14 DAY TRIAL // Over the course of his term, President George W. Bush seemed to be spearheading a crusade to destroy the American environment, despite serious efforts on behalf of several organizations to stop him. He went on and removed regulations, changed decisions, and eliminated the necessity of scientific opinions from various federal enterprises. The end result in all these measures was always more money for private companies and less care for the environment. Here are just 5 of these regulations, in a list put together by PlanetSave.
Ancient pine woods are to be transformed in Pine Woods, a new suburb, following a back-door deal the Bush Administration made with the nation's largest private land owner, Plum Creek Timber. Needles to say, activists and forest support groups are outraged by the infamous decision and have started a massive campaign to stop deforestation and urban development in pristine natural areas.
An Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ruling has decided that farmers no longer need to report the amounts of pollutants they put in the ground and in the atmosphere, because there is no possible way the agency can keep up with that, although, frankly speaking, that's the whole point of having a protection agency. Approximately 100,000 tons of wastes are to be removed from federal control under the new legislation.
EPA also removed a ban that the mining industry was subjected to, which prevented it from dumping wastes from surface coal exploitations within 100 feet (33 meters) of creeks or streams. This regulation has been in use for 25 years, yet in December Bush decided to please the fossil fuel companies and removed it. A lawsuit is currently underway, and environmentalists and senators from the most affected states hope to reverse it soon. If they don't succeed, it's up to president-elect Obama.
Oil fields near the nation's natural parks have been opened for exploitation, with no regard to the potential impact this regulation could have on the delicate balance of the ecosystems and the wildlife. The Land Management Bureau opened thousands of acres of land to auctions, and soon visitors in pristine parks could view the most beautiful landscapes in the US shrouded in fumes and pollution.
The Endangered Species Act (ESA) was hardly crippled during Bush's terms in the White House, to the point where potentially harmful development projects, such as opening various plants and factories, no longer need to have the approval of wildlife experts, as they did for decades. This opens the door for massive pollution in remote areas, where the wildlife could be severely affected or driven to extinction. Jerry Brown, the Attorney General of California, had his entire state sue the federal government on this account, and more than a dozen environmental organizations followed suit.