Why does the Bush Administration's EPA put the interests of car and oil companies over the environment?

Question

The EPA stands for "Environmental Protection Agency".

First the EPA refused to regulate CO2 emissions at all. Several states headed by Massachusetts sued the EPA, and the Supreme Court ruled that the EPA had to regulate CO2.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_v._EPA

Now the EPA has refused to allow individual states lead by California to regulate car greenhouse gas emissions, claiming that they need to follow the less-strict federal CAFE standards (recently signed by Bush).

"New CAFE standards, if they go into effect, do not fully phase in until 2020," said Jim Marston, general counsel for Environmental Defense. "The California greenhouse gas limits will occur earlier - beginning in 2009 and fully phased in by 2016. With the mounting evidence of climate change impacts occurring now, it is imperative that we are take action immediately."

http://www.enn.com/pollution/article/27891

Should the EPA change its name to Fossil Fuel Protection Agency?

Boatman - CO2 is a pollutant. The Supreme Court said so.

Car companies can simply not offer their least fuel efficient models in states with higher standards.

Answer 1

The EPA probably should change their name. It gives so many concessions to Industry, that it's basic mission to protect the environment has been compromised. Stephen Johnson, EPA's Administrator, is directly being told what to do by the White House. Science is not being considered in any of these decisions.

Answer 2

What was a great moment in political cognitive dissonance was hearing GWBush, in his typical odd cadence and intonation, in justifying the decision of the EPA to overrule the California state standards, asking rhetorically which would be more effective, letting individual states set the regulatory standards or having a uniform federal standard. It blew me away because I thought the core mantra of the Republicans was state's rights. I switched off the radio, jumped up and yelled "Holy christ! Bush is a Democrat now! I didn't know that!"

Answer 3

OK ------- just pretend for a minute that you own a restaurant and you want to go national with the concept------- you suddenly discover that your hamburgers cannot be sold in a particular STATE(S) because the definition of "what is a hamburger" and can be called a hamburger is different in
every state in the USA.

Scratch out------- McDonalds, Burger King, Chilies, and every other national restaurant chain------- in fact they could not even negotiate the price of "hamburger" since the specs are different in every State------ they would need 52 suppliers, and their purchase COST would increase because they cannot "BUY" nationally with one or two suppliers.

A "national" "problem" (if there is one) requires national coverage for law-making, with similar legal requirements regardless of what state you live in.

AND------- by the way CO2 is NOT a pollutant! ............. so it falls outside of what the EPA should regulate------- until the courts or Congress says otherwise.

Edit: kusheng-- what makes you believe that the EPA is a "scientific" organization. Here is their quote directly from their homepage web site:

"Who We Are:
EPA employs 17,000 people across the country, including our headquarters offices in Washington, DC, 10 regional offices, and more than a dozen labs. Our staff are highly educated and technically trained; more than half are engineers, scientists, and policy analysts. In addition, a large number of employees are legal, public affairs, financial, information management and computer specialists. EPA is led by the Administrator, who is appointed by the President of the United States. "

Answer 4

Because you owe your freedom to industries such as oil and automotive companies. We are the most powerfull nation on the Earth because our industry has and still can pump out massive amounts of things that use oil, and there are well over 2 billion people that would like to see America fall. I do not think the state politicians of California should ever have the power to regulate any industry that could effect the value of a US public corporate stock certificate.

Answer 5

General Motors Corp. said in a statement that "by removing the disproportionate burden of complying with a patchwork of state-specific regulations that would divert our resources, automakers can concentrate on developing and implementing the advanced technologies in ways that will meet America's driving needs."

Answer 6

It is really sad that environmentalists use the cover of protecting the environment to push their agenda in all sorts of ways from preventing me from hiking my favorite trail to protect the Southwest Arroyan Toad mating habits, to preventing building homes helping housing to be out of reach of all but the rich (to use their vernacular), to preventing the building of a border fence and countless other things. When will environmentalists stop using government and twisting legislation that do things they couldn't do at the ballot box and can only accomplish through partisan greedy trial lawyers and idiot judges.

Answer 7

They for specific performed a roll, however the California board that has over website over environmental themes, alongside with the motor vehicle industry themselves are additionally to blame. have you ever seen the action picture "Who Killed the electrical powered automobile"? this is great.

Answer 8

Because Bush and his administration are corporate owned. I have a better name Fossil F.U. Ppl. Agency. If you guys like this name give me a thumb up but if you give me a down, I will give you my middle finger. Merry X'mas anyway.

Answer 9

where did the bush family make there money and still are making their money? oil so what true interest do the have in trying to change things. government is all about big money. not necessarily the environment or little people, its called greed!

Answer 10

I think my man Puff Daddy....or P. Diddy, or whatever it is now, summed it up best when he said: "It's all about the Benjamins, baby!"