It’s Our Air, Our Water, Our Health, and Our Climate Future, NOT Trump’s
This is established in the preamble to the Constitution in the words:
“We the People of the United State, in Order to … promote the general Welfare…do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
This is in the Declaration of Independence, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” In 1776, the common meaning of happiness was “good fortune, prosperity, thriving, wellbeing.” In Jefferson’s draft, “life” read “the preservation of life”.
The original mission statement of the EPA was “The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s mission is to protect human health and the environment.”
We note two additional statements:
“all Americans are protected from significant risks to human health and the environment where they live, learn and work:”
“National efforts to reduce environmental risk are based on the best available scientific information:”
The FDA Mission statement is: “The Food and Drug Administration is responsible for protecting the public health … by ensuring the safety of our nation’s food supply …”
Trump has tried to lower every regulation on clean air and water to please polluting industries, especially coal, even if it saves them a minor amount of money.
There is a charge by doctor Eugene Gu, on twitter, and an article on People.com, that Trump suspended the Obama requirement that irrigation water be tested for bacteria and viruses. This FDA requirement was suspended last year, for four years. This could be the cause that let romaine lettuce become contaminated with the E. Coli virus from animal feces. However, the source and method of contamination of the current infection has not been determined. Clearly, in any case, this is a warning that irrigation water must be tested. Dr. Gu states that the farmers only save $12 million, while we pay $108 million in medical costs, not to mention the agony of the infected people.
The entire romaine lettuce industry has been tainted in people’s minds, and possibly for a long time. There also may be a cross-tainting to other types of lettuce in people’s minds. One cannot rely on individual growers, the industry itself, or the various states to enforce such regulations, since romaine comes from many growers and states. This must come from federal law with federal inspection and enforcement. Growers themselves should be the most up in arms demanding federal rules and vigorous enforcement, since all romaine is being destroyed and boycotted from what could be the actions of a single grower.
Of course, this is a response to Trump’s claim that he is providing the cleanest water, along with the cleanest air and the best climate, all of which are very unhealthy lies. Was Trump trying to confuse the public that climate change is really only about clean air and water, which is clean from previous EPA work since 1970?
Back to the title: It is Our Air, Our Water, Our Health, and Our Climate Future, NOT Trump’s to Sell Us Out.
