Proof government is the biggest polluter?

[Matt Collins]

I have read a big libertarian thinker say that the (federal) government is the biggest polluter in all the land.

Where can I get evidence to back this up?

[danberkeley]

I have read a big libertarian thinker say that the (federal) government is the biggest polluter in all the land.

Where can I get evidence to back this up?

Well, there are warzones.

[inibo]

Here's a start
http://www.adti.net/environment/bndunlop_kasten_1000.html

[libertarian4321]

I have read a big libertarian thinker say that the (federal) government is the biggest polluter in all the land.

Where can I get evidence to back this up?

It ain't even close. The US government is the greatest polluter in the land by far.

Part of it, of course, is the sheer size of the government. No company in the world is anywhere near the size and scope of the US government. So even a big heavy manufacturer like GM can't compete with the government.

Part of it is the nature of certain government activities (the military and the DOE are major polluters).

[Ex Post Facto]

I think the US government supports about 50% of all jobs and companies either indirectly or directly through contracts. So they are at least 50% responsible. I don't have the facts for this, just information I remembered when reading this post.

[Matt Collins]

I need hard facts, not speculation

[danberkeley]

I need hard facts, not speculation

In a war, when a bomb explodes, it destroys stuff. If the bomb happens to be in the environment, it destroys the environment. :cool:

[dannno]

http://www.adti.net/environment/bndunlop_kasten_1000.html


America's largest polluter – guess who
By Sen. Robert W. Kasten Jr.
Senator Kasten is a Senior Advisory Board Member of the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution

Here is a question that really ought to be put to both the presidential candidates, but especially Vice President Gore, in the final weeks of the campaign: Can you tell us who the largest polluter in the country is? And – important follow-up – if you are elected president, what would you plan to do about this defiler of our planet's future?

The answer, as market environmentalist Becky Norton Dunlop notes in her forthcoming book, Clearing the Air, will surprise many Americans. It isn't Exxon, duPont, or even, with respectful apologies to Ronald Reagan, trees – although trees are, as Reagan said, a major source of certain "pollutants."

Rather, as Dunlop notes, the largest polluter in the United States is: the United States government. Federal vehicles are not only numerous, but, in many cases, don't meet federal clean air standards. Temporary bureaucrats who commute to major federal centers, especially in Washington, D.C., often do so in vehicles that aren't locally registered, and thus don't meet area pollution requirements.

There are even a large number of federally-protected toxic waste sites. And of course, the federal government's sorry effort to blame land-owners who didn't pollute for the chemicals put on their property by others is a major reason why the vast majority of Superfund sites around the country haven't been cleaned up.

Dunlop knows about federal pollution first-hand. As Secretary of Natural Resources for the state of Virginia from 1994 to 1998, she had to go to court against the Gore-Clinton Environmental Protection Agency to stop some federal agencies from polluting, or protecting polluters being harbored because they were federal contractors. For this, she won the ire of some extremists for whom environmentalism means not making the air, water, and soil cleaner, but expanding the federal government's ability to strong-arm states, cities, companies, and private citizens.

Even some environmentalists are starting to realize the irony, as Scott Harper of the Virginian-Pilot put it recently, that if you're looking for the biggest polluter of all, "it's government – the same authority that's supposed to protect the environment." The Boston Globe did a whole series on the issue of government pollution in 1999. This summer, USA Today did an expose on federal agency pollution dating back to the 1940s, a series that has led to Senate hearings this fall. But you don't have to go back to the history books to find federal polluting. It's going on right now, under the man supposed to be the environmental vice president, Al Gore.
Now, to be sure, one reason the federal government is the largest polluter is its sheer size. The federal government owns more vehicles, buys more products, employs more commuters, and does a lot of other things in much greater volume than any company. (That the federal government is so vast is, in itself, a comment on the state of our society; but that is a subject for separate discussion.)

But size isn't the only reason government pollutes so much. Far from it. A major contributing reason is that federal authorities frequently attempt to shift the expense for cleaning up their pollution to other levels of government, or to private landowners – allowing federal agencies themselves to continue polluting while blaming others.

As Dunlop recounts, for instance, in the mid 1990s, the EPA, run by former Gore aide Carol Browner, tried to prevent the state of Virginia from making the federal government clean up one of the worst toxic waste sites in the country, Avtex fibers. The plant had been kept open thanks to Colin Powell and the Bush administration because it was producing valuable products for the federal government. That's understandable.

What was wrong was the effort by the Clinton Administration to avoid making the party responsible for the pollution, namely Uncle Sam, from paying for the cleanup. "Can you imagine," as Dunlop notes, "if the guilty party had been a major corporation?"

EPA ultimately paid a huge fine to Virginia in the Avtex case but only after a legal struggle. Today, Browner brazenly takes credit for having cleaned up the site.

The government as a polluter is a vital issue all by itself. But in an election where trust, character, and taking responsibility have become part of the debate, it may be especially important.

Wasn't it Al Gore who was led an exhaustive review of everything the federal bureaucracy does, the ill-starred "re-inventing government" crusade? How does Gore square this effort and mission, and his vaunted attention to detail, with the fact that he apparently paid little attention to the polluting activities and policies of government itself?

Here we see the intersection of something Al Gore claims to revere, namely clean air and water, with the place where he and Bill Clinton have had the most direct control, the federal executive branch. And instead of a record to be proud of, the story of EPA in the 1990s is one of political vendettas, bad science, and "the buck stops over there."

I'm no Jim Lehrer or Larry King, but if I were, I know that I would point this out. It isn't a nit-picking question, and it isn't a personal attack – instead it goes to policy and the future. And it would sure be interesting what Al Gore has to say.



Mr. Kasten served Wisconsin in the House of Representatives (1975-81) and U.S. Senate (1981-93) and is an advisor to the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution.

[libertarian4321]

http://www.adti.net/environment/bndunlop_kasten_1000.html

Not only does the government currently pollute a lot, it's HISTORICAL pollution is an even bigger problem.

The government, even the military, largely complies with environmental regulations today.

However, the government did not worry about the environment in decades past- they have thousands of sites, large and small, that were polluted decades ago and have still not been cleaned up- everything from motor pools and filling stations to arms manufacturing.

If you look at the NPL- the list of the most polluted sites in America, you'll find a bunch of government sites on it.