The fight against climate change in this country is over.
Oh, it may start up again the next time a Democrat wins the White House, but for now it’s over. Done. Finished. End of story.
That’s because voters in the United States decided to elect a man who clearly told them that he and his party would do absolutely nothing to address this existential threat to our planet. They explained that they’d do whatever they could to make it worse in favor of their big donors in the fossil fuel industry, to speed up the timetable for the serious climate issues on our horizon.
Science has showed us that there’s a loaded gun pointed at our planet, then MAGA voters went out and said, “go ahead and pull the trigger.”
In her book “Strangers in Their Own Land,” Arlie Russell Hochschild wrote how residents of Republican-controlled states suffer higher levels of industrial pollution than residents in their Democratic counterparts.
She explained how states where residents generally called for less government regulation of business lived in more polluted environments, and states where residents generally favored stricter regulation lived in cleaner environments.
It makes you wonder how people suffering because of excessive pollution that threatened not only their health but the health of their children, grandchildren, and others, were against the government stepping in and making their lives better – in all possibility saving some of them from an early death.
But they don’t want that. It’s a level of short-sighted stupidity that you’ll have to explain to me because I don’t get it. How out-of-touch with reality do you have to be to bring this upon yourself and future generations? How selfish? How hateful?
Ask the tens of millions of people who elected four-time indicted, twice impeached, sexual assaulter, tax fraudster, wannabe fascist dictator, convicted felon Donald Trump. The sad part is, it’s their planet, too.
Their homes are going to end up underwater, too. More severe storms are going to decimate their towns, too. And a lot of them will be long gone, leaving their children and grandchildren to suffer the brunt of their idiocy, too.
In a recent “The Morning” newsletter from the New York Times, Lisa Friedman, who covers climate politics, writes about Trump’s climate agenda.
Some of his first steps are expected to be pulling out of the Paris climate agreement and stripping the phrases “climate change,” “clean energy,” and “environmental justice” from every agency website
Then things can really get ugly. In the end, Trump’s actions will increase the United States’ greenhouse gas emissions – which are directly contributing to our climate change problems – along with its overall level of pollution.
Let’s look at some of Friedman’s report (the editorial comments are mine):
Deregulation to help the fossil fuel industry
This would include repealing pollution limits on automobiles, power plants, and oil and gas wells. Lee Zeldin, a political hack Trump wants to run the Environmental Protection Agency, will do what he’s told, damage be damned.
It won’t stop with having a puppet at the top of the EPA. Trump wants to cripple the whole agency, move its headquarters outside Washington, and replace civil servants with acolytes who’ll do as they’re ordered, as opposed to what’s right.
Giving oil and gas companies easier access to federal lands for drilling
Trump wants Doug Burgum who, not surprisingly, is close to fossil fuel companies, to lead the Interior Department and Chris Wright, who runs a fracking company, to lead the Energy Department.
You can’t be more transparent than this.
This will turn these agencies into lapdogs for the fossil fuel industry. The Interior Department oversees nearly 500 million acres of federal land. You can see what’s coming from a mile away.
Trump has promised to end protections for places like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuse, approve all drilling permits, and relax regulations against pollution and harming wildlife.
Repealing as much of the Inflation Reduction Act as possible.
Republicans want to get rid of the IRA for a couple of reasons – to help their fossil fuel benefactors and to find money to help pay for their beloved tax cuts.
The IRA includes $390 billion over 10 years for emissions reductions, including funding wind and solar power, electric vehicle battery factories, and nuclear reactors. It includes a $7,500 tax credit for people who purchase electric vehicles and a tax break for building offshore wind turbines.
There could be some problems. About 80 percent of clean-energy money spent in the first two years has gone to Republican congressional districts. How did Democrats let that happen?
Automakers have spent millions to transition to electric vehicles. Trump apparently wants the end of electric vehicles and a country where only gas-powered ones are available, a complete reversal of the direction we should be heading, all to make the fossil fuel giants even richer and to ensure their gratitude for the future.
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This isn’t new. During Trump’s first term he and the GOP conducted a calculated, relentless assault to stop any effort to address climate change or even to clean up our environment from these serial polluters.
In 2020, the Times ran a list of the nearly 100 environmental rules the Trump administration reversed in areas that include air pollution and admissions, drilling and extractions, infrastructure and planning, animals, water pollution, and toxic substances and safety.
Here are just some of them:
*Weakened Obama-era fuel economy and greenhouse gas standards for passenger cars and light trucks.
*Withdrew the legal justification for an Obama-era rule that limited mercury emissions from coal power plants.
*Replaced the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, which would have set strict limits on carbon emissions from coal- and gas-fired power plants, with a new version that would let states set their own rules.
*Canceled a requirement for oil and gas companies to report methane emissions.
*Withdrew a Clinton-era rule designed to limit toxic emissions from major industrial polluters.
*Revised a program designed to safeguard communities from increases in pollution from new power plants to make it easier for facilities to avoid emissions regulations.
*Repealed rules meant to reduce leaking and venting of powerful greenhouse gases known as hydrofluorocarbons from large refrigeration and air conditioning systems.
*Withdrew a proposed rule aimed at reducing pollutants at sewage treatment plants.
*Lifted an Obama-era freeze on new coal leases on public lands
*Finalized a plan to open up part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska for oil and gas development, a move that overturns six decades of protections for the largest remaining stretch of wilderness in the United States.
*Rescinded water pollution regulations for fracking on federal and Indian lands.
*Loosened offshore drilling safety regulations implemented by the Obama administration after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill.
*Revoked a rule that prevented coal companies from dumping mining debris into local streams.
*Weakened a rule that aimed to limit toxic discharge from power plants into public waterways.
*Weakened a portion of the Clean Water Act to make it easier for federal agencies to issue permits for federal projects over state objections if the projects don't meet local water quality standards, including for pipelines and other fossil fuel facilities.
*Extended the lifespan of unlined coal ash holding areas, which can spill their contents because they lack a protective underlay.
*Withdrew a proposed rule requiring groundwater protections for certain uranium mines. The administration’s Nuclear Fuel Working Group proposed opening up 1,500 acres outside the Grand Canyon to nuclear production.
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It’s been written here before that just about every action the GOP takes is for the same goal: More for the rich. The thinking being that by making the rich richer they will in turn donate/give more money to Republicans. It’s a win-win situation in their minds.
The only problem is that win-win also includes some losers: the poor and middle class and, in this case, our planet. Of course, they don’t care about that. They never have, and they never will.
We are about to see the power and influence of the fossil fuel industry unleashed upon our country. There will be almost no limit to what the Trump administration will do to benefit them. And, with Republicans controlling both houses of Congress and our corrupt U.S. Supreme Court, there are no stopgaps.
That’s why I say the fight is over.
Still, that doesn’t mean honest elected officials and the public shouldn’t speak out, protest, things like that. I’m just saying that structurally there’s not much that can be done. The voters of our country have spoken. MAGA is getting its way.
This will be part of the carnage of the biggest electoral mistake in our country’s history.
The damage could be incalculable. The question is how much will be reversable if that opportunity ever presents itself.
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