Bush

By
Max J. Castro                                                                    Read Spanish Version
majcastro@gmail.com

Not
content with leaving his successor and future generations extremely
heavy burdens — two ruinous, endless wars, a global financial
crisis, a deep recession that threatens to become a depression, a
gigantic budget deficit, a battered international reputation, and
record economic inequality — George W. Bush is using his last weeks
in office to put an exclamation point on eight years of war against
the interests of the vast majority of the people of this nation and
the world.

Like
a runner on the twenty-sixth mile of a marathon, the Bush
administration is racing the clock in a desperate effort to
outflank
Obama
and the Democratic Congress in order to lock-in even more
corporate-friendly giveaways and partisan cronyism at the expense of
workers, the environment, and good governance.

On
November 30, The
New York Times reported
that Bush’s “Labor Department is racing to complete a new rule,
strenuously opposed by President-elect Barack Obama, that would make
it harder for the government to regulate toxic substances and
hazardous chemicals to which workers are exposed on the job.”

In
all, the paper reports Bush administration is planning to issue
“about 20 highly contentious rules…in its final days” as part
of an effort “to cement in place a diverse array of new
regulations…” dealing “…with issues as diverse as abortion,
auto safety, and the environment.”

The
new Labor Department rule
(http://UCHwww.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/30/AR2008113001900.html) stands
out as one of the more noxious measures of the lot. Its intent is to
make protecting workers lives as difficult as possible. It is not
enough that during eight long years of misrule, the Bush
administration has eviscerated the Occupational Safety and Health
Administration. Now Bush wants to add an additional step “to the
lengthy process of developing standards to protect workers’
health.” The budget for occupational safety and health enforcement
has been reduced by 8 percent during the Bush administration
while the number of workplace inspections fell by two thirds between
1980 and 2005.

But
it is the health of the planet as a whole and not just that of
American workers that the administration is working hard to harm in
its waning days. It is not enough that the administration has spent
eight years blocking Kyoto and all other effective means of limiting
carbon emissions — infuriating most of the world in the process.
Now, as a an article in the November 26 edition of The
Washington Post makes
clear, the White House is prodding allies to oppose limits on
greenhouse gases.

Ironically,
the Bush administration is trying to torpedo a proposed rule spelling
out how government could curtail emission of greenhouse gases — a
rule the government’s own Environmental Protection Agency was
forced to develop as a result of a 2007 Supreme Court Decision
ordering the agency to issue a ruling on greenhouse gases. Now, the
White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs is urging mayors to
lobby against the rule. In an e-mail to mayors across the country,
Jeremy J. Broggy, associate director of the office, urged mayors to
comment on the proposed ruling, reminding them that “many of you
contacted us to let us know how harmful this rule would be to the
economies of the cities and counties you serve.” In response, S.
William Becker, executive director of the National Association of
Clean Air Agencies said that “it appears that there is no bottom to
the administration’s pit of disdain for regulating greenhouse
gases.”

One
of the hallmarks of the Bush administration has been the appointment
of incompetent but ideologically pure and fanatically partisan
officials. Now the administration is working overtime to confer
career civil service status to those political appointments, a
practice known as “burrowing.” It is one more parting gift
conferred on the American people courtesy of George W. Bush.

Barack
Obama won the presidency riding a wave of enthusiasm for him as a
political leader and a spasm of revulsion against eight years of
George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and their ilk. It took tremendous energy
to elect Obama. It will take even more to undo Bush’s dastardly
legacy.