Drilling, Disaster, Denial
By PAUL KRUGMAN
NY Times Op-Ed: May 2, 2010
It took futuristic technology to achieve one of the worst ecological
disasters on record. Without such technology, after all, BP couldn't have
drilled the Deepwater Horizon well in the first place. Yet for those who
remember their environmental history, the catastrophe in the gulf has a
strangely old-fashioned feel, reminiscent of the events that led to the
first Earth Day, four decades ago.
And maybe, just maybe, the disaster will help reverse environmentalism's
long political slide - a slide largely caused by our very success in
alleviating highly visible pollution. If so, there may be a small silver
lining to a very dark cloud.
Environmentalism began as a response to pollution that everyone could see.
The spill in the gulf recalls the 1969 blowout that coated the beaches of
Santa Barbara in oil. But 1969 was also the year the Cuyahoga River, which
flows through Cleveland, caught fire. Meanwhile, Lake Erie was widely
declared "dead," its waters contaminated by algal blooms. And major U.S.
cities - especially, but by no means only, Los Angeles - were often cloaked
in thick, acrid smog.
It wasn't that hard, under the circumstances, to mobilize political support
for action. The Environmental Protection Agency was founded, the Clean Water
Act was enacted, and America began making headway against its most visible
environmental problems. Air quality improved: smog alerts in Los Angeles,
which used to have more than 100 a year, have become rare. Rivers stopped
burning, and some became swimmable again. And Lake Erie has come back to
life, in part thanks to a ban on laundry detergents containing phosphates.
Yet there was a downside to this success story.
For one thing, as visible pollution has diminished, so has public concern
over environmental issues. According to a recent Gallup survey, "Americans
are now less worried about a series of environmental problems than at any
time in the past 20 years."
This decline in concern would be fine if visible pollution were all that
mattered - but it isn't, of course. In particular, greenhouse gases pose a
greater threat than smog or burning rivers ever did. But it's hard to get
the public focused on a form of pollution that's invisible, and whose
effects unfold over decades rather than days.
Nor was a loss of public interest the only negative consequence of the
decline in visible pollution. As the photogenic crises of the 1960s and
1970s faded from memory, conservatives began pushing back against
environmental regulation.
Much of the pushback took the form of demands that environmental
restrictions be weakened. But there was also an attempt to construct a
narrative in which advocates of strong environmental protection were either
extremists - "eco-Nazis," according to Rush Limbaugh - or effete liberal
snobs trying to impose their aesthetic preferences on ordinary Americans.
(I'm
sorry to say that the long effort to block construction of a wind farm off
Cape Cod - which may finally be over thanks to the Obama administration -
played right into that caricature.)
And let's admit it: by and large, the anti-environmentalists have been
winning the argument, at least as far as public opinion is concerned.
Then came the gulf disaster. Suddenly, environmental destruction was
photogenic again.
For the most part, anti-environmentalists have been silent about the
catastrophe. True, Mr. Limbaugh - arguably the Republican Party's de facto
leader - promptly suggested that environmentalists might have blown up the
rig to head off further offshore drilling. But that remark probably
reflected desperation: Mr. Limbaugh knows that his narrative has just taken
a big hit.
For the gulf blowout is a pointed reminder that the environment won't take
care of itself, that unless carefully watched and regulated, modern
technology and industry can all too easily inflict horrific damage on the
planet.
Will America take heed? It depends a lot on leadership. In particular,
President Obama needs to seize the moment; he needs to take on the "Drill,
baby, drill" crowd, telling America that courting irreversible environmental
disaster for the sake of a few barrels of oil, an amount that will hardly
affect our dependence on imports, is a terrible bargain.
It's true that Mr. Obama isn't as well positioned to make this a teachable
moment as he should be: just a month ago he announced a plan to open much of
the Atlantic coast to oil exploration, a move that shocked many of his
supporters and makes it hard for him to claim the moral high ground now.
But he needs to get beyond that. The catastrophe in the gulf offers an
opportunity, a chance to recapture some of the spirit of the original Earth
Day. And if that happens, some good may yet come of this ecological
nightmare.
***
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/05/03-5
Arizona's Immigration Law Spurs Copycat Legislation
by Marcelo Ballvé
New America Media: May 3, 2010
Arizona's new get-tough immigration law has emboldened other state capitols
to follow suit.
Legislators in at least 10 states -- Utah, Oklahoma, Colorado, Ohio,
Missouri, Georgia, South Carolina, Mississippi, Texas, and Maryland -- have
called for laws that would mirror Arizona's Senate Bill 1070, according to
the Progressive States Network and reporting by New America Media.
First out of the gate to actually introduce a bill was South Carolina.
Along with 20 co-sponsors, Rep. Eric Bedingfield, a Republican, introduced a
bill April 29 that, like Arizona's, requires law enforcement officials to
check individuals' immigration status.
