We all know how important energy is in our lives, just as commercial energy is critical to free market capitalism and the pursuit of prosperity in America. Now, thanks to environmental activists and several states, that may all be at risk in the US Supreme Court.
In 2004, unhappy that the duly elected Bush administration wasn’t restricting carbon emissions in the alleged cause of global warming, environmental activism prompted several states to file a “public nuisance” lawsuit, which would empower the courts in this regard.
They lost in the lower court but that was reversed in 2007.
This case is novel, and far more aggressive and disruptive than the global warming case the Court previously permitted. In a 2007 decision, Massachusetts v. EPA, a closely divided Court agreed with 12 states and several cities that the Environmental Protection Agency has authority to regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act. Though that case dealt with a narrow claim to enforce a federal statute, the Court’s decision emboldened what had already become a cottage industry of lawsuits designed to slow global warming by asking federal courts to enact what interest groups have been unable to secure through the democratic process: carbon caps and other limits on the way energy is produced in this country.
Under the guise of “public nuisance,” the plaintiffs in these suits seek to impose enormous damages and binding emissions caps on energy companies. The plaintiffs have acknowledged that their goal is a veritable sea change in the way energy is produced, sold, and used in this country. Incredibly, they assert that these companies can make major changes to lower emissions – such as the adoption of wind and solar alternatives – “without significantly increasing the cost of electricity.” But never before has the “public nuisance” doctrine been used to set national economic and energy policy. While litigation may be therapeutic for those frustrated by political inaction, this case is at odds with this country’s legal tradition.
Meanwhile, a recently elected Republican House is taking steps to go in the other direction through budget cuts to the EPA. Environmental activism in the US is, in effect, looking to up-end the democratic process – an all too common theme across the Left – by empowering the courts to make policy in perhaps the single most critical policy area for American prosperity.
The agency will lose $1.6 billion as part of a deal between President Barack Obama and congressional leaders to produce $38 billion in spending cuts for the rest of the 2011 fiscal year, according to legislation made public today. A plan detailing where the cuts will be made is due in 30 days.
Republicans argued for a larger cut plus provisions that would bar the EPA from enforcing rules on reducing carbon dioxide from power plants and factories. The budget deal accepted by Obama will undermine efforts to reduce pollution from mountaintop coal mining and mercury emissions from power plants, said Gabe Wisniewski, coal campaign director for the environmental group Greenpeace.
Also, as if all that isn’t bad enough, the EPA recently admitted it has zero interest in worrying about job production in America – video at link. Of course, all this plays out as the economy lags, unemployment skyrockets and American jobs continue to disappear.
The EPA has admitted that they don’t even consider jobs when they do their economic analysis. No really. They don’t even think about the potential impact on unemployment. This is appalling, coming from an administration that has said over and over and over again that jobs are the top priority.
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