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Despite the fact that I love the wild outdoors, I have come to fear Earthday, since rather than being a celebration of the earth's wonders, it has become just another day of political sloganeering. I dread this Earthday more than usual because through "false advertising" radical environmentalists have a chance of putting one of their own in the White House.
Environmentalists are struggling to portray Vice President Al Gore as an environmental moderate while casting Texas Gov. George W. Bush as an environmental villain. Neither portrayal is accurate.
When Gore was chosen as President Clinton's running mate, his support for radical environmental causes garnered him the nickname "Ozone Al." This was in part due to his book, Earth in the Balance, which argues that the greatest threat to humanity is its disconnection from the natural world, never mind little things like nuclear proliferation, biological terrorism or totalitarian regimes bent on genocide. His solution, institute a "Global Marshall Plan," under which international laws would make protecting the environment the central organizing principle of civilization.
As vice president, Gore pushed Clinton to sign a United Nations Biodiversity treaty, which former President George Bush had rejected because it harmed U. S. national interests. He also convinced Clinton to back Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Carol Browner's scientifically questionable national clean air regulations. A federal court later threw them out as unconstitutional.
Gore has also led the administration's land-control efforts, including a "livability" agenda that would give the government - which already owns more than 33 percent U.S. land - more than one billion dollars each year to purchase land. He encouraged Clinton to lock up millions of acres of land in national monuments through executive orders, circumventing the normal congressional approval process. And, he backed Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck's regulations setting aside 40 million acres of national forests as roadless, and making watershed protection the highest priority. Forest supervisors and members of Congress have argued that these proposals threaten the health of the forests and violate the forest service's mandate to manage forests, not as wilderness, but for multiple uses including recreation.
Despite this record, environmental groups are placing television ads arguing that Gore has not done enough to protect the environment.
While Gov. Bush has not championed fringe environmental causes, he has a solid record of accomplishment in Texas. During his tenure, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions fell in Texas by more than 17 percent, while rising nationwide. Emissions of volatile organic compounds dropped more than 43 percent in Texas but only 16 percent nationally; and carbon monoxide emissions fell 12 percent in Texas but only 5 percent nationally.
In addition, Bush signed legislation deregulating the electric industry while requiring the second highest use of "clean" energy (i.e., renewable energy and natural gas) in the country. He also signed a bill creating Texas's first ever environmental education program. Thus, only politics could explain the League of Conservation Voter's claim that Bush's "tenure as governor . . . is marked by, . . . worsening air quality and a . . . philosophy that, if applied nationally, would jeopardize three decades of national environmental progress."
The evidence suggest that the doom-and-gloom pronouncements about Gov. Bush and the attempts to downplay Al Gore's environmental record have more to do with electing Gore president than any real concern for environmental quality. In any case, Earthday deserves better than this misrepresentation.
The National Center for Policy Analysis is a public policy research
institute founded in 1983 and internationally known for its studies on public policy issues.
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Julie Hillrichs, Dallas, TX 972-386-6272 Sean Tuffnell, Dallas, TX 972-386-6272 Joan Kirby, Washington, DC 202-220-3082 Internet: http://www.ncpa.org Home | Support Us | All Issues | Social Security Debate Central | Contact Us |