After seven years of lies, deception and cover-ups, revelation of more misdeeds by the Bush-Cheney regime now raise little more than a yawn. So numerous are their high crimes and misdemeanors that run-of-the-mill episodes of favouritism toward big business barely get a mention anymore.
Nevertheless, the pattern of using the bureaucracy of the executive branch to help big business at the expense of the American people ought to be getting attention, no matter how many examples there are.
The Los Angeles Times has reported that the Bush-Cheney Environmental Protection Agency dismissed an award-winning toxicologist, Deborah Rice, who was the chair of an EPA panel looking at the safety of a flame retardant chemical because the chemical industry objected to her.
In attempting to justify its move, the Bush-Cheney EPA said that Rice was dismissed because of "the perception of a potential conflict of interest." She’d testified before the Maine state legislature urging that the chemical in question be banned because her studies had shown that even low doses were toxic to animals. However, the Bush-Cheney EPA routinely uses scientists with clear pro-industry bias on its review panels.
The LA Times article reported, “The Environmental Working Group, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group, reviewed seven EPA panels created last year and found 17 panelists who were employed or funded by the chemical industry or had made public statements that the chemicals they were reviewing were safe.”
For the Bush-Cheney regime, the only interest that doesn’t seem to matter is the public interest. America needs a president who will put the people ahead of corporations. Add this incident to the obscenely long list of why January 20, 2009 cannot come quickly enough.
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