Bush's Second-Term Stamp On Environment - CSM

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ASHLAND, ORE. – With the newly reelected Bush administration backed up by a tighter GOP grip on Congress, the coming political season could become a watershed mark for environmental protection and energy policy. As a result, federal laws and regulations dealing with everything from endangered species and forest protection to air and water pollution to oil and gas drilling, are likely to see a rigorous shaking out.

The administration is eager to achieve things denied it during President Bush's first term: pumping oil out of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), allowing loggers access to millions of acres of roadless national forest land, easing Clean Air Act restrictions on some pollutants, making it easier to extract oil and gas in the Rocky Mountains, and passing an energy bill put together by Vice President Dick Cheney with help from the energy industry.

The election dust had barely settled before activity on environmental issues began. Monday was the deadline for public comment on the administration's rollback of protections for national forest roadless areas ordered by former President Bill Clinton. Tuesday, Sen. John McCain (R) of Arizona held Commerce Committee hearings on climate change. Wednesday brought hearings in the House on mercury pollution. The resignations this week of Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman, who oversees forest policy, only served to stir the political pot. Confirmation hearings for their predecessors are sure to include pointed questions about administration goals."

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Mr. Bush may have won a majority of the popular vote and most states in the Electoral College, but that does not mean that voters in "red" states rejected environmental protection. Montana voters said "no" to a kind of gold mining that uses cyanide. Coloradans approved a measure requiring major public utilities to get larger portions of their electricity from renewable sources. "When citizens had the chance to vote directly on protecting natural areas ... and other environment matters, sizable majorities voted in favor of them," says Ben Beach, a spokesman for the Wilderness Society. Still, activists can read election returns as well as anybody, and, like Democrats, they're rethinking their priorities and their image. In a conference call with reporters this week, National Wildlife Federation president Larry Schweiger stressed the interests of "hunters and anglers" in environmental protection. In a nod to the "values" dimension of the recent election, organizers of the call included Episcopal Bishop William Gregg of eastern Oregon as one of the speakers urging continued protection of roadless areas in national forests."

EDIT

That headline writer knew exactly what s/he was doing.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1118/p02s01-uspo.html