Smokescreen

The worst thing about Obama junking his plans to reverse Bush’s lowering of standards for air pollution is, of course, that people will die because of it, and he knows it. The second worse thing is that he justified it with the argument that protecting the environment and people’s lungs is an optional extra in bad economic times, that profits must always come first. But I want to point out the third worst thing, the craven sneakiness of announcing the decision in a news dump on the Friday before the Labor Day weekend. Obama’s promised transparency has turned out as transparent as the air over Houston.

Oh, and EPA head Lisa Jackson should have resigned in protest. I miss people resigning in protest over matters of principle.