While reading a Wall Street Journal editorial this morning, I was reminded of the insidious manner in which Washington causes change in America. This editorial was titled "The Lawnmower Men" and dealt with the latest Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) epistle, a 588 page document. In this latest EPA document released on Friday, the EPA lays out its vision for America's future. The upshot of the document is that the EPA shows us exactly the degree of its "power grab" notions.
The document's future will rest with the next Administration and the next Congress. It could be largely emasculated or it could be given the force of law and cause massive change in our land and in our economy. It doesn't take too much 'vision' to see into the future so far as this is concerned. If we have a President Obama and a Democrat-controlled Congress, these ideas and postulations will stand a very good chance of finding their way into your life and mine...into your wallet and mine.
A Supreme Court decision in Mass. v. PA in 2007 found that greenhouse gases are "air pollutants" under current environmental law, and the EPA was ordered to regulate if it determined that carbon emissions are a public danger. This was a 5-4 decision with the liberal court members comprising the majority position. How important elections are, huh?
The EPA has now shown just how it would like this court decision to look when put into practice. It finds that cow flatulence is such a threat that herds of greater than 25 head would exceed EPA-proposed carbon limits. The same goes for farms with more than 500 acres of crops. It would regulate farm tractors and lawn and garden equipment. Fuel efficiency standards would be increased even before the current set of standards is due to be met in our automobile and truck fleet. EPA would develop regulations to standardize how airplanes can taxi on the ground. Boat design would fall under EPA regulations. Buildings, even those in existence, would be regulated by EPA.
The rules are so broad and sweeping that the EPA was quoted as saying, "We expect that the entire country would be in nonattainment."
The fact that Congress has not found it within itself to accomplish various regulations in this arena notwithstanding, the EPA believes it has the power to impose carbon fees and that it might be able to establish the "cap and trade" program that would control every aspect of our modern lives. This has to have excited those who believe the bunk fed to us by the global warming crowd as fact when there is virtually no science to support its theories. The EPA's final ruling will come in the the era of the next Administration.
What about this "Hidden Government" I mentioned earlier? The reality of all this is that there is a solid cadre of career bureaucrats in every agency in Washington. We see that in the FBI where infighting can cripple the Attorney General of the moment. We see it in the State department where the same happens to the current Secretary of State. Ditto for the Pentagon, and so on. In almost every instance, the career people have decidedly left-leaning principles and simply hunker down, and obstruct as best they're able during some administrations while waiting for the opportunities to surface during other administrations. This is where many of the 'leaks' come from that keep the Capitol Hill press and talking heads in business. These leaks are often prevented by law, but seldom do we see any punishment levied for the leakers...if we ever determine who those people are.
We have a "hidden government" and it is very powerful though virtually invisible to us 'fly-over' people who actually keep this country perking along.
