Demaskering i Washington DC

[Roald B. Larsen]

The slimy, oil greased Bush administration was in the denial business and
protecting the energy interests of themselves and those who got Bush
elected. So the world has seen 7+ years of organized, anti scientific stone
walling.

-- rL

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Ex-EPA aide tells of White House censorship
Zachary Coile, Chronicle Washington Bureau
(07-09)

Democrats have long alleged that Vice President Dick Cheney played a key
backstage role in thwarting U.S. efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions,
but they have had little evidence. Until now.

Jason Burnett, a senior official with the Environmental Protection Agency
who resigned June 9, charges that Cheney's office urged him to delete or
water down testimony to Congress by top administration officials on the
impacts of global warming.

Burnett also said the White House blocked an effort by the EPA to issue an
endangerment finding, a conclusion that climate change is a threat to the
public. Under a Supreme Court ruling last year, the finding would have
forced the administration to cut emissions.

California Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, who held a news conference with
Burnett on Tuesday, said the revelations show that the White House conspired
to muzzle its own scientists' findings on climate change to delay action on
regulations.

"We now know that this censorship was not haphazard - it was part of a
master plan," Boxer said.

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said he couldn't comment on the charges
because they concern internal deliberations. But he added there would be
nothing wrong with Cheney's office or other administration officials
offering their views.

"There's nothing unusual about that, and it's no different than in any other
administration," Fratto said.

The new revelations put a damper on the announcement by the White House that
President Bush had joined other world leaders at the Group of Eight summit
in Japan on Tuesday in a nonbinding agreement to seek a goal of cutting
carbon emissions in half by 2050.

Burnett said an official in Cheney's office - he declined to name the
person - asked him to change a sentence in testimony being prepared for EPA
Administrator Stephen Johnson, Burnett's boss, to deliver to a Senate
committee Jan. 24, 2008, that read, "greenhouse gas emissions harm the
environment." Burnett said he replied that if Cheney's office wanted to
change the language, they'd have to contact Johnson himself. The language
stayed in.

First to challenge climate policy

Burnett is the first high-level EPA official to publicly challenge the White
House's climate policy. But his background suggests he was an unusual choice
by Johnson for the inner circle at EPA.

Burnett, 31, was trained at Stanford University in environmental economics
and has taught there. Since 1999, he has given about $125,000 in campaign
contributions to Democrats, including former Vice President Al Gore in 2000
and current candidate Sen. Barack Obama, according to the Center for
Responsive Politics. Since leaving the EPA last month, he had endorsed Obama
and announced plans to return to Northern California to campaign for him.

But Burnett has not always been a favorite of environmentalists, either. In
2001, he was co-author of a paper that argued that a Clinton administration
rule tightening arsenic standards for drinking water did not justify its
costs. While at EPA's Office of Air and Radiation between 2004 and 2006, he
was involved in drafting mercury regulations that critics called weak and
that a federal appeals court struck down this year.

Burnett left the EPA for a think tank in 2006 but was invited back by
Johnson in June 2007 to serve as an associate deputy administrator to
respond to the Supreme Court's Massachusetts vs. EPA decision, which
required the agency to decide whether climate change was a threat to the
public health and welfare. He left this time, he said, after concluding,
"there wasn't more productive work to be done" on climate change.

Burnett said he spent months in meetings with EPA scientists and lawyers,
including several meetings with senior officials at the White House. He said
everyone involved understood the stakes: Making an endangerment finding
would require EPA, under the Clean Air Act, to regulate emissions.

In October, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Julie
Gerberding was scheduled to testify before the Senate Environment and Public
Works Committee. Burnett said he was asked by Cheney's office and the White
House Council on Environmental Quality to "work with CDC to remove from the
testimony any discussion of the human health consequences of climate
change." He was told deleting the sections would help keep options open for
Johnson on whether to make an endangerment finding.

Burnett refused, saying the testimony was accurate. But Office of Management
and Budget officials later deleted six of 12 pages of her testimony,
including sections suggesting climate change could lead to a rise in
infectious diseases, air pollution, food and water scarcity and extreme
weather events.

Still, Burnett said Johnson ultimately asked his staff to draft a
provisional finding that climate change could endanger human health.
Burnett said he vetted the finding with top OMB officials and sent a copy to
the White House in December. But just after he sent it, the White House
called EPA asking that the document not be sent. When Burnett said it was
already e-mailed, the White House asked him to send a follow-up saying the
document was sent in error. He refused.

Bettina Poirier, staff director and chief counsel for the Senate Environment
and Public Works Committee, said there's a reason the White House didn't
want to open the e-mail. Once opened, it would become part of the public
record. Boxer said she plans to hold a committee vote as soon as next week
to subpoena the document.

Told to retract document

Burnett said he was told to retract the document because a bill to raise
fuel efficiency standards for vehicles, which was moving through Congress at
the time, would make the endangerment finding moot. But he said that logic
was flawed.

"The energy bill did not change the science, it did not change the law,"
Burnett said, adding, "EPA still has a responsibility to respond to the
Supreme Court."

EPA spokesman Jonathan Shradar insists that Johnson is following the high
court's decision. He said the EPA chief will unveil on Friday a so-called
advance notice of proposed rule-making, which allows public comment on the
issue of endangerment. Shradar said the agency will also look at whether the
Clean Air Act is the best law to regulate carbon.

Boxer said she sees an effort to delay a decision, forcing the next
administration to deal with global warming.

"History will judge this Bush administration harshly for recklessly covering
up a real threat to the people they are supposed to protect," she said.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/07/08/MN9L11LLJI.DTL