Last Wednesday, the Obama administration issued new rules defining the EPA’s jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act. These rules are supposedly aimed at protecting the nation’s drinking water. But, this isn’t really about drinking water. This is a classic case of federal over-reach.
The EPA’s definitions are a bureaucratic attempt at justifying federal intrusion into issues that belong to local and regional jurisdictional bodies.The complexity of the rules and minutiae associated with their definitions is supposed to be proof of their objectivity.
The story being spun by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is that “They really do care and their actions only highlight the depth of their concern.”
In support of the EPA’s designs, the Army Corps of Engineers (another Federal Agency specializing in “carefully orchestrated over-reach”) has issued documentation supporting the EPA’s schemes.
The Corps stated that the changes mark a “historic step for the protection of clean water” and would help roughly 117 million Americans who get drinking water from streams not clearly protected before these regulations.
Are you and I really going to fall for this fake emergency? Does the federal government really think a full 33% of America’s entire population is drinking water that is unsafe? Is there any “real” danger here? Or, is this only another boogie man pulled from the statist’s closet?
Supposedly, the rule would clarify which smaller streams, tributaries and wetlands are covered by EPA’s anti-pollution and development provisions in the Clean Water Act.
Notice, the phrase “anti-pollution and development”. This is the key to the whole equation. The EPA is operating under a false understanding of stewardship. Their stewardship model links development directly with pollution and claims that the world would be better off with lower human populations and lower levels of human prosperity.
The EPA’s decree would unilaterally expand federal authority over all areas of water, whether for consumption or not. This would crush jobs in developing cities and metropolitan areas as they would be saddled with an onslaught of regulations, rules, paperwork, permits and filings. Additionally, these same issues would lead to losses in agricultural development and food production.
More than 30 governors and government leaders rejected the EPA’s water rule. Local leaders know better than any bureaucrats walking the marbled halls of Washington about local water conditions, uses, and needs.
North Dakota Republican Rep. Kevin Cramer said in a statement these regulations “trample on the rights of private property owners as well as local and state governments” and vowed to work with colleagues to overturn it.
EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, tried to deny the charges of tyrannical over-reach by stating “the rule will only affect waters that have a ‘direct and significant’ connection to larger bodies of water downstream that are already protected.”
Yet, contrary to McCarthy’s statements, the EPA has said 60 percent of the nation’s streams and waterways are vulnerable, and these regulations would only kick in, “if a business or landowner takes steps to pollute or destroy those waters.”
Now, that sounds like something that is at the top of every business person’s “To-Do List”, doesn’t it?
The collectivists, socialists and statists have gone crazy in Washington and they are mounting efforts to destroy the very Freedom that made America great.
Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., also disagreed with McCarthy’s innocent assessment of the EPA’s new rules. Inhofe said the rules make it “more important than ever for Congress to act.” He said the final rule allows the EPA to regulate isolated waters — even ponds in farmers’ fields — by declaring them a “regional water treasure.”
Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said his panel will try to force legislation which would require the EPA to withdraw and rewrite the rules this summer.
We need more conservative values in Congress. True representation should includes the voices of those who believe in Freedom and Liberty.
My recommendation is to Stand Firm Against the EPA’s Tyrannical Designs.
Stand Firm against any, and all, federal intrusions. Whether the EPA, TSA, IRS, USFS, FWS, BLM, NSA, DHS, BOR, NPS, USDT, DHHS, NLRB or any of the other more than 3500 federal organizations that are usurping authorities that rightfully belong to our state, and ourselves.
Remember, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”, Article Ten, United States Constitution
Tea Party Patriot and Republican groups are organizing and sponsoring “Petunia Pig Visits.” Petunia (the giant pig) is the one doing the visiting. She recently stopped into the Josephine County Commissioner’s offices and she may be coming to Klamath County, too.
The most insidious part of Oregon’s SB 941 is that it is designed to solve a problem that doesn’t exist. Illegal or criminal gun transfers and/or purchases are not happening amongst law-abiding citizens. This is disingenuous and farcical at best and down right evil at its worst.
I am telling you now that disastrous unintended consequences will happen if Congress passes new laws banning presently legal firearms. To make it very easy to remember, and in the spirit of our beloved Department of Homeland Security’s old color-coded security threat levels, let me spell out three lines of demarcation.
onto history’s next boxcars. If boxcars and detention camps are to be in America’s future, then you, Mr. Security Agent, will have to disarm them the hard way first. Not Piers Morgan, not Michael Moore, not Rosie O’Donnell, not Dianne Feinstein, not Chuck Schumer.