By Peter Dykstra<\/p>\n
There’s a case to be made that the Trump Administration’s rollback of environmental regulation won’t be devastating; that market forces will prevail in the coming energy revolution; that the environment and public health will continue to be protected under the EPA and other agencies, and that state governments will do their part as well; and that a newly-elected President, self-branded as an astute businessman and dealmaker, will be open to the wisdom of ensuring a safe and healthy America.<\/p>\n
But there are two fatal flaws with this argument: 1) You weren’t born yesterday; and 2) You don’t come to this page to be lied to.<\/p>\n
The Trump Administration\u2019s cabinet nominees and transition staff are a wall-to-wall collection of zealots, ideologues and latter-day Robber Barons. Their collective message, both stated and implied, is that the American government\u2019s ability to protect the environment, already besieged and underfunded, is on the brink of oblivion.<\/p>\n
\u201cAn open mind\u201d<\/p>\n
In early December, the cavalcade of aspirants and celebrities seeking an audience at Trump Tower included two high profile climate activists, former Vice President Al Gore and actor Leonardo DiCaprio. Gore\u2019s visit was brokered by the First Daughter-Elect, Ivanka Trump.<\/p>\n
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Upon exiting, Gore told the press gaggle that meeting with the Trumps was \u201cextremely interesting.\u201d Combined with Trump\u2019s declaration to the New York Times that he had an \u201copen mind\u201d about climate change, the wilted spirits of environmentalists were revived. Kudos to Gore and DiCaprio for making their case, but now, let\u2019s return to climate reality.<\/p>\n
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EPA:A day after Gore\u2019s meeting, Trump announced the nomination of Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. In his six years on the job in Oklahoma, Pruitt has enjoyed the support of keystone local industries, including fossil fuel and poultry.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s not let them down, helping to lead a battle\u2014against the agency he\u2019ll be in charge of if approved\u2014on the Clean Power Plan, the Waters of the United States definition (WOTUS). WOTUS and the Clean Water Act hold a particular irony, since the anticipated assaults on Section 404 of the Clean Water Act could make it easier to drain real, not metaphoric, swamps from coast to coast.<\/p>\n
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State:Next was ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, who vaulted past the likes of Rudy Guiliani and Gen. David Petraeus for the Secretary of State nomination. Months away from Exxon\u2019s mandatory 65 year-old retirement age, Tillerson was a man in search of a hobby. Tillerson has acknowledged that human-caused climate change is real, and has endorsed both a carbon tax and the Paris climate agreement. He\u2019s an Exxon lifer, with 41 years in the employ of a corporation that\u2019s buried its own science affirming climate change, and that still funds climate denial groups. But don\u2019t think he\u2019s inexperienced in government or foreign policy. Steve Coll\u2019s must-read 2012 book \u201cPrivate Empire\u201d makes the compelling case that Exxon functions as a sovereign petro-state, leveraging diplomatic pressure in virtually every corner of the Earth.<\/p>\n
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All told, the CEO of Exxon looks to be the most progressive voice on climate change in the Trump Administration. The CEO of Exxon. As Elizabeth Kolbert, the Pulitzer-winning New Yorker writer observed, \u201cYou have to be pretty desperate \u2013 and at this point many people are \u2013 to take this as cause for optimism.\u201d<\/p>\n
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DOE:Editorial cartoonists and late-night comics love Rick Perry, who, as its potential boss, probably now remembers that Department of Energy was one of those agencies he\u2019d like to abolish.<\/p>\n
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The former Texas governor is actually a big fan of wind power, which he watched become a booming industry in his state. \u201cYou can be proud that Texas produces more energy from wind turbines than all but five countries,\u201d he boasted upon leaving office in 2015.<\/p>\n
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He ruled over a bonanza in Texas fracking as well, and last year joined the Board of Directors of Energy Transfer Partners, the builders of the Dakota Access Pipeline.<\/p>\n
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Perry has also said that climate science is a conspiracy to keep climate scientists as wealthy as we all know that they are. While DOE has been home to groundbreaking clean energy research, the bulk of the department\u2019s mission and budget goes to maintaining the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, and cleaning up the immense messes left by their manufacture.<\/p>\n
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Since leaving the Texas State House, Perry has kept himself busy with an unsuccessful appearance on \u201cDancing With the Stars,\u201d and by turning back a criminal indictment for abuse of power as Governor. Step lightly, Guv.<\/p>\n
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Interior: Ryan Zinke is a first-term Montana congressman who accepts that climate change is real. In the past, he\u2019s called climate change a \u201cthreat multiplier,\u201d but that Obama\u2019s climate strategies would unleash \u201ccatastrophic\u201d economic costs.<\/p>\n
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He earned a 3 percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters in 2015. Unlike many on the Trump team, he\u2019s voiced opposition for turning federal lands over to states.<\/p>\n
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An avid hunter, Zinke says he\u2019d like to see more intensive use of federal lands by both sportsmen and oil and gas drillers, and is expected to favor opening controversial export terminals to ship Montana and Wyoming coal across the Pacific. He does have credentials as a \u201chook and bullet\u201d conservationist, including support for the crucial Land and Water Conservation Fund. That\u2019s earned him opposition from western anti-environment groups like the American Land Rights Association.<\/p>\n
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Justice: If approved, Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions would serve as Attorney General. He\u2019s said that efforts to bring clean energy to developing nations would be a veritable assault on the world\u2019s poorest people.<\/p>\n
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He believes CO2 is a benign \u201cplant food,\u201d and famously launched a bizarre interrogation of EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy earlier this year.<\/p>\n
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The Undercard<\/p>\n
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Enough about the energy\/environment bosses. The secondary players may be considerably worse. Many of these items are taken from first-rate reporting by Lyndsey Gilpin of High Country News, and research by Jenny Rowland and Erin Auel at the Center for American Progress. The CAP researchers documented that nearly every key member of the transition teams for EPA, Interior, and DOE worked for Koch-funded organizations or office-holders.<\/p>\n
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Energy: Thomas Pyle, a former lobbyist for both Koch Industries and the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association, leads the transition team. He currently runs the Koch- and Exxon-funded Institute for Energy Research, a think tank that\u2019s espoused a loosening of energy regulations and climate denial while denouncing wind energy.<\/p>\n
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A special moment came on December 14, when Energy transition team member Anthony Scaramucci appeared on CNN.<\/p>\n
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Anthony Scaramucci, a financial CEO and Fox Business News contributor, mixed it up with CNN anchor Chris Cuomo in mid-December. Cuomo repeatedly asked his guest about whether climate change is real. Citing Flat Earth Theory, Scaramucci took a deep dive into the manufacture of doubt.<\/p>\n
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Funny thing: Scaramucci was asked the same question six months ago and declared climate science to be \u201cirrefutable.\u201d\u00a0 For good measure, and possibly with his new boss in mind, he added back in June, \u201cI find it tragic that so many people in this country believe global warming is some sort of elaborate hoax perpetuated by every credible scientist on the planet.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Other Energy Department transition officials include two more former Koch Industries lobbyists, Mike McKenna and Mike Catanzaro. Catanzaro also served a stint as Communications Director for uber-denier Sen. James Inhofe. Team member William Greene is Deputy Legislative Director for the Safari Club International, which has lobbied for trophy-hunting exemptions from the Endangered Species Act.<\/p>\n
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Transitioner Daniel Simmons comes from two Koch-funded groups, IER and ALEC.<\/p>\n
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Somewhere on this DOE team, an unidentified someone has been \u201ccounseled.\u201d Those were the announced consequences for distributing a questionnaire to DOE employees that, among other things, sought to identify anyone at the agency who had participated in climate-related meetings.<\/p>\n
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After an uproar, and a refusal by current DOE staff to comply, the Trump team disowned the questionnaire and its McCarthy Era overtones (In fairness to Senator Joe McCarthy, he was nowhere near as forgiving with the Russians).<\/p>\n
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NASA Transition head Chris Shank is the #2 staffer to House Science Committee Chair Lamar Smith, and is expected to steer the agency away from its vital Earth science and climate change research.<\/p>\n
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Commerce: The Commerce Department\u2019s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is NASA\u2019s government counterpart in climate research. Commerce Secretary nominee Wilbur Ross has made billions on rescuing and leveraging distressed companies, including coal, oil and gas firms. He\u2019s acknowledged that climate change is a thing, offering suggestions to boost rail traffic and invest in ethanol as climate fixes.<\/p>\n
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Ross\u2019s International Coal Group owned the Sago Mine in West Virginia. In January 2006, 13 miners were trapped in an explosion at the mine. Only one was rescued. In 2011, Ross sold ICG to Arch Coal for a reported $3.4 billion.<\/p>\n
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There\u2019s little indication that NOAA\u2019s climate science is nearly as much in the crosshairs as NASA\u2019s. But, as one former Commerce official told me, \u201cmaybe they just haven\u2019t gotten to it yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
