Environmentalism Finding New Ground for Controlling Life

One thing everyone with half a brain can agree on is that the EPA is all about controlling the environment to fit a progressive socialist agenda. At the same time, one has to try and understand how this came about where an unelected individual has the power to demand obedience from the entire nation. Progressive socialism is based on elites deciding what is best for an unaware  population.

You needn't look any further then the IRS nightmare of attacking the administrations political enemies to see how EPA is setting the stage for subordinates to organize the eventual total control of everything related to how humans effect the environment. That they are now suggesting people of color become pawns is no surprise. It always works.

I believe a majority of citizens that still think our country is what it was a decade ago where the ruling class in Washington has their collective best interests at heart. This is not true any longer but is lost in the minds of this country citizens that are pursuing fantasies of past liberties of their parents and grand parents. Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of movement through society, moving up the economic ladder of new prosperity. I

Individual freedom is the enemy of progressive socialism.

Progressive socialism is slowly taking hold of all aspects of our lives, and is being accepted as readily as the frog in the pot of water, swimming around merrily until the heat is added, and by the time the frog understands his problem, it too late to save himself.

Whether it's swimming in pot of water or the IPhone glued to ones ear or texting incessantly, the outcome is the same.

Environmentalism Takes a Turn toward Civil Rights
Source: Steven F. Hayward, "Environmental Justice, 'EPA Style,'" The American, June 9, 2013.

June 12, 2013

The elitist environmental movement has always had a problem with its limited appeal to low-income minorities, few of whom identify with the upscale, Volvo-driving profile of environmental organizations' typical membership.

In the early days of the movement, civil rights leaders were often opposed to environmentalism. Richard Hatcher, the black mayor of Gary, Indiana, told Time magazine at the time of the first Earth Day in 1970: "The nation's concern with the environment has...distract[ed] the nation from the human problems of black and brown Americans," says Steven F. Hayward, the Thomas Smith Fellow at the Ashbrook Center.

While the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has paid lip service to environmental justice (even under President George W. Bush) it has avoided incorporating the idea into the permit process, which is the key choke point of the EPA's regulatory powers. Environmental justice is about to receive a significant boost from the Obama administration.

• Last month, the EPA released for public comment an 81-page "Draft Technical Guidance for Assessing Environmental Justice in Regulatory Analysis," and although the document says it "does not impose any legally binding requirements," there is no doubt the "guidance" will be used in developing new EPA regulations that will have subsequent effects on permit applications.
• The "technical guidance" lays out a detailed framework for assessing the demographic and racial impact of regulations, such as how to identify minority populations at higher health risk.
• Repeated studies have shown that higher levels of environmental chemicals in humans correlate more closely with incomes than with race or location.
• A correlation with income is a very different matter than race.
• Correlations between low incomes and poor health outcomes exist on a broad range of risk measures beyond environmental exposures.

The EPA is probably on doubtful legal ground to incorporate disparate impact analysis directly into the regulatory process, which is why the report disclaims any official legal status for this initiative. But the report gives away the game that the EPA is creating when it calls for the "meaningful involvement" of potentially affected people in the rulemaking and permit process. This is code for providing official "findings" of environmental injustice in the public comment portions of permit applications. The EPA won't do the dirty work directly, but activist groups will be empowered to ratchet up their game.

If the EPA wants to help low-income and minority populations, it should stick to promoting technologies that reduce pollution for everyone, rather than making environmental issues about racial justice.
Source: Steven F. Hayward, "Environmental Justice, 'EPA Style,'" The American, June 9, 2013.