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Just two weeks ago, President Obama introduced Gina McCarthy, an expert on federal air quality law, as his choice to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. Given the severity of the climate crisis and the scope of the administration's policy options, McCarthy is arguably Obama's "most significant" second-term nominee.
At this point, however, the nomination is already facing far-right opposition. Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) announced yesterday he's blocking McCarthy, not because he disagrees with her, but because she currently heads EPA's Office of Air and Radiation, and that office has raised concerns about something called the St. Johns Bayou and New Madrid Floodway Project.
Blunt said McCarthy's nomination would go nowhere until the Obama administration agreed to provide him with a "concrete timeline for progress" on the project.
And what, pray tell, is the St. Johns Bayou and New Madrid Floodway Project? I'm glad you asked: it's a $100 million slice of pork in Missouri that even internal Army Corps of Engineers memos have described as "swine" and "a bad project."
In 2000 ... the St. John's Bayou-New Madrid Floodway levee-and-pump project was ... almost too dumb, ecologically destructive and transparently deceptive to believe. It was, as a top Corps official later wrote in an internal email, "an economic dud with huge environmental consequences."
"Huge" was putting it mildly. Corps documents suggested the project would drain more acres of wetlands than all U.S. developers drained in a typical year, cutting off one of the last swath of Mississippi River floodplain that was still connected to the river. The Fish and Wildlife Service warned that it "would cause substantial, irretrievable losses of nationally significant fish and wildlife resources, and greatly diminish rare and unique habitats in southeastern Missouri." And the mitigation plan was a joke.
Michael Grunwald's report on this is equal parts painful and hilarious, explaining why this project is practically a case study in boondoggles, complete with Corps reports, filled with "third-grade errors," which were ultimately rejected by a federal judge.
And if the Obama administration doesn't resuscitate the project to Roy Blunt's satisfaction, the Republican senator intends to block the EPA nominee.
This has been the latest installment of "The Senate Confirmation Process Is Badly Broken."
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So much for cutting spending.
IOKIYAR
Yes because we know deficits are evil and will destroy American civilization
How much was Murtha's private airport? And no, we do not have a climate crisis.
Murtha's project was wrong. So is Blunt's. Didn't your mommy tell you that two wrongs don't make a right.
Fixed that for you, because denying climate change is like believing in the Tooth Fairy.
Oh, look...Shooter242:
Shooter is of the mind that the one who dies with the most toys wins...
I am pretty sure it doesn't work that way...well not unless you think your a Pharaoh or the emperor of China
Shooter is a popgun with a cork in it.
Perhaps. Another possibility is the psychosis where people feel better about themselves (temporarily) by keeping other people down. It's a uniquely Conservative philosophy.
On the schoolyard, this is known as the Mean Girls Theory.
The scandal is not about pork or for that matter destruction of Missouri ecosystems. The scandal is that Obama is pursuing a policy from the Dem right wing on climate change, and even that accomodation is not good enough for the right.
Just look at the balloon floated earlier this week:
Oh?
How is the XL pipeline part of the all of the above approach to climate change????
This is not Dept. Of State lackeys of Big oil stating the pipeline is not a serious impact to climate change- it is Obama's White House.
It appears the cynics speculating at the reasons for Jackson's departure at EPA were correct. Obama sees exploitation of fossil energy resources as more important that climate change. No matter what the cost in Hurricane Sandy climate events, no matter what the cost to reduced crop yields and global population dislocations and the attendant wars that our military will inevitably get involved in.
Obama views approval of XL as the pragmatic compromise balancing the risks.
.
His mistake will be his singular failure his administration will be rememberred in history for. Because at the moment a "progressive" could act, he stood by and allowed irreversible damage that will be felt for the next 1000 years.
We finally got rid of his son but MO keeps electing this bought and paid for goober I suspect merely from name recognition or the triumph of money in elections. Blunt could care less about this ridiculous project so there must be money involved.
Why is it that senators can now blackmail the president to get favors holding nominees hostage. Since he admitted his reasoning his objections should be overruled...as his objections are not related to the nominee they should be disallowed.
Roy Blunt, demonstrating once again what 10 generations of hillbilly incest creates.
Yes, but you missed something, TCinLA. His cretanism blends seamlessly into the Republican approach to governing. He wants a bribe that will hurt the country, but believes he has a right to demand it, and does so openly. He shares ideological DNA with those who enacted voter suppression and devaluation laws, making no attempt to deny that their purpose was to skew the election in their favor. These are the same phlegmwads who bragged, bragged about how their gerrymandered districts would defeat the will of the majority. These ideological zealots are so full of themselves and their contrived self importance that they think it's their right, if not their duty, to govern as a junta, assuming the word "govern" is appropriate. Guys like Blunt are as close to clear and present danger as one can get without justifying armed intervention.
The glib is gone!
