Sunday, April 22, 2012

Earth Day Message





This is a good one. Listen.

Here's the stats on what Republican leadership in the House has done in the 112th's first session, "The Most Anti-Environment House in the History of Congress", courtesy on the House Democrats Committee on Energy & Commerce:

In the first session, the House Republicans voted 191 times to weaken environmental protections.

The House of Representatives averaged more than one anti-environmental vote for every day the House was in session in 2011. More than one in five of the legislative roll call votes taken in 2011 – 22% – were votes to undermine environmental protections.

On average, 228 Republican members of the House – 94% of the Republican members – voted for the anti-environment position during these roll call votes. On average, 164 Democratic members of the House – 86% of the Democratic members – voted for the pro-environment position.

The anti-environment votes cut across a broad array of issues and included 27 votes to block action to address climate change, 77 votes to undermine Clean Air Act protections, 28 votes to undermine Clean Water Act protections, and 47 votes to weaken protection of public land and coastal waters. The Environmental Protection Agency was the target of 114 of these votes; the Department of the Interior was the target of 35 of these votes; and the Department of Energy was the target of 31 of these votes.

The full report is available here.

The choice really is simple. You can vote for the people who want to pollute and rape the planet of all our natural resources, or you can vote for the party that wants to move in a direction that puts us on the path to renewable energy and sustainability.

When it comes to climate change, there is a part of me that thinks it's too late already - the only thing we can do now is try to mitigate some of the damage and start to prepare for the aftermath of what has already been done.

Enjoy today, wherever you are.

Update: Thanks to Paddy at the Political Carnival for the cross-post. More eyeballs = good thing!