President Bush gets in a few last blows on America before he leaves

Say good riddance to the Bush Administration.

“Conservatives Want More Dirt in Your Water“, Matthew Yglesias, ThinkProgress.org, 1 December 2008:

As Kieran Healy observes, this Robert Pear article {in the New York Times} focusing on the Bush administration’s efforts to weaken labor rights so as to make it easier for businesses to poison their workforce and so forth also contains a few more doozies mentioned offhand:

“The Labor Department rule is among many that federal agencies are poised to issue before Mr. Bush turns over the White House to Mr. Obama. One rule would allow coal companies to dump rock and dirt from mountaintop mining operations into nearby streams and valleys.”

Yes, that’s right. In these troubled times, the right-wing has reached the conclusion that one of the primary issues facing the country is that it’s unduly difficult for coal companies to dump dirt into nearby streams. Because everyone wishes there was more dirt in their stream!

Note that this is one of those issues where nothing about a commitment to free markets or property rights or liberty compels one to slavishly adopt the business-friendly view that people should have unlimited rights to ruin the water quality of people downstream. But that’s conservative governance in action.

Background on this issue

The whining about loss of scenic vistas seems absurd to me — we have no shortage of mountains.  The pollution of streams is a serious matter.  The apparent inability of some greens to distinguish between these two issues seems quite odd, IMO.

“Appalachia Is Paying Price for White House Rule Change“, Joby Warrick, Washington Post, 17 August 2004 — The accompanying graphic is also helpful.  A small excerpt from this powerful article:

The coal industry chafes at the name — “mountaintop removal” — but it aptly describes the novel mining method that became popular in this part of Appalachia in the late 1980s. Miners target a green peak, scrape it bare of trees and topsoil, and then blast away layer after layer of rock until the mountaintop is gone.

In just over a decade, coal miners used the technique to flatten hundreds of peaks across a region spanning West Virginia, eastern Kentucky and Tennessee. Thousands of tons of rocky debris were dumped into valleys, permanently burying more than 700 miles of mountain streams. By 1999, concerns over the damage to waterways triggered a backlash of lawsuits and court rulings that slowed the industry’s growth to a trickle.

Today, mountaintop removal is booming again, and the practice of dumping mining debris into streambeds is explicitly protected, thanks to a small wording change to federal environmental regulations. U.S. officials simply reclassified the debris from objectionable “waste” to legally acceptable “fill.”

The “fill rule,” as the May 2002 rule change is now known, is a case study of how the Bush administration has attempted to reshape environmental policy in the face of fierce opposition from environmentalists, citizens groups and political opponents. Rather than proposing broad changes or drafting new legislation, administration officials often have taken existing regulations and made subtle tweaks that carry large consequences.

… One proposed change — described by administration officials as a “clarification” of the Clean Water Act — would effectively void a two-decade-old ban on mining within 100 feet of a stream. Another proposal would scale back the federal government’s legal obligation to police state mining agencies, by reclassifying certain duties from “nondiscretionary” to “discretionary.”

In October 2001, the Bush administration intervened to change the focus of a federal mining study that was poised to recommend limits on the size of new mountaintop mines. And, in an internal policy change this spring, the administration promulgated guidelines that allow ditches dug by coal companies to serve as substitutes for streams that were being buried by debris.

“They call them ‘clarifications,’ but it’s really all about removing obstacles,” said Jack Spadaro, who regulated coal mines for 32 years as a federal mine inspector and senior mining safety officer. “They’ve made it easier for companies to dump mining waste into streams, and harder for citizens to challenge them.”

Government studies show that mountaintop mining inflicts a heavy toll. Streams that have not been buried under mining debris carry high levels of silt and toxic chemicals, experts say. About 5 percent of forest cover in southern West Virginia has been stripped away by mines, along with popular mountain vistas that can never be replaced.

Update

“U.S. halts hundreds of coal mining permits“, AP, 24 March 2009 — Excerpt:

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency put hundreds of mountaintop coal-mining permits on hold Tuesday, saying it wants to evaluate the projects’ impact on streams and wetlands. The decision, announced by EPA administrator Lisa Jackson, targets a controversial practice that allows coal mining companies to dump waste from mountaintop mining into streams and wetlands.

It could delay 150-200 surface coal mines, including mountaintop removal operations, according to the EPA. Those permits are issued by the Army Corps of Engineers, an agency that has been criticized by environmental groups and has been sued for failing to thoroughly evaluate the environmental impact of mountaintop removal.

Under the Clean Water Act, companies cannot discharge rock, dirt and other debris into streams unless they can show that it will not cause permanent damage to waterways or the fish and other wildlife that live in it.

Last month, a three-judge appeals panel in Richmond, Va., overturned a lower court’s ruling that would have required the Corps to conduct more extensive reviews. The appeals court decision cleared the way for a backlog of permits that had been delayed until the lawsuit was resolved.

The EPA’s action on Tuesday leaves those permit requests in limbo a little longer.

Afterword

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To read other articles about these things, see the FM reference page on the right side menu bar.  Of esp interest these days:

• Good news about America, a collection of articles!
• about America – how can we reform it?

These posts discuss American politics:

1. What happens to the Republican Party after the election?, 2 November 2008
2. R.I.P., G.O.P. – a well-deserved end, 7 November 2008
3. Conservative reflections about America – starting to use their time in the wilderness to think, 15 November 2008
4. Lilliput or America – who has a better way to choose its leaders?, 19 November 2008
5. Conservatives should look back before attempting to move forward, 5 December 2008