Why Is the EPA Out Of Control? Because They Succeeded.

Ever since travel writer Anne Royall regaled early 19th century audiences with tales of environmental destruction in the Kanawha Valley salt works, there has been concern about pollution and destruction.  Ronald Lewis' Transforming the Appalachian Countryside chronicles the effect of the later 1800s timber industry on the landscape, eroded mountains, streams devoid of fish, and other disasters. In 1969 came the seminal environmental event, when pollution in Ohio's Cuyahoga River caught fire.

Modern conservatives blame Richard Nixon for the later sins of the Environmental Protection Agency that he created.  Nixon, however, knew that systematic abuse of the environment had become standard operating procedure in many industries.  This was the problem that the EPA was created to address. The Industrial Revolution brought prosperity, education, higher living standards, and longer lives.  It also set a river on fire.  Nixon created the EPA to reduce pollutants and enforce new environmental standards to encourage conservation and protect the environment. 

And what came of it?  The EPA succeeded.  According to their own statistics, carbon monoxide levels in the air dropped 83 percent from 1980 levels, from 178 million tons to 51 million. Much of the drop in carbon monoxide emissions came between 2001 and 2009, the years of the George W. Bush presidency.  Airborne lead dropped 91 percent. Aggregate emissions of six common pollutants dropped 67 percent.

Percentages and raw numbers dropped even though the US has more people, producing more goods and services, and driving more vehicles than ever. 

So the EPA actually succeeded in its most important primary task.  It brought reasonable standards into being and provided an enforcement mechanism to ensure that the air and water did not harm us.  In any group of people, accidents and even disasters will happen.  But they do not have a serious long term impact because industries generally abide by EPA standards.  

If the story ended here, we'd call it a government success story.  Most people understand, however, that it did not, that the EPA now uses flimsy evidence and bad science to justify destroying industries.  Worse, they work at the behest, as Heritage's Stephen Moore describes, of green energy moguls who have a vested interest in its work.  So-called green energy cannot replace coal, gas, or oil.  It also requires enormous amounts of resources to build and ship which limit their benefit to the environment. 

A lot of politics and money have energized the EPA to attack the cleanest coal mining and power production that has ever been seen anywhere in history.  But why do they also go after farms?  Why, for example, as Delegate Kelli Sobonya said last week, has the EPA gotten so obsessed with limiting "bovine emissions" (that's cow farts to the rest of us.)

Another aspect fuels EPA lunacy.  They succeeded and now the agency has little real justification for crusading.  Going after bogeymen, real or false, gives bureaucrats a sense of purpose.  Secular Saint Georges slaying the mean and nasty pollution dragon, saving the world from global warming, err climate change.  This all sounds like much more fun than a scaled down agency administering reasonable regulations that maintain a successful status quo.  

The EPA achieved its original goal beyond what was likely expected in 1972. It eventually hit a balance between the needs of a dynamic economy and the needs of a protected environment.  Now, to justify itself, it goes out looking for new empires to battle and conquer.

It's human nature to want to matter and have a strong sense of purpose.  But this agency level self-fulfillment should not come at the cost of real jobs, real standards of living, and real lives.

 

Obama, Dick, and Andy: "I Wanna Talk About Me"

About a year ago, Barack Obama caused a personal pronoun stir when CNSNews.com reported that he used the first person pronouns "I" and "me" a combined total of 117 times in a single speech.  But, however, Obama is far from alone in "wanting to talk about me."

About a year and six weeks before the oft reported July 2012 speech, blogger Marc Cenedella reported an analysis of Obama speeches given at CIA headquarters compared with several of his predecessors.  Since 1968, Presidents Carter, Reagan, and George W. Bush referred to themselves the least often.  George H. W. Bush gets a pass for a slightly higher level because he once was CIA chief, which would lead to more first person mentions.

By far, the three highest levels of use came from Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama.  Clinton's high use shrinks when Cenedella factors in the length of the addresses.  The famously loquacious Clinton drops down to Bushian levels of first person pronoun use while Obama and Nixon remain higher than the rest.

