As usual, leaders hardly react. They are just not that interested.
We are still recovering from the abolishment of female body autonomy. But the GOP and their judicial croons do not rest. Almost unmentioned by mainstream media, the Supreme Court issued another ruling. It has just given the green light to capitalists to destroy the environment at will. They put a bomb under all environmental regulations. They gutted the EPA.
This is a decision, that has global implications. It undermines everything environmental activists have been fighting for in the last decades. Worldwide. For those that still didn’t get it. Climate Change and ecological disasters do not give a flying f*ck about national borders. They also do not care about what party you happen to affiliate yourself with. If the air you breathe is toxic in your place, you will die an early death. This is not negotiable.
Environmental Regulations Are the Biggest Contributors to Our Health
50 years ago, the EPA did not yet exist. Economists were following the same bullshit logic then, as they still do. The environment and our natural resources are just externalities. They do not matter. We can amass capital infinitely. Even though that is a violation of the laws of physics. Infinite growth in a system with finite resources is not possible.
In history, there were some key events that changed how we look at nature. When I was a kid, it was the disappearing ozone layer and acid rains that destroyed European forests. Many forests in Germany still have not recovered. In the U.S., one of those events was the Cuyahoga River fire. The river was so polluted, that it caught fire and burned. This has happened at least 13 times before. But in 1969, it finally caught the attention of the media and the public.
At the time, industries dumped everything into the river. They did not care about the consequences. But this event resulted in the Clean Water Act and with it the establishment of the EPA. It became clear, that the capitalists will not limit pollution if it hurts their profits. The only solution was to force change through environmental regulations.
