Sadly, Earth Day has shifted from caring about real environmental issues…clean air, clean land, clean waters…to the idiocy of “climate change”. Cult of Climastrology member John Kerry (who owns multiple fossil fueled vehicles, several McMansions, and takes lots of fossil fueled flights) links the two in an opinion piece at USA Today. But, not all are happy campers in following the CoC
(MRC) “We’ll observe Earth Day when the EPA observes the law,†the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB), which represents 350,000 small and independent business owners, said today. “The President could do something meaningful tomorrow by sending the Waters Rule back to the EPA to be analyzed for its impact on small businesses,†said NFIB Senior Manager of Regulatory Policy Dan Bosch.
The EPA recently submitted to the White House its final rule expanding the Clean Water Act, adopted by Congress three decades ago to protect navigable waterways like rivers and bays. Under the rule, the agency could have jurisdiction over virtually any water no matter how local, including backyard streams, farmers’ ponds and even creek beds and depressions that are only wet for a few days a year.
Regulatory agencies are supposed to assess how new rules will affect small businesses. In this case, however, the EPA bypassed that step, arguing that the new rule is merely a definitional change and does not, therefore, require a small business impact study.
The EPA rules, like so many other Big Government rules, are designed to give the Central Government, and, in this case the EPA, more and more Power over the lives of Americans and private entities, regardless of any negative impacts.