Some of the language in the South Carolina bill, which was posted on the
legislature's website, is virtually identical to the most controversial
portion of the Arizona measure signed into law by Gov. Jan Brewer on April
23.
The South Carolina bill reads: "When reasonable suspicion exists that the
person is an alien who is unlawfully present in the United States, a
reasonable attempt must be made, when practicable, to determine the
immigration status of the person."
Civil rights advocates, like the Rev. Al Sharpton, blasted the same phrasing
in the Arizona law as opening the door to ethnic profiling of Latinos and
anyone else appearing foreign-born. Kevin R. Johnson, dean of the University
of California, Davis School of Law, agrees the language is "very open-ended"
and that some of the civil rights concerns over the Arizona law are
warranted. But, he argues, successful legal challenges will likely focus on
the far more clear-cut case that such laws usurp the federal government's
constitutionally granted supremacy over immigration.
Even so, state capitals, county seats and city halls insist on trying to
legislate immigration controls.
In 2007, for example, Oklahoma passed a hard-line immigration law that,
while not as tough as Arizona's, imposed a set of controls on employers and
made it a felony to harbor, shelter or transport undocumented immigrants.
This year, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit struck down a
section of the Oklahoma law pertaining to penalties on employers. The court
said the Oklahoma measure was pre-empted in that area by federal law.
But that didn't frighten Oklahoma legislators away from the immigration
issue. They are now cobbling together proposals that would outdo even
Arizona. Republican Rep. Randy Terrill has said a bill he's authoring may go
one step further and provide for the seizure and forfeiture of property of
those caught in immigration violations. Latino communities in Oklahoma, who
lived through panic and an exodus in the wake of the 2007 law, are bracing
for a new crackdown, says Patricia Fennel, executive director of the
Tulsa-based Latino Community Development Agency.
"With the legislature we have now, if that [new] legislation was introduced
tomorrow, I think it would pass easily," says Fennel.
The controversial Arizona law may be emboldening immigration hardliners.
But as Oklahoma's own experience shows, states' efforts to curb illegal
immigration -- and criminalize it -- pre-date Arizona's new bill.
But Arizona's action seems to have spread the idea that state-level
immigration laws can get tougher. Mississippi passed a bill in 2008 that
made it a felony for an undocumented immigrant to solicit or accept work in
the state. Now, Mississippi legislators are calling for the state to adopt
Arizona's tougher approach, according to Bill Chandler, executive director
of the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance. The handful of state
legislators known for their frequent "ranting and raving" about illegal
immigration "ramped it up since Arizona," adds Chandler.
In Missouri, a broad bill to crack down on illegal immigration was being
considered in the legislature as Arizona debated and passed its law. The
Missouri bill, the subject of hearings last week, would make it a felony to
knowingly transport or harbor an undocumented immigrant. But now the bill's
sponsor, Republican Rep. Mark Parkinson, says he will go further and
introduce legislation similar to Arizona's next year.
Utah is another state that has recently taken a hard tack on immigration. A
Utah law, which went into effect last year, sought to prevent state
employers from hiring undocumented immigrants and also made it illegal to
harbor them. At the same time, undocumented immigrants are allowed in-state
tuition in Utah schools, and the influential Mormon Church allows
undocumented immigrants to be bishops.
Now, Republican Rep. Stephen Sandstrom says he's drafting a bill modeled on
Arizona's. "With Arizona making the first step in this direction, Utah needs
to pass a similar law or we will see a huge influx of illegals," he was
quoted as saying in The Salt Lake Tribune.
Despite the rash of calls for copycat legislation, it is likely an attitude
of caution will prevail in many places, says Suman Raghunathan, who tracks
immigration policy for the New York-based Progressive States Network, which
works with progressive state legislators nationwide.
In Texas, for example, some legislators have called for a local version of
the Arizona law. But Gov. Rick Perry, a conservative Republican, has
cautioned against doing that. So has the business community.
States aren't the only jurisdictions trying to craft their own immigration
laws. Last year, Farmers Branch, a suburb of Dallas, Texas, passed an
ordinance seeking to bar landlords from renting apartments to undocumented
immigrants. That ordinance was struck down by the federal courts, as was a
similar one passed a few years ago in Hazelton, Penn.
However, states and localities will continue taking matters into their own
hands until Congress enacts federal immigration reform. Congressional action
seems at least possible this year after Senate Democrats' release of an
immigration reform blueprint last week.
Immigrant advocates like to point out that both the backers and detractors
of Arizona-style laws agree that the nation's immigration system is broken.
The question is when the U.S. Congress and White House will summon the
resolve fix it.
"The crisis in Arizona today only shows what happens when the federal
government fails to do its job," says Ali Noorani, executive director of the
National Immigration Forum.
Copyright © Pacific News Service
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