreal, from an interesting conversation to an absurd tragedy of proportions never before experienced on this planet.

A one word conclusion: Help.