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SAN FRANCISCO -- Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman (D-CT) today decried President Bush's "regressive" environmental agenda, and announced he would hold oversight hearings next month to examine the Administration's growing record of anti-environmental policies and actions.
Speaking to the California League of Conservation Voters, Lieberman said Bush's backwards approach has too often promoted the interests and industries that "profit from business as usual," and demanded a vigorous response before more damage is done to public lands and public health.
"While President Bush has provided strong leadership in the war against terrorism, he's been AWOL in the war against environmental pollution," Lieberman said. "He is standing by as dangers gather. We in Congress and you, the citizens, cannot and will not do the same."
Lieberman, who chairs the Environment and Public Works Clean Air and Climate Change Subcommittee, said it was particularly important for Americans to engage in this debate now, pointing to the global warming proposals the Administration just released and the upcoming Senate debate on energy policy next week.
"We are standing at an environmental crossroads. President Bush's feeble formula to address air pollution and global warming points in one direction. We must lead in another. Next week, the Senate will discuss two distinctly different visions for our nation's energy policy-one that's mired in crude oil and one that aspires to a better way. Not only is our energy independence at stake in this debate, but some of our most precious pieces of public land are at risk."
Part of that response, Lieberman said, should be to shine a light on some of the more subtle ways the Administration is working to weaken or roll back critical safeguards to benefit special interests. That will be a particular focus of hearings that Lieberman said he will begin in March in the Governmental Affairs Committee.
"This is not just about arsenic and air conditioners," Lieberman added. "Alongside the regulatory rollbacks in the headlines, there's been a quieter but equally damaging effort to undermine environmental protections through settlement agreements, funding reductions, and other administrative tricks, tactics, and tools."
Lieberman also said environmental advocates must work together to block the President's plans to despoil the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other precious and irreplaceable places like the California coastline by allowing more oil exploration. "It's time to draw a line in the surf," Lieberman said of the California coast. "We won't sit back and watch this beautiful coastline become just another place to drop oil rigs."
But Lieberman argued that it is not enough just to stop destructive policies, and that the real solution is to articulate and advance a new environmental ethic - one that will harness innovative strategies and technologies to meet the complex challenges of our time while honoring America's enduring values.
He outlined his vision of such a new proactive and progressive approach, built on four key principles - anticipating where the nation needs to act, understanding the interrelation of environmental threats, using new technologies to diagnose and solve problems more quickly and cost-effectively, and encouraging greater public-private collaboration.
As an example of this new approach, Lieberman highlighted the cap-and-trade initiative he is developing with Senator John McCain (R-AZ) to combat global warming. This market-driven system would set hard national targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, grant permits based on these goals to different companies, and then allow companies that exceed their targets to sell their credits to companies that are overproducing - thereby fostering flexibility and incentivizing ingenuity.
"As we begin a new century, many environmental problems remain serious and are growing: addressing climate change, cleaning our air, producing more energy in a way that does less damage to our environment, protecting America's beautiful open spaces and healthy ecosystems, and defending biological diversity in America and in other threatened islands of diversity around the planet," Lieberman said.
"These are formidable challenges-but we Americans are up to them. Our conservation values are right. Our innovation economy is the most creative. Our scientists are the best. Our experience as environmentalists is broad and encouraging. And our people-across all geographic and demographic divides-are eager to find creative solutions to our environmental problems.
"If government has the values and the vision to lead, I have no doubt we will succeed in protecting the blessings of nature God has given us, and in the process also safeguarding our health and safety."
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