...and then you get to vote for dumb or dumber.
I don’t know, man. At this point I’m pretty much convinced that DC politicians – maybe politicians everywhere, except a few in Wisconsin – are what happens when you give a hooker the IQ of a donut (the hole part, not the dough part). In other words, they can be bought for any amount, no filter.
Might sound harsh, but maybe not harsh enough after reading this headline: “Sportsmen Condemn House Attempt to Weaken Clean Water Act.”
What?!
Some deets from a press release:
> American sportsmen Tuesday strongly criticized the House Transportation Committee for hastily passing legislation that would dramatically weaken the Clean Water Act and undercut four decades of progress in restoring the nation’s waters and wetlands and conserving valuable fish and wildlife habitat.
> The Clean Water Cooperative Federalism Act of 2011, H.R. 2018, attacks two critical components of the CWA: enforcement of water quality standards and protection of waters from discharges of dredged and fill material.
> H.R. 2018 would increase state control over Environmental Protection Agency implementation of the CWA, including veto authority over EPA enforcement of water quality standards and over EPA authority to block projects that compromise or diminish fish and wildlife habitat.
> In April, sportsmen welcomed proposed guidance issued by the administration that would more clearly define which U.S. waters are subject to Clean Water Act protections, a move that would begin restoring long-standing protections to many of the nation’s [waters] that have remained threatened in the wake of two ambiguous Supreme Court decisions…. Recent actions undertaken by House lawmakers since that time, however, attempt to weaken or undercut these restorative measures.
The contacts at the bottom of the press release are from the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (good group), Izaak Walton League of America (fishing, good), National Wildlife Federation (honestly not sure) and Trout Unlimited (fishing, good).
Obviously we’d be a lot more fired up if BASS (B.A.S.S.) was in the mix, but hopefully it won’t get that far.
Oh yeah: Here’s a list of the glad-handing donut holes on the House Transportation Committee.
4 Comments
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Jeff Ashford
June 24, 2011 at 10:26 am
I think you have it totally wrong here. ANYTHING transfering more power to THE STATES means less federal goverment intervention and that is ALWAYS a GOOD thing, not bad. The EPA is doing a great job of destroying our economy and you want them to control more of our waterways, are you kidding?
Aaron Shinkle
June 26, 2011 at 10:32 pm
Well said, Jeff. The less Federal govt intervention, the better.
admin (mostly Jay)
June 27, 2011 at 7:04 am
Looks like I omitted the phrase “federal backstop” (in case of poor state govt) from the included quotes. All this govt stuff is fine in concept but seldom works out that way imo.
Pete
June 27, 2011 at 2:49 pm
I don’t know what the hell you commenters are talking about. My home water, the Potomac River, was essentially a bassless cesspool until the Clean Water Act fixed it up. A prime example of combined legislation and regulation benefiting anglers. But for the Federal intervention, we’d still be walking across the river on a raft of trash.
I’d say it’s a law that worked in concept and in reality.