Don’t be fooled by the distractor-in-chief

Without Borders: Behind the Beauty Lurks the Threat, the title of a Ted Turner documentary on dangers that threaten the environment, could well be the description of the witnessed pandemonium known as the Oval Office, where Trump’s bombastic behavior dominates social media, thereby distracting the American people.

Meanwhile, administrator Scott Pruitt and his cronies are quietly assaulting the integrity and fortitude of the Environmental Protection Agency.

As attorney general of Oklahoma, Pruitt repeatedly called for the elimination of the EPA and sued the agency 14 times. In 13 of these cases, he partnered with companies or trade associations that were financial contributors to his political causes. It’s no accident that Trump selected Pruitt to head up the one agency focused on protecting the Earth and the health of its inhabitants. His actions appease and protect the GOP donors from the fossil fuel industry as well as other corporate charlatans who disdain decent business practices while disregarding the welfare of the American people.

So far during Pruitt’s tenure at the EPA, 52 climate rules are on their way out, with 25 already rescinded, 19 rollbacks in progress, and eight rollbacks currently in limbo, including overturning methane emission limits at new oil and gas wells, mercury emission limits for power plants and hazardous chemical facility regulations.

But that matters not to an administration that scrubs qualified scientists from serving on advisory committees, and supports the appointment of a chemical industry insider to help shape EPA policy. One of those policies is to discard a proposed ban on the potentially harmful insecticide chlorpyrifos, produced by Dow Agrosciences, rejecting research that found the compound posed a risk to fetal brain and nervous system development. Another policy advanced to rewrite a rule that will make it harder to track the health consequences of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), a chemical linked to kidney cancer, birth defects and immune disorders.

These are but a few examples of the destructive policies being advanced by the Trump administration. Hindsight is 20/20; use it in the 2020 election. You owe it to future generations.