On
March 7, "Today" show host Katie Couric asked
EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman about
the Bush administration's latest rollback
of environmental protections.
"The
EPA has also been criticized for extending
the deadline for compliance with the Clean
Air Act," Ms. Couric said. "Congressman Henry
Waxman says, 'Contrary to the Clean Air Act,
the Bush administration has delayed the date
by which toxic air pollution will be cleaned
up.'"
Whitman
responded, "We are continuing to enforce the
Clean Air Act, we're continuing to meet deadlines.
I'm not sure... to what the Congressman is
referring."
It
was a toxic deception: Two days earlier, Whitman
approved a two-year delay of Clean Air Act
rules that would cut toxic emissions from
80,000 industrial sources. The rules -- among
scores of Clean Air Act deadlines that the
EPA is currently violating -- are already
more than a year overdue.
And
so President Bush's environmental rollbacks
roll on. Public outcry halted his effort to
weaken arsenic-in-drinking-water rules. But
Bush has retreated from a wetlands protection
policy adopted by his father. He's undermined
rules that save threatened public lands from
ruinous road building. He's sabotaged efforts
to hold refinery and power-plant polluters
accountable.
There's
more to come. The White House is moving to
allow coal companies to bury entire valleys
under mountains of mining waste; to derail
the cleanup of polluted lakes, streams and
rivers; and to exempt entire categories of
polluters from the Clean Air Act.
As
EPA Administrator, Ms. Whitman is supposed
to uphold environmental laws. But her boss
would rather protect the profits of his political
patrons than protect public health or the
nation's natural heritage. He's counting on
Whitman's help to make sure voters don't catch
on.


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