Carl Pope
How fast Donald Trump has abandoned his own promises. From “Make America Great Again” we have fallen to “Everything involves trade-offs.” Whatever pollution and climate disasters may devastate American communities, however many Americans die of cancer, or however vicious the fires, floods, storms and droughts that sweep through our neighborhoods – and regardless of the law – Trump has declared that this carnage should be expected as “A side effect of building the modern world!”
Fifty years ago, in passing the Clean Air Act, Congress rejected that vision of deadly air, water and community environments as a somehow “necessary” side effect of prosperity. The nation promised Americans, and wrote into legislation, a commitment to air that was safe to breathe, water pure enough to drink, and to keep toxic chemicals out of daily life.
But It’s Illegal!
Trump’s biggest challenge is that those 1970’s legislative acts were and remain legally binding promises. Over the last 50 years citizens groups, local government, health experts and responsible businesses have struggled with only 50% success to eliminate murder by breathing for all Americans. That’s right: after 50 years only half of Americans can take a deep breath, turn on the tap and drink the water, and go lie outside to eat a picnic in the park without risk ing their health or shortening their lives doing one or the other. But we have accomplished half of the job.
The law still guarantees every American air, water food and community safety. But Trump’s latest policy response is to assert that he is above the law. He instructed his EPA to simply ignore safety standards. They are to allow irresponsible energy companies and other businesses to poison the air, pollute the water and disrupt the climate even if the law instructs them to avoid such dangerous behavior.
Trump seems to have chosen the Clean Air Act as his test bed for the premise that Congress (and the Courts) are powerless to make such policy decisions because he, as President, can refuse to fund or enforce them. He says the millions of Americans who have died over the decades from air, water and community pollution are merely “A side effect of building the modern world!” He says tens of thousands more such deaths are justified by his belief that “everything in life involves trade-offs.” Massive data Trump is striving to conceal and suppress shows that these lost lives were not necessary, but the side effect of the reckless behavior by irresponsible and inadequately regulated companies. The net impact was impoverishment, not progress, fewer jobs not more – a trend Trumps orders will exacerbate.
What It Means To Have A King
A paraphrase of Trump’s last two months of careening is simple Your democratic government has failed to protect you. I as your King will make such failure certain. You are not worth protecting if this gets in the way of important people – my friends. You lives are merely “a side effect.” This concern about a few people dying from pollution or climate change is wimpy – true, but unimportant. It must not impair the profits of my business buddies, courtiers and donors, and certainly not my own profits.
The Concealed Death Toll Behind the Rhetofic of “Deregulation”
The fact that Trump’s decisions, if allowed, will kill at least tens of thousands of people – “a side effect of building the modern world” – is unfortunately largely absent from news coverage that smothers every real consequence behind the DC language of “deregulation” – unstated synonym for government sanctioned murder. The Verge, the Guardian, Eco-Watch, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg are among the outlets which managed to cover Trump’s mass murder without focusing on the actual death toll of the lethal toxic releases and climate disruption that Trump seeks to unleash. These figures are available and verified. It’s time to put them in the spotlight. The destruction of America communities cannot be allowed to be dismissed as a “side effect” of modernity – fifty years ago we decided that modernity meant safety, not recklessness, innovation not insider capitalism.
But it’s equally dangerous to look at Trump’s behavior and miss the biggest stakes of all: assertions that the promises made to the American people in the Earth Day era, promises locked into law and still law – can just be ignored by a President. Trump seeks to dismantle the core of modern Congressional power. Since the 1930’s Congress has mattered because it could manage the national economy through its power of the purse. But if the affirmative use of Congressional appropriations can be choked off by the White House, there is no effective power of the purse – if the national economy can only be effected by the White House, and the Congress is reduced to the role limiting federal expenditures, then we have a dictatorship or monarchy.
That outcome – a Royal Presidency – was what the founders feared. It our duty today to prevent Donald Trump from behaving like a King. Particularly since he has shown he would be a King who doesn’t believe our lives matter a twit. You and I are mere “side effects in building the modern world.”
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“To learn more about Carl’s views on the environment, energy and climate, read “Climate of Hope” which he has co-authored with former NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg and which can be purchased online or from your local book store.
A veteran leader in the environmental movement, Carl Pope is the former executive director and chairman of the Sierra Club. He’s now the principal advisor at Inside Straight Strategies, looking for the underlying economics that link sustainability and economic development and serves as a Senior Climate Advisor to former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg. He has served on the Boards of the California League of Conservation Voters, Public Voice, National Clean Air Coalition, California Common Cause, Public Interest Economics Inc, and Zero Population Growth.
Mr. Pope is also the author of the books: Sahib, An American Misadventure in India and Hazardous Waste In America. Carl Pope is the co-author with Michael Bloomberg of Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet. How to attack climate change as a series of manageable challenges, each with a solution that can make our society healthier and our economy stronger.
* This article was originally published here