In his 1960 work Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction, famed American historian Eric McKitrick examined another president persistent in his employment of first person pronouns.

About Johnson, he wrote :

For a public man, he was obsessed with himself to a degree that exceeded the normal, and most of his speeches, no matter what else they dealt with, may be read as demands for personal vindication and personal approval.

McKitrick also concluded that Johnson preferred general rules to concrete thinking "in order that (his mind) might once more close itself and be at rest."

Johnson, at his worst, often evoked images of crucifixion and Judah Iscariot-like betrayal in reference to himself and his enemies.  This worked in the East Tennessee hills where the poor felt just as nailed to a cross by their betters as he did.  But it fell short of the expectations that the national public had for the demeanor of their president.

McKitrick compared the inferiority complex of Johnson to the confidence of Lincoln.  About the 16th president, he said his "'humility' was sustained by the odd arrogance of a superior man's self-knowledge."  Interestingly, this also describes President Reagan and both chief executives of the Bush family.

Nixon's public speaking patterns mimicked McKitrick's evaluation of Johnson, especially early.  Journalist Theodore White remembered almost a decade later that in 1960, Nixon's "common utterances all too frequently a mixture of pathetic self-pity and petulant distemper."  Aide Robert Finch told White in 1968 that Nixon" doesn't want to be loved.  He's not looking for adulation the way he used to."  But that campaign evaluation looks more like Nixon covering than transforming his nature.

The three presidents all share in common some attributes.  All three worked to expand the authority of the executive branch.  None of them could work and play well with anyone except their closest trusted associates. All three had fatal flaws that kept them from functioning comfortably in the role chosen for them by the public.  Nixon enjoyed the most success, but of course unraveled his legacy by covering criminal activities.  Obama and Nixon both preferred layers of secrecy to public examination of their administration's doings.  Conversely, Johnson was perhaps too open about his exact feelings for proposals and personalities.

Of the three, Johnson was far and away the best speaker.  He could address a crowd extemporaneously for hours.  Sure, the crowds sometimes despised him after his efforts, but Johnson could never leave an audience cold.  Obama reads well from a teleprompter, but may be one of the worst presidential speakers if the ability to speak and respond without notes is factored.

Will Obama's presidency end in scandal and/or disgrace as Johnson and Nixon's did?  It certainly has achieved no success that has been of any value to the people. And history's remembrance of Johnson certainly has found echoes in Obama.

History will illuminate more of Obama as years and decades pass, but he has shown enough over the past several years that some conclusions are inescapable.

The most important of these is that Obama has been consistently a much smaller man than the American presidency demands.

Is the NSA America's Stasi?

A protester "defaced" the U. S. Embassy in Berlin last night with a debate provoking message. 

The protester/artist/rabblerouser Kit Dotcom used a projector to put an image of his face on the side of the building under the words "United Stasi of America." 

Invoking the word "Stasi" brings almost as sharp of a response from Germans as "Nazi."  Some may mistakenly assume that the East German secret police force was simply a continuation of the Gestapo under a new regime.  Far from it.

The Gestapo was the political police unit within the Reich Security Main Office, or RSHA in short.  It had a relatively small number of thugs compared to the later Communist states in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.  The Gestapo's reach remained limited due to this shortage (likely brought on by the needs of the war more than Nazi scruples) although those in its grasp felt the full measure of cruel tortures.

The Stasi, on the other hand, built an enormous agency of counterintelligence and surveillance.  Likely no East German family escaped the reach of the Stasi. Those who did not inform were often informed upon.  East Germany preached that good citizens turned in their suspicious neighbors for any number of offenses.  Each report warranted an investigation carefully filed in enormous warehouses. After the fall of the East German government and the opening of the files, it became a point of pride to have been investigated, of shame to have informed.  British historian and journalist Timothy Garton Ash wrote a book investigating the informants who helped to amass the file created on himself.

Has the NSA reached Stasi levels of interference and snooping?  Certainly their technological power to gather and hold information outstrips the clumsy files filled with cards used by the East Germans.  That being said, East Germans had no avenue to protest the widespread collection of personal information, no functional constitution protecting their rights, no legal or democratic alternative to the dictators in control.

