The Clean Water Act Comments

The Clean Water Act

Posted date: 2010-03-01

Posted By : Marc

The New York Times had an article up today on the gutting of the Clean Water Act with a couple of Supreme Court decisions in the past few years. According to the Wikipedia, the Clean Water Act covers

All waters with a "significant nexus" to "navigable waters." The Supreme Court ruled to narrow these definition drastically in two decisions, Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (SWANCC) in 2001 and Rapanos v.
United States in 2006(via our local tree-hugger alliance).

According to the New York Times:

The Clean Water Act was intended to end dangerous water pollution by regulating every major polluter. But today, regulators may be unable to prosecute as many as half of the nation’s largest known polluters because officials lack jurisdiction or because proving jurisdiction would be overwhelmingly difficult or time consuming, according to midlevel officials.

Indeed, there is a local aspect to this. From the same article:

The consequences of the Supreme Court decisions are stark. In drier states, some polluters say the act no longer applies to them and are therefore refusing to renew or apply for permits, making it impossible to monitor what they are dumping, say officials.

Cannon Air Force Base near Clovis, N.M., for instance, recently informed E.P.A. officials that it no longer considered itself subject to the act. It dumps wastewater — containing bacteria and human sewage — into a lake on the base.

Places which can least afford to lose access to untainted water can be affected most severely. It amazes me that a person claiming to defend the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, will consider dumping raw sewage into a lake acceptable on any level. I suppose that I could blame some of that on the Air Force's fairly recent policy of Insane Evangelicals in Top Positions. Why bother leaving the waters unpolluted when we're already living in End Times®?

Author: Larry Wallberg	Date: 0000-00-00
Email:	Home page
Those air force fundies ought to be worried. If Jesus decides to turn the water from Cannon's lake into wine, it'll have tons of sediment in it. On second thought, with all that bacteria in it, the water may ferment on its own, without any divine help.

Author: marc	Date: 2010-03-02
Email:	Home page
It really sucks to be a young airman. Air Force bases are usually in some Jeebus-forsaken hellhole with a nightlife that mostly involves pickling one's liver alone. Add to that the fact that the local recreational area is raw-sewage flavored...

Author:	Date (yyyy-mm-dd):
Email:	Home Page:
Comments: