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Local politics, the county, and the world, as viewed by Tammy Maygra Tammy’s views are her own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Bill Eagle, his pastor, Tammy’s neighbors, Wayne Mayo, Betsy Johnson, Joe Corsiglia, President Trump, Henry Heimuller, VP Pence, Pat Robertson, Debi Corsiglia’s dog, or Claudia Eagle’s Cats. This Tammy’s Take (with the exception of this disclaimer) is not paid for or written by, or even reviewed by anyone but Tammy and she refuses to be bullied by anyone. See Standard Disclaimer.
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Industrial Polluters
Not only are companies in America polluting our rivers, lakes and streams, they are also polluting our political system. Americans are concerned with the pollution which are being dumped into our water systems and feel that this environmental issue is the most important of all environmental issues. The outrage became even more widespread after toxins in Lake Erie left 400,000 Toledo, OH citizens unable to drink the water coming out of their taps.
More than half of all America’s rivers, lakes, and streams aren’t safe for fishing, swimming, or drinking. Reports concluded that industries are still dumping more than 206 million pounds of toxic pollution into our nation’s waterways every year. But Americans are taking notice, and over 800,000 everyday Americans sent in comment of support for the Obama Administration’s plan to restore Clean Water Act protections to smaller waterways across the country. These numbers of supporters certainly were larger than those people opposing the plan.
While the little people support these safeguards for water, the industrialists simply do not, safe guards cost them a few dollars and these people are greedy and will do anything to keep their billions in profits growing. These people have polluted our politics and policy’s. Industrial polluters dump millions of pounds of toxins in our nation’s waterways every year, and match that number by spending millions on elections and lobbying decision-makers every year to make their polluting easier. The ten companies that reported the most industrial dumping in 2012 spent more than $53 million on lobbying in 2014. And they also contributed more than $9.4 million to candidates for federal office in the 2014 election cycle. Between these ten companies they reported dumping more than 95 million pounds of toxic chemicals into waterways across the nation.
Unfortunately The House of Representatives voted twice prior to December 2015 and blocked to restore the Clean water Act, this vote was blocked by the Republicans who had the majority, and are known to careless for the environment, and the health and welfare of Americans. These politicians receive campaign funds from these huge corporations and other perks.
The owner of Georgia-Pacific spent $13,800,000 on lobbying in a single year, the huge spending came after Georgia-Pacific dumped 123,040 pounds of toxic chemicals into Oregon’s waterways in 2012. Heinz Frozen Food Co. dumped 183,744 pounds of toxic pollution into Oregon’s Snake River Watershed in 2012. In 2014, HJ Heinz Co., its parent company, spent $105,000 on lobbying and another $131,900 in campaign contributions to key lawmakers in the 2014 election cycle.
The same year, Georgia-Pacific Toledo LLC dumped 123,040 pounds of toxic pollution into Oregon’s Yaquina Bay. Koch Industries, Inc., its parent company, spent $13,800,000 in lobbying expenditures, another $7,703,185 in campaign contributions, and was ranked #6 in the nation on the list of worst offenders for total pounds of toxics released.
These greedy yet powerful polluters are lobbying their allies on Capitol Hill to derail the EPA’s plan to restore Clean Water Act protections to over 61,000 miles of streams in Oregon. Loopholes in the law currently leave the waterways that feed the drinking water of nearly 1.7 million Oregonians at risk. These loop holes must be closed. These polluters have huge deep pockets, but Oregonians are fed up with these greedy corporations and show their resolve to stop the contamination of Oregon’s water, many environmental groups have successfully stopped some of the attacks on Oregon’s waterways and scenic areas, and have stopped the corporation domination of owning Oregon’s majestic spring water in Cascade Locks for corporate ownership.
Wednesday, December 16, 2015 WASHINGTON, DC – As Congressional leaders agreed on an omnibus budget deal without riders to block EPA’s landmark Clean Water Rule, Environment America’s senior attorney John Rumpler issued the following statement:
"Due to overwhelming public support, the Clean Water Rule has now withstood every attack that polluters could muster in Congress — the 'Barrasso bill,' the Congressional Review Act measure, and now an attempted budget rider. Polluters and their allies have played all their dirty water cards in Congress and lost." The Clean Water Rule restores protections of the Clean Water Act for streams that help provide drinking water to 117 million Americans, along with millions of acres of wetlands. The rule is vital to the health of waterways from the Great Lakes to the Chesapeake Bay to Puget Sound.
October 2017 Under the Trump administration many of the gains which were made under President Obama is now under attack by the Republicans. The Senate budget makes extreme cuts to some of our most vital programs that protect our air, water, and families’ health. In addition, the Senate budget attempts to peddle out our public lands to polluters by including instructions to the Senate Natural Resources Committee that would ultimately allow drilling in the pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The Trump administration budget includes cuts of nearly $900 billion over the next ten years, which would mean that the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of the Interior, the Department of Energy, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other departments and agencies will not be able to adequately defend and protect our health, environment against assult from Trumps buddies in corporate America.
Trumps desire to drill in The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is nothing more than greed. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in northern Alaska has stood as a symbol of our nation’s strong natural legacy. The Senate’s budget now leaves the Arctic Refuge to face irreversible damage from oil and gas drilling, just so corporate polluters can make a profit. We need to stop the attack now. It’s time for the majority of Americans, and the scientific community to take strong action against the ignorant non-believers and greedy corporations and stop the assault on our earth. We need to act now to stop global warming, our fate is in our own hands and Trump and his like will do nothing but ensure our failure to save our planet.
People need to speak out against the polluters and greedy corporations, we need to demand that our politicians start doing what the people want and not that of their corporate friends. I know it is hard to go against big money but, we can’t sit idly by and let them run roughshod on the rest of us without a good fight.
Tammy
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