Letter: Breathable air is evaporating as priority for GOP

Friday, May 16, 2003 | 6:08 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION: May 18, 2003

Three decades ago a bipartisan group of U.S. senators, led by Edmund S. Muskie, guided the landmark Clean Air Act to the president's desk. That law was truly unique. Not only did Congress tell the auto industry to clean up pollution from cars by a certain date, but Congress also said the American people were entitled to healthy, breathable air. Moreover, they said where air is clean, it should be kept clean and that sources of pollution ought to meet rigorous pollution requirements.

President Clinton and his environmental team implemented those laws with vigor. Polluters were brought to the bar of justice. Health-based standards were tightened to reflect new science. And in many years of the nation, the air actually got cleaner. Times have surely changed. Clean air is not an objective of President Bush or his majority in Congress.

George Bush wants to repeal the basic mechanism by which investments in new or improved pollution sources add clean air technology. Propelled by Bush's affinity for the oil industry, but more by his vice president's almost stooge-like obeisance to the mining industry, the "Dirty Air Act" would cripple current plans to significantly reduce toxic mercury emissions, delay smog-forming controls of nitrogen oxides from 2010 to at least 2018, wipe out rules to protect the scenic vistas of America's parks and wilderness areas and, worst of all, make it far more difficult to ever achieve healthy, breathable air for all Americans.

JOHN MARCHESE