I am disturbed

I am disturbed

by this article. So far, evangelicals have been fairly quiet on environmental legistlation. Now, apparently, there's a growing move to get more involved -- to pressure the White House and Congressional Republicans into enacting environmental legislation and treaties (like Kyoto). Some have even latched onto the "What Would Jesus Drive" movement (my answer: A touring van; the man had an entourage).

They need to stop. Stop now. The Republican Party is the only party that has any sort of sense about environmental legislation right now. Do you know why we haven't signed Kyoto? Because it's meaningless pablum. It, at best, would slow temperature rise by an almost imperceptible amount, but cost hundreds of billions of dollars. Is there any reputable economist (I don't count Paul Krugman) who believes that Kyoto won't cripple the U.S. economy?

Clean air and water are the result of prosperity. Anywhere man goes, his activity creates some form of pollution. If we were back in pre-industrial days, we'd still have pollution from farming, from artisanry, from natural production of human waste, from the use of horses to get around, etc.

It's the advent of technology -- sewer systems, automobiles -- that led to a precipitous decline in all kinds of communicable diseases and environmental problems. When's the last time you heard of an American getting dysentery or cholera? (Sewer systems, one can see why they'd lead to a decline in disease, but cars? Simple: Cars replaced horses. Horses had a tendency to leave all kinds of waste products all over the place. Once cars came on the scene, a source of disease was removed. People tend to forget that.)

The air and water in the U.S. is getting progressively cleaner. More legislation may actually hamper this process. Witness, for example, what's happening with some older air-pollution producing plants. New technology exists that would allow these plants to seriously curtail their pollution. However, installing the new technology would require recertification of the facility, which would cost millions and place the facility under all kinds of new, far more stringent and costly regulations. It's more cost effective for the facility to be run inefficiently. This needs to change.