White House Suppressed EPA Report on Car Emissions

At this point, I think the question is, can the Bush administration do anything right, or are they really all just a bunch of corrupt assholes? Last December, White House officials tried to stop the EPA from submitting a proposal that would limit greenhouse-gas emissions, supposedly because they ‘threatened public welfare’. Once they found out that the EPA had sent out the email only minutes before, they wanted the email ‘recalled’.

From The Washington Post:

The EPA official who forwarded the e-mail, Associate Deputy Administrator Jason Burnett, refused, said the sources, who insisted on anonymity in order to discuss internal deliberations.

The proposed rule was EPA’s response to an April 2007 Supreme Court ruling that the agency had violated the Clean Air Act by refusing to take up the issue of regulating automobile emissions that contribute to global warming.

Burnett, who resigned from the agency this month, sent the e-mail to the White House Office of Management and Budget at 2:17 p.m. Dec. 5 and received the call warning him to hold off at 2:25 p.m., the sources said. The EPA is expected to release a watered-down version of its original proposal within a week, highlighting the extent to which Bush administration officials continue to resist mandatory federal limits on emissions linked to global warming.

The New York Times reported Wednesday that White House officials never opened EPA’s e-mail. In March, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee disclosed documents showing that the White House had overruled EPA’s findings on the impact of vehicle emissions on climate change.

Burnett refused to comment on the White House calls but said in an interview, “In early December, I sent an e-mail with the formal finding that action must be taken to address the risk of climate change,” adding that he resigned his political appointment because the agency had been stymied in its efforts to respond to the Supreme Court. “The White House made it clear they did not want to address the ramifications of that finding and have decided to leave the challenge to the next administration. Some [at the White House] thought that EPA had mistakenly concluded that climate change endangers the public. It was no mistake.”

WTF – does the White House know how email works? They wanted it ‘recalled’? They never opened the email so the EPA rewrote it? Amazing. What a bunch of partisan rightwing hack pussies.

Apparently, the revised version that the EPA is preparing to put out no longer states that climate change is a direct threat to public welfare, is far shorter and no longer includes alternative approaches to regulate greenhouse emissions from vehicles and power plants. The White House stood on the EPA’s balls and the EPA gave in.

Is it 2009 yet?

Link [The Washington Post]

Photo credit: Flickr user KRSPO

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