Friday, December 30, 2005
Prevaricating on Pollution
The Bush administration is up to their old tricks of fuzzy math and outright lying--this time so that they can continue polluting and rolling back environmental regulations at unprecedented rates. (Note to GOP-impaired readers: "Prevaricating" means "lying")
Although the White House tried to twist the numbers to make it look like greenhouse gas emissions went down, "the Energy Information Administration, one of two government agencies that tracks climate statistics (the Environmental Protection Agency is the other) has released its 2004 numbers. As many predicted, they show a hefty 2 percent rise in greenhouse gas emissions, the largest growth in five years. Thanks to that rise, U.S. emissions now account for about 25 percent of the world's total.
What, then, of the Bush administration's claim it has put in place "more than 60 mandatory, incentive-based and voluntary federal programs" to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases? An earlier version of that claim was examined two years ago by the Government Accountability Office. Its report, published in October 2003, noted that of the 30 elements of the administration's then-recently proclaimed agenda on greenhouse gases, only three were new programs -- as opposed to existing, repackaged programs -- that were actually intended to reduce future emissions in a measurable way. If it can't get its numbers right, why should we take seriously the White House's declared intention to forge a "constructive and effective approach" to climate change at all?"
Answer: We shouldn't trust anything this administration tells us, since they lie about everything--WMDs, the environment, leaking a CIA agent's identity--and have even stooped so far as to pay reporters to print their propaganda.
White House Prevarications
Although the White House tried to twist the numbers to make it look like greenhouse gas emissions went down, "the Energy Information Administration, one of two government agencies that tracks climate statistics (the Environmental Protection Agency is the other) has released its 2004 numbers. As many predicted, they show a hefty 2 percent rise in greenhouse gas emissions, the largest growth in five years. Thanks to that rise, U.S. emissions now account for about 25 percent of the world's total.
What, then, of the Bush administration's claim it has put in place "more than 60 mandatory, incentive-based and voluntary federal programs" to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases? An earlier version of that claim was examined two years ago by the Government Accountability Office. Its report, published in October 2003, noted that of the 30 elements of the administration's then-recently proclaimed agenda on greenhouse gases, only three were new programs -- as opposed to existing, repackaged programs -- that were actually intended to reduce future emissions in a measurable way. If it can't get its numbers right, why should we take seriously the White House's declared intention to forge a "constructive and effective approach" to climate change at all?"
Answer: We shouldn't trust anything this administration tells us, since they lie about everything--WMDs, the environment, leaking a CIA agent's identity--and have even stooped so far as to pay reporters to print their propaganda.
White House Prevarications
