On Thursday, EPA will announce that 490 counties in the USA don't meet the new 8-hour air pollution standard. Pretty bad news for the environment.
But to kick off the announcement, EPA administrator Mike Leavitt made this speech today. It was an entirely over the top, "look what the Republicans are doing to protect the environment" spin job.
Here's a sample...
"Sitting in my study recently, I started listening to one of those best-of-the-60s-and-70s CD collections. The music swept me back.
Nothing conjures up that era quite like Three Dog Night, Chicago, or the Rolling Stones. Crank up songs like Joy to the World, Saturday in the Park, Under My Thumb; and you get that "change the world" feeling all over again.
In 1970, I was 19 years old and left home to live in Oregon. What an era that was - Vietnam, flower children, long hair and bell-bottom pants. But what was also memorable to me was the emergence of a new environmental consciousness."
Here is the entire speech.
http://yosemite.epa.gov/administrator/speeches.nsf/b1ab9f485b098972852562e7004dc686/393855f25023abdb
85256e7600589dbe?OpenDocument
I hope The Daily Show can track down some C-Span coverage of this.
It would be quite a laugh riot.