Critics of the NSA point to the potential abuse of power.  If officials in general did not have track records going back to Nixon, Franklin Roosevelt, and beyond, of misusing such information, Americans might have trust in it.  Officials have misused information, wrongfully harming innocent individuals as a result.

Around the world, many now realize that the NSA snoops on them as well.  Few can argue that this surveillance has foiled terrorists in many nations, but it still raises questions of sovereign rights and power. 

Like other agencies who have gradually crept more into citizens' private lives, the problems remain in the potential more than the actual.  What happens if a less scrupulous administration comes to power? What if they do use the full range of information possibilities for political purposes instead of national defense.  The Internal Revenue Service back to FDR has been used politically, why not also information gathered by the NSA?

Constitutional safeguards exist because the Founders did not trust future governments to respect rights.  It would be wise to restrain all government agencies in their search for more information and weigh carefully what is done in the name of national security.

Who Said It?

First group:

"we should put permanent tails and coverage on (political opponents) on all the personal stuff to cover the kinds of things they hit us on . . ."

"I don't want the folks who created this mess to do a lot of talking."

"Ideological talk and phrase mongering about political liberties should be disposed with; all that is just mere chatter and phrase mongering. "

"Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov."

"The mass, whether it be a crowd, or an army, is vile."

"We don't let them have ideas, why would we let them have guns?"

Second group:

"Stifling dissent and likening those who disagree with you to Nazis are not the hallmarks of a confident agenda."

"The censor's sword pierces deeply into the heart of free expression."

"Citizen engagement must not be chilled by fear of government monitoring free speech rights."

"If we do not believe in freedom of speech for those we despise we do not believe in it at all."

"The sound we hear of tireless voices is the price we pay for the right to hear the music of our own opinions."

"The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be out first object."

"Leadership to me means duty, honor, country. It means character, and it means listening from time to time."

"Everybody is in favor of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled,but some people's idea of it is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that is an outrage."

First group in order: Richard Nixon, Barack Obama, Vladimir Lenin, White House Ministry of Truth release, benito Mussolini, Josef Stalin.

I know a lot of conservatives still like Richard Nixon and he did learn about dirty politics from the Kennedys who were the true masters of that art in the 1960s. However that does not excuse his desire to spy on Teddy Kennedy, Ed Muskie, and Hubert Humphrey, nor his apparent belief that the presidency is not subject to rule of law.

Second group in order: Newt Gingrich, Chief Justice Earl Warren (at one point he was a liberal hero), Senator Jon Cornyn, Noam Chomsky (yes he is a Communist who likely right now does not care for conservative free speech rights, but the contrast between his words and Obama is illuminating), Adlai Stevenson, Thomas Jefferson, George W. Bush, and Winston Churchill.

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Two more quotes. The first is from one of the heroes of Obama's Marxist professors at Columbia University. Yes he was one of the worst Communist thugs, but the statement makes sense nonetheless:

"It is still better if the enemy attacks us wildly and paints us as utterly black and without a single virtue; it demonstrates that we have not only drawn a clear line of demarcation between the enemy and ourselves but achieved a great deal in our work." Mao Tse Dong

Here's the second:

"I think they are AstroTurf -- you be the judge -- of carrying swastikas and symbols like that to a town hall meeting on health care. " Nancy Pelosi

In other words, as a left winger's hero himself described, Obama, Pelosi, and Reid are losing. Pelosi referred to a hand made poster that did feature a swastika, but had a red circle around it and a red line through it. It was an internationally recognized symbol of rejecting, not embracing the Nazi image.

Nixonian Foreign Policy and Obama

A couple of days ago, I described Hillary Clinton's foreign policy as being that of Richard Nixon and the more I thought about it, the more I felt that point needed clarification.

