Power, Lost and Found: America At Century’s End 519fossil fuels as quickly and cheaply as possible with no concern for the ecosys-
tem. Restrictions and laws protecting public lands and offshore sites from oil
and gas removal were lifted—the administration even opened the ANWR to
exploration. “Rather than seek broad public support for an energy policy that
also protected natural areas and reduced greenhouse gas emissions,” explains
Andrews, “Bush and his congressional allies chose to make opening the
ANWR a symbolic public test of political power against the organized envi-
ronmental movement.” By the end of the Bush presidency, permits allowing
oil and gas drilling increased 70 percent above the number of approvals dur-
ing the Clinton presidency.
Other moves demonstrated Congress and Bush’s assault on the environ-
ment. The United States withdrew from talks in Kyoto, reversed environmen-
tal and public-lands protection policies, removed pollution restrictions on
industry and landowners, and increased ease of access to public lands for com-
mercial development. Instead of regulating resource extraction, removing
minerals and ores from the ground, the federal government subsidized it. The
administration became secretive—it limited public access to government
information regarding the environment and restricted the public right to chal-
lenge executive decisions. The administration exempted military agencies
from all environmental law. Finally, Bush appointed business leaders to key
positions within the EPA. More than two dozen of Bush’s political appointees
came from the energy, chemical, timber, mining, and agribusiness industries.
Others had been attorneys or lobbyists for those industries. Environmental
policy was designed not for the protection of the ecosystem but rather for
easing the ability of capitalists to abuse it quickly, severely, and cheaply.
While some may argue that it is too early to accurately assess the Obama
administration’s environmental policy, it appears as though the trend of pri-
oritizing Capitalism over environmental soundness has continued. Although
the EPA publicly announced a “war on coal” to cut carbon emissions and
Obama has discouraged coal consumption at home, his administration at the
same time promoted the commercial extraction of domestic coal and its
export abroad. By Obama’s second term, the administration developed plans
to lease 8 million tons of coal located on public lands in Colorado’s Delta
County to “meet the nation’s energy demands.” Domestic demands for coal,
however, were at a 24-year low. The prospective buyer of the natural resource
is Bowie Resources—a company that sells coal to overseas countries, particu-