Perry slashed environmental enforcement in Texas

AUSTIN, Texas — Gov. Rick Perry likes to say the best way to promote economic growth is to reduce regulation. When it comes to the environment, Perry has made Texas one of the most industry-friendly states in the nation.

Perry has cut funding for clean air programs and sued the Environmental Protection Agency to avoid enforcing laws to make the air cleaner. As part of his Republican presidential campaign, he routinely blasts the White House for tightening environmental standards.

"As president, I would roll back the radical agenda of President Obama's job-killing Environmental Protection Agency," Perry wrote recently in an op-ed for the New Hampshire Union-Leader. "Our nation does not need costly new federal restrictions, especially during our present economic crisis."

....[David Blackmon] said the Texas agency has "reached out to business and found solutions that not only cleaned up the air, but did it in a way that has a minimal impact on our ability to do business."

.....Cyrus Reed, the Texas legislative director for the Sierra Club, said the state may lose the progress it's made toward cleaner air.

"We've had to come forward with citizen suits to get the law enforced," Reed said. "It's not our job to launch citizen suits, but we've had to do it in Texas."

Another new measure made tightening air quality permits on the oil and gas industry more difficult. That law, which Perry signed in June, requires the Texas environmental agency to analyze the effect of new regulation on the economy - including how it might hurt a company - before implementation. The economic impact could override the environmental benefit of the new regulation.

The new law reflects Perry's contention that global warming is a questionable theory and that regulation always creates an adverse business climate.

Environmentalists, and liberals killed transportation infrastructure in Texas too. They want money spent on light rail in major inner-city hubs instead.

The environmentalists were all over shutting down Texas infrastructure (claiming 20 lanes running from Mexico to Canada)

CorridorWatch.org Submitted Three TTC-35 Draft Environmental Impact Statement Comment Documents
July 27, 2006
August 17, 2006
August 21, 2006

CorridorBotch.org, or David Stall-ed………The problem is, Corridor Watch et. al. are by no means allowing the facts to get in the way of a good beating. Every proposed path (and there are still at the very least three) currently under consideration places the TTC on the northern and southern ends of planned SH-130, which is a good fifteen miles west of the villes in question and in crisis over their alleged impending devastation.

That these Corridor clowns are asserting anything with certitude belies their veracity on all things, because right now NO ONE outside of the TxDoT TTC circle knows anything about any aspect of the plans.

As per Federal Highway Administration (FHA) law, these chosen few are required to remain tight-lipped thereon; to violate this legal oath of secrecy would be to inviolate the ridiculously exhaustive two Tier, six year FHA approval process, forcing them to then begin again anew.

So too would it open them up to lawsuits from any and every environmental group in the state wishing to return us all to the horse and buggy (or simply to caves awaiting Prometheus to grace us with his fiery presence), further impeding any progress on any progress.

No Press queries, no citizen demands, no Freedom of Information Act requests can breach this federally mandated confidence. These officials must sit silently by whilst the CW.org vanguards storm the ramparts with their dishonest assaults on a plan the details of which they are absolutely bereft.

Has no one else yet noticed the blatant inconstancy of the Stalls et. al. decrying the super secrecy of the process, yet promulgating with absolute certitude that towns criss-crossing the state are all doomed to TTC ruin?

There are attending political ramifications to all of this, which is rarely the case when one is discussing a candidate who garnered a mere 8% of the interest of the citizenry. For there is a distinct waft of Strayhorn in the air surrounding the empty Stall and his Corridor Watch.

Comptroller Carole Keeton McClellan Rylander Strayhorn, currently adrift on signature collection waters in her bid for Independent Gubernatorial validity, has been a fixture at CW.org events, railing prodigiously (yet without substance) against the TTC, and the very concept of toll roads.

But herein arises a consistent theme when discussing Madame Comptroller; her inconsistency. Because prior to her decision to run against the TTC-proposing Governor Rick Perry, she too saw the meritoriousness of the concept of consumption road funding. “……

Why can't those who jumped from the Palin wagon to the Cain Train just be happy Perry is doing the job Cain wont do. Perry has said nothing derogatory about Cain yet is spending his millions going after Romney. It can only help Cain right?

Gregory: “Why you and not Mitt Romney?”

Cain: ”Why me and not Mitt Romney? Mitt Romney is a great businessman. I have a lot of respect for him. He has been more of a Wall Street executive. I have been more of a Main Street executive.”

If this is as hard as Cain is gonna hit Romney (MTP on Sunday) then he will need Perry anyway. Be grateful.

Oh by the way, didn't Romney tell voters what a swell guy Cain was too and to check him out? I think he did.

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