Nixon's main achievements came in the field of foreign policy. Lyndon Johnson's tax and spend approach to welfare combined with his mismanagement of the Vietnam War led to a period of American weakness. High inflation, breakdowns of social cohesion, and a declining ability to project power meant that by the late 60s, that weakness was real. Nixon adjusted US policy accordingly. For the first time since World War II, we dealt from a position of weakness rather than one of strength. This required Nixon, more so than other presidents, to engage enemies with despicable domestic records. Mao Tse Dong was the worst of the lot. However, Nixon did this with an overall vision of m,aking our enemies (USSR and China) more afraid of each other than of us. It worked, giving us breathing room before the American Renaissance of Ronald Reagan.

Obama has insisted that we show disrespect to our friends and love to our enemies (who use the opportunity to slap us in the face when they get the chance.) It is the Nixon concept of engaging enemies, without the overall plan of how to use that engagement to secure security. What is most galling is that at the end of 2008 the United States was the most secure and strongest power in the world. Obama's excessive borrowing has placed us at the mercy of our adversaries. His policy of apologizing for every slight, real or imagined, has dissolved the international respect so carefully established by Bush and Rice.

So a point of clarification. I used Nixon to describe Clinton and Obama's policy because liberals believe that Nixon is worse than Hitler and Judas Iscariot rolled into one. However it does use some aspects of Nixon's process without the overall vision or savvy that will lead to an enhanced American security.

Either Naivete, Stupidity, Or A Serious Lack of Concern

In 1959 a newspaper photo was sent over the wires that reaffirmed in the strongest possible way the support of the United States of America for democracy as well as its opposition to oppression and tyranny. Vice President Richard Nixon responded to a debate challenge by Nikita Kruschev with characteristic aggressiveness. The pugnacious Nixon stands with index finger extended into the chest of a suddenly bemused Soviet premier.

Other presidents, such as Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, were credited for boosting the spirits of those fighting tyranny in their own countries. Reagan's challenges reverberated secretly through the gulags while Tibetan freedom protesters in recent years cited American support as a strong source of motivation. You never forgot our position on dictatorship and democracy during these presidencies.

That is what makes Obama's familiarity with Chavez so chilling and foolish at the same time. He plays the picture of a handshake and the two men obviously enjoying each other's company as meaningless. Remember, this is the same person who (along with his wife) could not help but demonstrate contempt over and over for our real allies.

Obama in foreign affairs conducts himself like the stereotypical witless TV dad who has no real connection with the world around him, simply wants to get along with everyone, and try to look "cool" doing it.

Maybe he should stay home and let the adults handle "big boy" issues like America's daily shrinking credibility. Then again, he would just be tempted to foul up the banks and General Motors some more. Or maybe pass another tax on employers.

Does anyone else remember the days when the President of the United States was called "leader of the free world?"

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Count me as someone unconcerned that one of the 9/11 plotters was waterboarded over 180 times. Seems to me it was about 2,000 times too few. I have zero sympathy for this gentleman. The idea that terrorists will treat American or allied prisoners more harshly as a result is ludicrous. They beheaded Daniel Pearl. At least some of the victims of execution were not given clean cuts either. Does it get much more brutal than that? We need to remember who we are dealing with.

Every report on the number of waterboardings done to these people ought to be prefaced by a shot of the towers being hit and coming down.

Where Is the Media Now When Robert Byrd Is Criticizing a President?

They are there. Maybe it does not lead the broadcast or make the front page, but the story did spread across the country. Senator Robert C. Byrd compared Barack Obama to Richard Nixon in blasting his use of policy czars. Byrd's fear is that these officials are not subject to the same supervision as Cabinet officials.

Byrd also compared Obama to George W. Bush, a figure that most liberals seem to think is worse than Richard Nixon. Bush operated, like Franklin Roosevelt, to prosecute a war and enhance national security. Obama wants to use such officials to oversee the auto industry and attack coal companies.

Byrd notes that this contradicts the campaign promise to be the most transparent administration in history. Bush made no such promise.

Still one wonders about the process of story placement. Whenever Senator Byrd breathed an anti-Bush word it led the news, sometimes for days. When the defender of the Constitution trains his guns on Obama, the story selection process is slightly different.

