5 Terrible Bush Environmental Policies We Hope Obama Fixes

The Bush Administration was the worst on record in terms of the environment, perpetrating one crime against nature after the other as they pushed their industry-first agenda at the expense of human and environmental health. And they’re not even done yet – Bush is in the midst of a sprint toward destruction, enacting as many harmful environmental laws as he possibly can before President-elect Obama takes up residence in the White House in January.

Eight years worth of horrifying misdeeds won’t be cleaned up easily; some of the measures Bush is pushing through at this very moment will take months or even years to undo, and Obama is no miracle worker. But we know that the environment – and global warming, in particular - is one of Obama’s top priorities, and we’re hopeful that he’ll get to work quickly to reverse the damage that Bush and Co. have done.

These five examples are, of course, only a sampling of Bush’s environmental follies. To get a real sense of the worst president in history’s environmental record, we recommend reading Crimes Against Nature by possible future EPA Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Putting lobbyists in top environmental positions

Bush has a lot of lobbyist friends, and he wasn’t afraid to give them top-tier jobs in his administration. The same goes for industry lawyers, spokespeople and advocates. More than 100 high-level officials in the Bush Administration once represented the industries they now regulate.

Some examples include putting a former meat-industry lobbyist in charge of determining how meat is labeled, giving an energy lobbyist the job of handing out parcels of land for oil drilling to his former clients and friends, and appointing a lawyer who formerly represented utility companies – some of the biggest polluters – as head of the EPA division that controls air pollution.

More so than any President before him (save, possibly, Nixon), Bush brought a culture of corruption into Washington – an essential conflict of interest that ensured that these officials would not properly do their job. It’s a case of the fox guarding the hen house. Luckily, we’re pretty confident that Obama will put the safety of the people first and choose officials who will be truly dedicated to their jobs.

Refusing to address climate change

For far too many years, Bush was silent on climate change and what we need to do to address it. By the time he finally acknowledged – albeit begrudgingly – that global warming poses a significant threat, years of inaction had passed. And, even after some empty speeches about how serious the problem is, Bush still sat on his hands, doing absolutely nothing meaningful to address it.

Unsurprisingly, Bush has suggested completely voluntary limits on greenhouse gas emissions. It’s obvious to most of us why that won’t work (haven’t we learned by now that businesses will do whatever they can get away with?), but Bush has been all too content to give in to pressure from his buddies in the industry. Bush also famously refused to sign the Kyoto Treaty, insisting that it would seriously harm the U.S. economy (yeah, because his way of doing things worked out great, didn’t they?).

President-elect Obama, on the other hand, has mentioned climate change as a top priority many times throughout his campaign, vowing to begin an aggressive fight to reverse its effects. Obama has pledged to reduce U.S. emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, and then a further 80 percent by 2050 via a cap-and-trade program. That will likely be just the beginning as we begin as a nation to turn toward an economy based on renewable energy.

Failing to protect endangered species

Bush’s parting moves on the environment have been a sobering reminder of just how much damage he has done in his nearly decade-long presidency. George W. Bush already has the worst track record of any president for listing endangered and threatened species under the Endangered Species Act, allowing hundreds of species to continually decline in population while waiting to be added. Now, his administration is creating significant exemptions to regulations that require expert scientific review of any federal project that could possibly harm endangered or threatened species. The proposal would also let federal agencies pass on considering the impact of global warming on species.

It’s like Bush is giving us all the finger before he finally makes his big exit. His administration knows that no matter what, Obama won’t be able to change the laws that Bush is currently pushing through for months or possibly even years, especially with the economy taking so much of his attention. It’s their parting gift to the businesses who fear that Obama will no longer give them a free ride when it comes to profiting at the expense of the environment. And don’t doubt that he won’t – Obama, unlike Bush, is no industry’s bitch.

Rolling back laws on clean air and water

Another of Bush’s recent moves was to reduce pollution runoff limits for factory farms, literally opening the floodgates to allow toxic substances into our water. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Under pressure from polluters, the Bush Administration repeatedly took steps to remove Clean Water Act and Clean Air Act safeguards. Only the passionate opposition of conservation groups, dedicated members of Congress and citizens did Bush and Co. fail to carry out quite as much damage as we initially feared they would when he was elected.

The New York Times recently noted that they expect the EPA to issue a final rule that will weaken a program created by the Clean Air Act, which currently requires utilities to install modern pollution controls when they upgrade their plants to produce more power. The EPA is also expected to issue a final rule that will make it easier for coal-fired power plants to operate near national parks, despite longstanding Congressional mandates to protect air quality in such areas.

Obama, of course, will reverse these decisions. Upholding the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act are common sense, when you don’t have puppet masters pulling your strings.

Always putting oil first

The era of oil is coming to an end, but if Bush had his way, we’d cling to it until the last human on earth exhaled his dying breath. After all, Bush comes from an oil family and has many ties to the industry. And, he certainly hasn’t been shy about doing favors for oil companies while the clean energy industry had difficulty getting off the ground due to lack of funding and support.

Back in 2001, the Bush Administration’s National Energy Policy was created based on recommendations from coal, oil, nuclear and other dirty energy companies. Since then, Bush has leased nearly 27 million acres of public lands to oil and gas companies for drilling and has opposed incentives to promote clean energy. See what Bush said about renewable energy versus what he actually did at the Center for American Progress.

There’s hope, though – Obama’s clean energy plan is so large we can’t even fit it all here. But for starters, he will create 5 million new green collar jobs through the investment of $150 billion in clean energy, a move that will address both the economic crisis and the energy crisis at once. He’ll also put 1 million plug-in hybrids on the road, and ensure that 10% of our electricity comes from renewable sources by 2012 and up to 25% by 2025.

Hope. We’ve heard that word a lot over the last two years, and now it’s becoming reality. Not being angry and fearful of the government’s environmental decisions sure will take a weight off our shoulders.

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