November 19, 2003

From a Sierra Club press release yesterday:


Hatched three years ago in the backroom meetings of the Bush/Cheney Energy Task Force, this energy bill has been an act of secrecy from start to finish. Today, the House passed a 1000+ page bill that was just released publicly for the first time on Saturday. Democrats were given almost no time to examine the myriad disastrous provisions of the bill before having to vote on it . . .

Some of the worst provisions of the bill include:

* Making oil and gas drilling the dominant use of our public lands.
* Weakening the Clean Air Act and making it easier for polluters to dirty our air for longer.
* Exempting damaging oil and gas activities from the Clean Water and Safe Drinking Water Acts.
* Letting MTBE (a gasoline additive known to pollute drinking water) manufacturers off the hook for cleaning up their own messes, and saddling local communities with a $29 billion cleanup cost.
* Giving billions of dollars to the polluting coal and nuclear industries instead of focusing more resources on cleaner renewable energy like wind and solar power.

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- - AARP Sells Out - -

William Novelli, the current CEO of AARP, has just alienated most of his membership by endorsing the Republican-crafted Medicare bill. The AARP Message Board is about to catch fire; Democrats are flabbergasted. The skinny is that this guy is a friend of Newt Gingrich and AARP is these days mostly interested in selling its products. This AARP move is to seniors what the draft is to the young folks. The agenda seems to be pretty clear:


It's no coincidence that one of the rising right wing nut stars, Senator Lindsay Graham, on Tuesday announced a senate bill to start privatizing Social Security. [LINK]

The Medicare bill is just the first step in the Grover Norquist/Bush Cartel plan to dismantle Medicare and Social Security.


Be at peace.