Needless to say, the reporters and analysts have tried to do their job. They have done well pointing out the problems and inconsistencies of the Won. Republicans are skillfully staking out their position while playing divide and conquer between the antagonistic presidential and congressional Democrats.

I just keep saying, two more years, two more years. The good ol' USA needs to hang in there. Help is on the way.

If only Senator Byrd would add some useful action to his criticisms. Abandon those people who evicted him from his chairmanship and join the next GOP filibuster. He's will lose nothing, but he can protect his principles.

McCain Wins Nomination

As of Super Tuesday, the Republican Party received the news it had expected for some time. John McCain is the party's nominee for president.

A couple of months ago, this prospect unnerved many conservative Republicans. McCain does differ in opinion from conservatives on some issues. He, along with other Republicans in border regions, has a different idea about immigration than most. McCain's joke about being a "conservative liberal" probably did not help.

That being said, Republicans have not won elections by selecting doctrinaire nominees. Dwight D. Eisenhower campaigned on "compassionate conservatism" that sought to soften the edges of free market economics. Richard Nixon engaged in heavy handed economic controls to try and right the ship after the disastrous Johnson presidency. Neither George Bush could be called right wingers when one examines their policies. Ronald Reagan even evoked savage conservative criticism when he embarked on a peace path towards Mikhail Gorbachev's Soviet Union.

We are conservatives, but we also reason and speak freely. This is why the media loves to pick on conservatism, because we are never unified and our debates usually happen in public. Liberals have ousted their own free thinkers, such as Joe Lieberman (you could call him the Democratic version of John McCain.) Liberals started tearing away at Angelina Jolie's statement that US troops are needed in Iraq to prevent humanitarian disasters. They cannot tolerate deviations from their increasingly left wing agenda.

John McCain is not a 100% right wing conservative, this is true. Neither was any other GOP president. We win elections because we choose and support moderate candidates who think and act on their principles instead of the party line. McCain has sacrificed a great deal for his country and he is the only candidate left that America can trust in a crisis.

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Has Mineral County run out of water yet? Just checking. It would be best to keep any other businesses from coming in just in case.

Presidential Prerogatives

Secrecy versus the right to know has grown into an important debate in terms of the restriction of presidential papers.

During the Watergate hangover years, lawmakers sought to reduce the aura of secrecy that existed around presidential papers. After Richard Nixon's administration, zealously guarded secrecy was seen as a catalyst for presidential misdeeds. Perhaps if presidential communications saw more scrutiny, they might themselves act in a more transparent manner. Additionally historians rejoiced in the idea that they could access crucial records more quickly.

The last two presidents have come under fire for restricting access to their papers. The New York Times recently blasted President Bush for adhering to a family "mania for secrecy." Five years ago he wrote an executive order placing many of his personal papers under restriction for the immediate future. During recent Democratic debates, Hillary Clinton's competition of stuffed shirts blasted her refusal to release her personal correspondence between herself and her husband. Historians despise both measures because they want access to these documents as soon as possible.

Historians may be hurting their own efforts. Our record of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia was locked up for fifty years so that the participants could speak freely. What if they believed their thoughts would appear in print within a few years? This would alter what was communicated and written down. Future historians will not have those rare finds of politicians actually communicating their real unguarded thoughts. Because Franklin D. Roosevelt did not trust that his papers would remain inviolate, he communicated everything through speaking. We rarely have any idea what was really on his mind at any given point.

Additionally personal papers, especially those between a husband and wife regardless of position, are personal. Hillary Clinton and her husband wrote things to each other on important issues that I personally would be interested in seeing. However these are personal communications and so long as no criminal investigation exists, these papers ought to remain private for the time being. They especially ought not be fodder during a presidential campaign.

George W. Bush's communications come during wartime, something that liberals and the media seem to haver perpetual ammnesia about. They reflect strategies and ideas that could help our enemies if released, even after his term is over. Again, this is a situation where historians want to write their books and political folks want mud to smear.

Bush and Clinton both deserve the right in the short term to limit access to their personal papers so long as there is an eventual date that everything end up in the public eye. It may be years, it may be decades, but that is the price we pay so that these people can feel free to record their thoughts.