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EPA: Myron Ebell is a veteran political operative guiding EPA\u2019s transition team. Ebell dodges the \u201cdenier\u201d label via a few old climate-denial standards: In the past, he\u2019s either said that climate change is \u201cnothing to worry about,\u201d or that it will be awesome when fewer people die from the cold in a warming world.<\/p>\n
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When hackers stole thousands of emails from climate scientists in 2009, Ebell described the climate science community as a \u201cgang\u201d that was \u201cwithout honor.\u201d Multiple investigations cleared the scientists of any wrongdoing.<\/p>\n
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Also on the team are attorneys David Schnare and Chris Horner of the American Tradition Institute. Schnare and Horner have specialized in filing lawsuits and sweeping Freedom of Information Act requests against prominent climate scientists. Bankruptcy filings by coal companies have revealed their funding for Schnare\u2019s and Horner\u2019s work.<\/p>\n
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National Security Team:K.T. McFarland, another Fox contributor, would become Deputy National Security Advisor. She\u2019s denounced the Obama Administration for citing climate change as a global security issue.<\/p>\n
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Monica Crowley, still another appointee drained from Fox News, will handle the press for National Security Advisor Mike Flynn. She recently called global warming \u201ca way of separating Americans and Westerners from God and organized religion, and it\u2019s also a wealth redistribution scheme.\u201d<\/p>\n
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CIA: Wichita-based Congressman Mike Pompeo counts on David and Charles Koch as his constituents. He\u2019s been a business partner with Koch Industries through an oil supply firm, and has said that President Obama is \u201chorribly wrong\u201d about climate change posing a global security risk.<\/p>\n
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Interior: Doug Domenech is a former Virginia state official who blames the \u201cregulatory war on coal\u201d for tough times in Appalachia, and says that the miracle mineral can relieve energy poverty. But coal jobs have been on a steady swan dive since the Reagan Administration due to mechanization.<\/p>\n
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Other Interior transition staffers include attorney Daniel Jorjani, who works for the Koch\u2019s Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce. Authors Alyssa Katz describes this effort as having bankrolled anti-regulatory campaigns by the U.S. Chamber and others with $255 million in 2012 alone.<\/p>\n
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Congressional staffer Harlan Watson served as chief climate negotiator under President George W. Bush. A leaked memo from ExxonMobil, written shortly after Bush\u2019s inauguration, sang Watson\u2019s praises and recommended him for a role in climate policy.<\/p>\n
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And a few more: As Transportation Secretary-designate, Elaine Chao would lead on major infrastructure projects, including the Obama Administration\u2019s plans to ramp up electric vehicle charging stations nationwide. Chao resigned her seat on the Bloomberg Philanthropies Board in 2015 when the charity decided to increase its support of the Sierra Club\u2019s \u201cBeyond Coal\u201d campaign. She is married to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell \u2013 a helpful reminder that sometimes, guilt by association means that you\u2019re guilty.<\/p>\n
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Linda McMahon, nominee for the Small Business Administration, has cited \u201cconflicting science on both sides of this issue.\u201d The former World Wrestling Entertainment executive didn\u2019t go so far as to declare climate science is fake and has a predetermined outcome.<\/p>\n
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Senior Counselor Steve Bannon\u2019s Breitbart News site regularly touts climate denial. Bannon accused the Pope of \u201chysteria\u201d for embracing climate action. Domestic transition head Ken Blackwell believes that climate models are rigged, and the science is a \u201choax.\u201d HUD nominee Ben Carson has said there\u2019s \u201cno overwhelming science\u201d on climate change. Chief of Staff Reince Preibus said \u201cmelting icebergs aren\u2019t beheading Christians in the Middle East.\u201d UN Ambassador nominee Nikki Haley fought the Clean Power Plan as South Carolina Governor, even as her state endured lethal, record-smashing downpours. And Vice President-Elect Mike Pence has at times said climate change is real, but that government policy can\u2019t impact it. But he\u2019s also called it a \u201cmyth.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Game. Set. Match.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Peter Dykstra There’s a case to be made that the Trump Administration’s rollback of environmental regulation won’t be devastating; that market forces will prevail in the coming energy revolution; that the environment and public health will continue to be protected under the EPA and other agencies, and that state governments will do their part …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":149,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5285],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6944"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/149"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6944\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}