The Rape of the World

"Mother of us all
Place of our birth
How can we stand aside
And watch the rape of the world?.."
- Tracy Chapman (lyrics from The Rape of the World)

A couple of weeks ago, I happened to stay up late and watch an episode of the PBS, Charlie Rose show. He had just begun to interview Robert Kennedy, Jr., about a book he authored titled, Crimes Against Nature : How George W. Bush and His Corporate Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy. Normally, Rose is an unashamed blabbermouth who competes with his guests in voicing his opinion which irritates me, but this night, Robert Kennedy, Jr., dominated the conversation and spoke an amazing amount of raw, undiluted truth. As Rose listened and interjected obligatory interview stuff, he was twitchy but enthralled, just like me.

I can't find a reference to this show on the Charlie Rose site, although the forum does discuss Kennedy's book, but I did find a BuzzFlash interview from 2003 that covers much of the same material. I've ordered the book and will give a little report back once I've read it.

What strikes me most about the interview with Kennedy is this assertion:

"..,All of our federal agencies have now been captured by the industries that they’re intended to regulate. The head of the Forest Service is a timber industry lobbyist. The head of our public lands is a mining industry lobbyist. The chief of staff in the White House, Andrew Card, was chief counsel to General Motors and its top lobbyists. And 22 of the top 38 White House officials all have energy industry pedigrees."

I know that Bush is systematically destroying environmental protections going back to the Nixon White House, and that he uses Orwellian terms like "Clear Skies" for legislation that creates the opposite effect. I know that the Bushites are owned by corporations which have perfected the semi-lie, better known as deceptive advertising. They are now using these same tactics to continue to keep the Bushites in the White House and some American voters are so conditioned to buy what these people sell, they actually believe the deceptions and spin. It doesn't occur to them that the Bush administration is simply one big advertising agency, selling a palatable vision of Americana, including yummy godliness, tasty security, and a healthy trickle down economy. What they are really selling is a lot of misery for the most vulnerable and defenseless of our citizens. Sad.

I need to read Kennedy's book to get the names of these officials, but I would image Christy Todd Whitman, former Director of the EPA and Secretary of the Interior, Gale Norton are probably mentioned.

I just scanned the Fedstats EPA site and see that the new/current Director is former Utah governor, Mike Leavitt, and his really new "enforcer" for EPA regs, is Deputy Administrator, Stephen L Johnson. Their bios are posted and they both seem to be career bureaucrats, except that Johnson worked for Hazelton Labs and Litton. I'd have to look up the polluting records of these companies, but I do recall that Litton had some "toxic clean up" difficulties in California some years ago.

The most interesting (i.e., don't know what to make of this) group is the Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee (CHPAC). Why this committee would include representatives from Monsanto, Bayer, Proctor and Gamble, and BP Products NA, I can't imagine. After reading some of the committee's action item reports and correspondence, it appears that they are getting lots of input, much of it from California, about pesticides and air pollutants harming children, but I didn't see much action other than info gathering and recommendations for more studies.

There was a glimmer of hope when I saw the President's Task Force on Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks to Children link. After a quick review, I found that this group was initiated in 1997 by Clinton's Executive Order 13045 to:

"a) shall make it a high priority to identify and assess environmental health risks and safety risks that may disproportionately affect children; and (b) shall ensure that its policies, programs, activities, and standards address disproportionate risks to children that result from environmental health risks or safety risks.

1-102. Each independent regulatory agency is encouraged to participate in the implementation of this order and comply with its provisions."

There's a report at the bottom of the linked page that details the accomplishments of this group. So far they've set up an asthma awareness day in schools, and are studying more things. You can really feel GWB's true commitment to America's children as he issued two of his own Executive Orders both of which eliminated the urgency to act until 2005 and the second one deprioritized the issue by making it unnecessary to have high level representation at the meetings.

Ah Ha! I now understand why the EPA has a Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee with Monsanto, et al, advising the advisors who will advise the the President's Task Force (working groups) into the year 2005. I was trying to determine if Robert Kennedy, Jr.'s "industry ties" stats in the quote by him above was bombast or observable fact. It's fact.

I seriously doubt Bush will say much about his environmental accomplishments, but he may try to "sell the sizzle" of those enticing "Clear Skies" and "Great Lakes Environmental Restoration Act" enviro buster bills. He may sell the sizzle of those snappy and deceptive titles, but it would be idiotic to delve deeper into this mess.

He will brag about the things he's doing to kids, though, and I'm going to remember this fact finding exercise. I'll also remember the assessment of The Children's Defense Fund, a co-author of "No Child Left Behind" legislation, which gave the Bush administration and most Republican representatives failing marks in supporting America's kids. Instead of doing some "hard work" on making life better for Americans by simply maintaining current environmental and child protection laws, they substitute industry friendly legislation or fail to enforce them.

The Bushites want Americans to exist on a diet of sizzle when we have the right to eat steak.