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The EPA and Politics

By cortex on December 8, 2006.

When will they learn?

The Environmental Protection Agency has changed the way it sets standards to control dangerous air pollutants like lead, ozone and tiny particles of soot, enhancing the role of the agency's political appointees in scientific assessments and postponing the required review by independent scientific experts.

The change, which largely tracks the suggestions of the American Petroleum Institute but also adopts some recommendations of the agency's independent scientific advisers, was announced yesterday afternoon by the agency's deputy administrator, Marcus Peacock. Mr. Peacock said it would streamline a cumbersome process and bring it "into the 21st century."

That's just what I want: partisan hacks for the energy industry determining what levels of pollutants I will inhale.

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I think they have learned.

I think they've learned that when they try to pull this kind of thing, it works and nobody can stop them.