Don’t let EPA regulate carbon dioxide emissions

Published: December 25, 2009 3:00 a.m. Web letter by Donna Maskell: Don’t let EPA regulate carbon dioxide emissions
It seems we must decide whether to save the planet or our lives. Every human who breathes out is exhaling carbon dioxide. Now the Environmental Protection Agency has claimed the authority, based on a Supreme Court decision, to regulate sources of CO2 by imposing caps on allowed emissions and fines for those who exceed their allowed limits. One would like to think that the EPA would never address the CO2 produced by an individual from breathing, but we will not escape unscathed.


The EPA has threatened to impose regulations on CO2 emissions if the Senate doesn’t get the cap-and-trade legislation passed. Many people have contacted their senators to express their opposition to this legislation, which will increase utility bills for everyone and motivate many businesses to move their operations overseas, since businesses will be the main victims. If they don’t leave, they will pass their costs along to their customers. If they do leave, the jobs they provide will go with them. And if the Senate doesn’t pass the legislation, the EPA has threatened to enact regulations, even while admitting that regulations are not the best way to handle this.


The legislation isn’t being passed because it is unpopular, and there are enough senators who still care what their constituents think to keep it from passing. But voters and taxpayers don’t control the EPA – the executive branch does. The president cannot be unaware of the EPA’s thuggish behavior, essentially holding the people of the nation for ransom against the designated behavior of the senators. Is this their political cover: “I had to vote for cap and trade to save my constituents from EPA regulations”?


Do not let them get away with it! Contact your senator and tell him not only to vote against cap and trade in any form, but also to pass emergency legislation to restrain all federal regulatory government agencies by (a) requiring any regulations to be confirmed by both houses of Congress before they can take effect, and (b) automatically defunding any agency if it enforces any regulations that have not been approved.


Regulations are de facto law, so the Congress should be involved in their development. It would also restrain the power of any appointee, confirmed or not, to exploit this back door to what amounts to taxation in the absence of representation.


DONNA MASKELL Fort Wayne