Extortion politics, crisis governance and crony capitalism are so in for the members of the Republican brand these days! -Kevo
Now Benen would never make the connection between this and proposing a trillion dollars for infrastructure spending. However some of us realize that what currently goes under the label infrastructure spending is really the once and future pork.
except for the fact that you're a trolling idiot who can't tell the difference between obvious pork that even the army corp of engineers rejects and shovel-ready much needed infrastructure repair.
Oh wait...you must be a congressman...
If you knew anything about Congress, you would know they really aren't interested in repairing roads very much. They leave that to the states and localities.
Not nearly enough graft involved.
I'm not sure exactly what your point is here. If you're trying to suggest that indiscriminate across-the-board budget cuts are somehow justified because some pork will be thereby eliminated, I'd answer that that's basically the equivalent of a surgeon cutting out random organs on a cancer patient in hopes of removing a tumor.
This is how Congress handles "infrastructure spending". The don't spend money on repairing roads and bridges. That jobs is handled for the most part by states and localities with some Federal dollars thrown in (similar to primary education).
They like big splashy projects much better.
Now if Congress wanted to do this right, it would have a separate capital budget with it's own funding source even, but the last thing Congress wants is to do this right.
I think the people who were on the interstate I-35 bridge in Minnesota - or those who had to re-route their daily commute for months after it collapsed - would probably disagree with infrastructure spending being pork.
Ask the people in Kentucky who are currently being re-routed a good 45 minutes each way every day how they feel about pork spending to fix their collapsing bridge.
Yeah, totally pork spending for the federal government to keep the freaking roads and bridges under our tires.
Idiot.
bannedagain (hopefully)
Please see Article 1 Section 8 Clause 7 of the Constitution and see what it says about Congress and roads.
ms joanne
Were you less simple minded, you would understand that you supported my post, not refuted it. Again for the dull witted like yourself, the Federal government doesn't spend money on repairs unless the state comes up with the majority of the money FIRST.
Otherwise, Congress would rather build a new Bridge to Nowhere in the district of a powerful Congressman than repair an old one.
This project is a good example of why the Republicans will not specify cuts to the budget. There are too many expensive projects that they support but which are detrimental to the life of the planet and which are a total waste of taxpayer dollars. They do not really want to cut government spending. They just want to talk about it.
Earmarks including emergency aid for Dem districts and states are too costly, but earmarks for Republican districts and states are necessary. Hypocrisy at its worst.
The Army Corp usually doesn't pass up the opportunity to work on projects and certainly not because of environmental reasons... at least that's the common perception (not unfairly conceived). So when even it is against this project, it must be ridiculously bad.
I've got a solution to all of this.
Obama should start putting a hold on ALL projects going into an area when morons such as Blount start putting holds on nominations for reasons unrelated to the nomination.
Screw 'em.
Reference to Blunt's opposition as being "far right" is inappropriate. To get his pork project Blunt would have opposed the nomination even if he wasn't far right. Scoring pork and paying off his friends is just how Roy Blunt rolls. It doesn't have anything to do with his ideology (such as it is.)
He says he will block the nomination until he gets a concrete timeline for the project? How about this for a concrete timeline? Not one minute will be dedicated to progressing the project over the next 4 Million years.
Seriously, it is a dead project, the people who would be in charge of it don't want to do it for a myriad of reasons, and a judge smacked it down anyways. I get that he would like 100 Million Dollars dedicated to his state but it just isn't going to happen. What is it with Republicans lately that they insist on pushing for things that just will not pass?
Next thing you know there will be another bill being presented to abolish Obamacare.
[someone whispers in my ear]
What??!! There are two currently out there and another 2 or 3 that have been promised to see the light of day? WTF?
Harry Reid, either fix this or resign.
He blew his chance to do that. Now changes are subject to a fillibuster, I think.
The GOP senators have fillibustered and blocked every single cabinet appointment as leverage to get what they want. This is a perfect example a senator from MO threatens to fillibuster an appointment unless a project that will be costly and has been shown to greatly negatively affect the environment and wildlife is not pushed forward. Yes folks thats responsible action by an elected official
The bigger picture...
New Madrid, Missouri is a little city on the Mississippi River. The New Madrid Fault is named after it, because it is very near the center of that fault line. The last time that the New Madrid Fault had major earthquakes was in the early 1800's, when it had 3 earthquakes exceeding 8 on the richter scale. Those quakes were so strong that the church bells in Boston rang and the Mississippi River ran backwards for three days.
The New Madrid Fault is overdue geologically for another major earthquake. This time there will be major populations affected as the fault runs from south of Memphis to north of St. Louis. Naturally, long term planning and foresight being what they are in the U.S., there is a nuclear power plant located right outside of New Madrid, Missouri.
The bigger picture is that any tax money spent in that area (beside maintenance of the Interstate Highway that runs by New Madrid) is a complete waste. I suggest that Pooper242 and FannedAgainOnLogic should move there.