The EPA Versus the USA ... Alan Caruba

The EPA Versus the USA
By Alan Caruba

It seems almost beyond reason that a single U.S. agency could so hate America that it was prepared to ignore the Constitution, distort a Supreme Court decision, and impose its will on the nation in the name of totally discredited science.

That, however, is what the Environmental Protection Agency is seeking to do while Americans are distracted by the Christmas celebrations.

The agency’s objective is to regulate so-called greenhouse gases (GHG) on January 2, 2011. More specifically, it would regulate emissions from power plants and other large emitters, but in reality it would end the role of coal as the provider of 50% of the electricity Americans require.

It is essential to understand that the primary GHG is carbon dioxide (CO2) and it was this gas, naturally produced by the Earth and vital to all vegetation and life on Earth, that was falsely identified as the “cause” of “global warming.” Humans individually exhale some six pounds of CO2 every day.

First, there was no “global warming”; only the normal and natural warming that had been in effect since around 1850 when a 500-year “little ice age” ended in the northern hemisphere.

Second, the Earth is now in a normal and natural cooling cycle, though with the added concern that it is also at the end of an 11,500 year interglacial cycle between the last major ice age and the next.

Third, the data put forth by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has been almost entirely discredited, based as it was on rigged research by corrupted university centers and governmental agencies. Some people need to go to jail, but it is unlikely because the fraud was so vast in its extent.

On November 22nd, The Wall Street Journal published a lengthy editorial, “The EPA Permitorium” noting that “The scale of the EPA’s current assault is unprecedented, yet it has received almost no public scrutiny. Since Mr. Obama took office, the agency has proposed or finalized 29 major regulations and 172 major policy rules.”

It can be said that, in terms of its original mission, cleaning the nation’s air and water, that the EPA succeeded, but like any government agency, the EPA has also sought to constantly expand its powers and has, from its beginning, also seen as part of its mission the restriction of virtually all chemicals—invariably called toxic—with a particular emphasis on pesticides that protect human health and property.

Too much exposure to any chemical is inherently toxic. The proper use of any chemical is beneficial.

The reason there is a nationwide infestation of bed bugs after a half century or more in which this insect had been virtually eliminated is that the EPA has restricted the use of almost every pesticide that might exterminate bed bugs. Now multiply that against EPA restrictions on a host of chemicals vital to the manufacture of thousands of products.

The effort of the EPA to regulate CO2 and other GHG gases has no basis in science and none in law. The Clean Air Act does not authorize it.

Moreover, by its own admission, restricting GHGs would only reduce global temperatures—if that were even possible—by 15 ten-thousandths of a degree Celsius in the next century.

The EPA has also proposed new rules calling for a reduction in the national ambient air-quality standard for ground-level ozone, a precursor of smog, from 75 parts per billion to between 60 and 70 parts per billion, a cut of up to 20%.

To most people that means nothing, but the reality is that hundreds of U.S. cities and counties don’t meet the current standard and compliance would destroy what is left of an ailing U.S. economy. If you think unemployment is bad now, it would increase as so-called “emitters” of GHG either undertook costly measures to reduce their emissions or just closed their doors.

Along with those who tried to impose a Cap-and-Trade Act on the nation in order to limit so-called GHGs and profit from it by creating a bogus exchange for the sale of “carbon credits”, the EPA is seeking to exercise a totalitarian control over every aspect of the provision and use of energy in America and it is all based on lies.

Congress can put an end to this nightmare by overturning the EPA’s “Endangerment Rule” and with it the GHG regulations. A new Congress can and should defund as much of the EPA as possible.

The use of fossil fuels---coal, oil, and natural gas---accounts for 85% of America’s energy sources. The EPA proposes to limit or end their use. As such it is an enemy of the people and Congress must act to stop this insane agency before it destroys the nation.

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Alan Caruba blogs daily at http://factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com/. An author, business and science writer, he is the founder of The National Anxiety Center.

© Alan Caruba, 2010

Alan Caruba's commentaries are also posted daily at "Warning Signs" his popular blog and thereafter on dozens of other websites and blogs. If you love to read, visit his monthly report on new books at Bookviews. To visit his Facebook page, click here For information on his professional skills, Caruba.com is the place to visit.

Is There a Socialist Threat to Supreme Court?

Is There a Socialist Threat to Supreme Court?
A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet

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Obama’s nominee to the US Supreme Court lamented the “decline” of socialism in the United States in her undergraduate thesis at Princeton.

Elena Kagan titled her thesis "To the Final Conflict: Socialism in New York City, 1900-1933.” In her writings Kagan expressed her sorrow that infighting caused the decline of the early socialist movement in New York. She asked why the "greatness" of socialism was not reemerging as a major political force.

US Solicitor General Kagan went on to say the following: "In our own times, a coherent socialist movement is nowhere to be found in the United States. Americans are more likely to speak of a golden past than of a golden future, of capitalism's glories than of socialism's greatness." She continued: "Why, in a society by no means perfect, has a radical party never attained the status of a major political force? Why, in particular, did the socialist movement never become an alternative to the nation's established parties?"

Kagan further lamented the infighting within the Socialist Party: "Through its own internal feuding, then, the SP [Socialist Party] exhausted itself forever and further reduced labor radicalism in New York to the position of marginality and insignificance from which it has never recovered.”

While echoing Obama’s mantra of “CHANGE,” Kagan went on to say: "The story is a sad but also a chastening one for those who, more than half a century after socialism's decline, still wish to change America. Radicals have often succumbed to the devastating bane of sectarianism; it is easier, after all, to fight one's fellows than it is to battle an entrenched and powerful foe. Yet if the history of Local New York shows anything, it is that American radicals cannot afford to become their own worst enemies. In unity lies their only hope." Read the entire article here … (SOURCE).
The US government consists of three branches: The Executive branch (The President), the Legislative branch (The bicameral Congress made up of the US House of Representatives and the US Senate), and the third branch, which is the Judicial (the Supreme Court).

Currently, socialists control the Executive and the Legislative branches of our government. The nomination of Ms. Kagan for a seat on the Supreme Court raises the question of whether we are about to see the infiltration of socialism into the third branch of our government. If so, the socialists will have a grand slam. The entire US government will either be controlled by, or heavily influenced by, socialism.

The fact that Kagan will be the youngest member of the court implies that she will be there for a very long time.

Will she confirmed as the next Supreme Court Justice? Of course, she will. The socialist tidal wave in the Senate and the lack of spine in the GOP will ensure her a seat on The Court. Remember, the socialism issue was not raised when she went through the confirmation hearings before she became the US Solicitor General. We should not expect it to come up now. However, hope springs eternal, I suppose.

There was a time in this country, and not so very long ago, when the taint of socialism spelled defeat for anyone seeking a position of power with the US government. No Longer.
Unfortunately, the American people have become so dependent upon government the door was swung open wide and socialism was invited in. The great underclass of Americans, who have been wards of the government for generations, laid the foundation for a socialist government in America. Now, America is just another mediocre country in the socialist dung heap.

J. D. Longstreet