The environmental LIES of George W. Bush
Suppressed or falsified science documented by Waxman Report and New York Times
by Richard Stover
Criticism
has been growing about the Bush administration’s interference in the scientific
research and analysis done by federal agencies. Much of that research involves
environmental issues. Bush’s interference has led to false statements by
the President, false statements given to Congress, suppressed reports, altered
web sites, and more.
Congressional Representative Henry A. Waxman (D-CA) commissioned a study to
document these falsehoods. The report by the Special Investigations Division of
the House Committee on Government Reform can be reviewed here.
While many of us have heard about the Administration’s lies, distortions,
and interference, it is still shocking to see so many of them documented in one
publication. The report identifies one common attribute of the interference: it
benefits powerful Bush supporters including business interests and political conservatives.
The interference sacrifices the credibility of Federal research and harms the
American public (and the world) in order to promote a political and ideological
agenda.
Specific examples are summarized below:
Bush Lie: Feedlots
The US Department of Agriculture suppresses research and information related
to agricultural pollution. In one case they prevented a researcher from presenting
his results from a study showing antibiotic-resistant bacteria in the air near
hog confinements in Iowa and Missouri. The USDA suppressed this research at the
request of someone from the National Pork Producers Council. USDA scientists must
now seek prior approval (from USDA Bush appointees) for any manuscripts related
to agricultural practices with negative health or environmental issues.
Bush Lie: Arctic Refuge
Interior Secretary Gale Norton gave false written testimony to Congress regarding
drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge when she said that ANWR’s
caribou calving occurred mostly outside ANWR while her own department’s
research showed the opposite. She also deleted important findings by her own scientists
that indicated that caribou calving and survival could be harmed by drilling activities
in ANWR.
Bush Lie:
Water Quality Perchlorate, the main ingredient in solid rocket fuel, is a serious
health threat. Research in 1997 showed significant health risks, even at low levels,
especially for infants and developing fetuses. The Bush Pentagon has systematically
suppressed information on the levels of perchlorate in ground water and soils
at numerous sites contaminated by the military and its contractors. Instead the
Bush Administration is pushing for legislation to protect the polluters from liability.
Bush Lie: Environmental Health
In an effort to make sure science facts don’t interfere with Bush pollution
policies, in 2002 the administration appointed persons with strong ties to polluting
industries to an important environmental health advisory body of the Centers for
Disease Control (CDC) in the Department of Health and Human Services.
Bush Lie: Global Warming
When Bush rejected the Kyoto protocol on global warming, that was bad enough.
But then Bush personally lied when he said his global warming policies would be
“science-based.” The truth has been the opposite. At the behest of
ExxonMobil, Bush had the State Department request the removal of Dr. Robert Watson
as chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate. Watson had produced a report
predicting 2.5 to 10.5 degree global temperature increases by 2100. This conflicted
with the Bush policy of global warming denial.
As part of the policy of denial Bush tried to suppress other information on
global warming. In 2002 the Bush administration left global warming out of an
annual report on air pollution. In 2003 a major EPA report on the environment
also contained no information on global warming. The report originally had a section
on global warming, but Bush’s political operatives demanded changes that
were not true or that distorted the scientific findings. This created enough of
an uproar among EPA scientists that EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman decided
to drop the global warming section completely.
Additionally the EPA has withheld reports from Congress that show that a proposed
alternative to Bush’s “Clear Skies Act” would be much more effective,
would cost very little more, and would save 17,800 lives from reduced pollution.
The alternative would also reduce carbon dioxide emissions, a major contributor
to global warming. Bush policy is opposed to reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
Bush also refused to let the EPA release a study requested by Congress which
showed that the financial impact to the U.S. economy from controlling greenhouse
gas emissions would be 50 to 100 times less than the amount claimed by the White
House.
Bush Lie: Environmental Lead Poisoning
Recent research indicates that the current federal standards for lead exposure
in children are too high. In a damaging (to children) attempt to block any changes
in the standards, the Bush administration has replaced members of CDC’s
Committee on Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention with persons from the lead industry.
It turns out that the lead industry had a direct hand in picking some of these
people. Even though research shows that childhood learning ability is impaired
at the current federal limits and that those limits need to be reduced by a factor
of 2 or more, one of the Bush appointees to the committee actually claims that
lead levels 7 times higher than the present standard are safe for children’s
brains. No one outside the lead industry holds that discredited view.
Bush Lie: Oil Drilling
Halliburton (headed formerly by Vice President Cheney) uses an environmentally
damaging drilling technique called hydraulic fracturing that injects benzene and
other carcinogens into the ground. In an attempt to cover up potential ground
water contamination from this practice, the EPA changed data in a report to Congress.
The report in its original form showed that there was real potential for contamination,
but at the request of the oil industry the data were changed to show no potential
for contamination. The White House also deleted discussion of the environmental
hazards of hydraulic drilling from the White House National Energy Policy document.
Bush Lie: Wetlands
Soon after Bush took office the U.S Army Corps of Engineers changed its policy
from protecting wetlands to one of destroying wetlands. U.S. Fish and Wildlife
scientists concluded that proposed rule changes on wetlands would lead to significant
environmental damage and that the Corps’ own data supported this conclusion.
Interior Secretary Norton suppressed this information by failing to present the
Fish and Wildlife scientists’ report to the Corps. The proposed harmful
rules were enacted.
Bush Lie: Yellowstone
A report written by Park staff detailing several ongoing environmental concerns
at the Park was edited to remove any mention of these concerns. The Bush Interior
Department used the altered report to argue that Yellowstone should be removed
from a list of parks in danger and in need of international attention. The United
Nations World Heritage Committee removed Yellowstone from the list based on the
bogus report.
Bush Lie: World Trade Center
In a sickening disregard for the health and lives of Americans, the White House
pressured the EPA not to warn the public about the potential health effects of
the smoke, dust, and debris from the collapse of the World Trade Center. This
was apparently done in order to get the New York Stock Market reopened as quickly
as possible. The White House prevented the EPA from issuing guidelines about cleaning
apartments and offices. Indeed the EPA made false statements about the safety
of the debris and dust without any monitoring data to back it up, and they gave
false advice on how to do the cleanup.
The Towers were known to contain thousands of pounds of lead, tons of asbestos,
and thousands of gallons of chemicals which when burned produced dioxins and other
highly toxic byproducts. While the EPA already had procedures in place for dealing
with the health and environmental problems of a major terrorist attack, the EPA
did not follow its own procedures. As a result tens of thousands of residents
and workers in Manhattan have been put at risk for serious, long-term health problems,
and much of the contamination still remains in the environment at dangerous levels.
All of this information, including the direct involvement of the White House in
falsifying EPA reports and press releases, is contained in a report by the EPA
Inspector General. Although the report was suppressed by the White House, a copy
was leaked to the New York Times and the full report is now available. This lie
came to light after the Waxman report was released.
Read the entire Waxman and EPA Reports, here.
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