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Tarun Sunkaraneni
Humanities 2002
Jose Antonio Hernandez Zamudio
3/8/2016
Environmental Policy
The Earth is the only planet out of the thousands detected by mankind
which supports life. And Life has been thriving on our beautiful planet for
millions of years. However, one of the principles which has even caused life
to diversify and become complex is the idea of mass extinctions. Without
such incidents the world without the demand for adaptation would reach a
leveling point with complexity of the organisms. The first mass extinction
was a result of a bacteria that had the unique ability of photosynthesis. This
single-celled organism had only had existed for relatively a short period of
time but by creating its own energy from the sun, this bacterium was able
to generate up to 16 times more energy than its counterparts, which allowed
it to outcompete and explode in reproduction (Casey). This organism would
spell doom for most of life on the planet, as photosynthesis produced free
poisonous oxygen molecules as a byproduct.
Two billion years later, it is quite ironic that humans have come to a
similar predicament as they are poisoning the atmosphere with another
dangerous gas, Carbon Dioxide. Although people have gone as far to
downplay the significance of the damage humans have caused the earth, it

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is very explicitly stated by the overwhelming scientific evidence that humans

might have started the next mass extinction. There has been effort done by
the U.S. government to help protect the environment by establish the
Environmental Protection agency, but for decades, conservative activists in
the United States have worked to roll back the nations environmental laws
and cut off new initiatives (Layzer).
A lot of the early initiatives still remain: Air Pollution Control Act, Water
Pollution Control Act, and Endangered Species Act to name a few. However,
money rests in big businesses, and environmental protection protocols are
not in the best interest of the conservative thinking of corporations, hence
much have succeeded in environmental debates by tapping into, among
other things, public mistrust of regulation to argue for opening up federal
lands for further development.
Activism against environmental regulations was born as a war for
industrial freedom. From a conservative perspective, U.S. environmental
efforts of the 1970s were very dangerous because of the amount of federal
interference into the private sector of corporations and businesses. Backed
up by the financial abundance of these business interests, conservative think
tanks started churning out antiregulatory manifestos (Adler). Their purpose
was to disparage environmentalists as out-of-touch elitists, minimize
environmental risks, dramatize curbs on individual property rights, and
depict restrictions on business as economically disastrous.

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The biggest success of long-term conservative pressures is making the

public start doubting environmental activists and goals, while also causing
speculations about the legitimacy and the point of regulation. By discrediting
new stories and new methods of looking after the environment, conservative
people have helped block new legislation, and oddly enough most
substantial also being one of the most apparent, climate control.
Conservative ideas also have greatly been detrimental to enforcement.
Worried about provoking a backlash, Democratic administrations have
turned to incentive-based and voluntary approaches, while Republican
administrations delay, relax, and sometimes just decline to enforce
environmental rules. (Layzer)
In 2011, President Barack Obama declared the America's Great
Outdoors Report, the Administration's action plan under the America's Great
Outdoors initiative to achieve lasting conservation of the outdoor spaces that
power our nation's economy, shape our culture, and build our outdoor
traditions. (AGO) The initiative was started by the federal government to
empower communities to help with conservation and recreation prioritizes by
listening solely to ideas out of Washington. Through 105,000 written
comments and in 52 listening sessions in cities and communities across the
country, Americans collectively expressed that they care deeply about
enjoying out shared outdoor heritage, and have a vibrant vision of how best
to protect it. (AGO) the goals of AGO are very ambitious and have proven to
be very effective so far, but this effort is very weak compared to serious

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legislation that can be passed through the conservative legislation. But the
goals of American Great Outdoors initiative are to educate people, which in
the long run will affect the legislation passed in the future as the current
generation gets more and more educated about the environment.
Another initiative constructed under the Obama administration is The
Clean Power Plan. The Clean Power Plan sets achievable standards to
reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 32 percent from 2005 levels by 2030.
(White House)
A major setback happened when the Supreme court blocked the
administrations effort to combat global warming from coal-fired power
plants. This call was 5-4 against Obama, and it is more than likely that the
voting difference was because of conservatism vs. liberalism as there are 5
conservative judges and 4 liberal ones.
Layzer says that although most Americans still claim to be sympathetic to
environmental goals, resistance to government action in pursuit of those
goals is widespread. This is a paradox. Pursuit of a better society needs to
come at the expense of individual liberty or economic growth. By accepting
the fact that regulatory stringency is a measure of environmental concern
people can start caring about the well-being of society.
While all this is happening humans impact on the world is only
increasing. The worlds reefs and rainforests are being depleted, and in 2012
was had the most production of Carbon Dioxide the world had ever seen (PBL

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Agency). Environmentalists have fought back vigorously, but they are led to
shortcomings to address the conservative governmental solutions. Because
of the holdup, many environmentalists have given up on politics and started
even bandwagoning those corporations themselves, or promoting change of
society by voluntary efforts. However, no amount of volunteering is going to
match the power of a piece of legislation, which can heavily impact the wellbeing of the environment. To be effective, environmentalists and their allies
need to fight antiregulatory ideas with ideas of their own. (Layzer)
Environmentalists need to fight back these conservative ideas by assembling
with enough popularity and support to take on the right wing.
That being said, this is not to discredit entire conservatism itself but
the few, right wing conservatives, who fail to believe or accept that the Earth
is being destroyed for personal benefits or even out of pure ignorance. All
three major global surface temperature reconstructions show that Earth has
warmed since 1880. (NASA) The facts provided are overwhelmingly
suggestive that climate change is in fact real and humans are destroying the
planet. It is not even just Conservatives. Anyone who discredits science and
this much evidence deserves to be fought against to protect the only home
we have, the planet Earth. Overall the point of environmental policy is in the
best interests of the whole world, and I believe it is a necessary burden
everyone should have to carry for the well-being of our home planet, so
selfish or ignorant ideas must be overcome by whats good and only right.

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Citations
Casey, Ryan. "The Oxygenation Catastrophe." The Origins Project. Arizona
State University, 05 Feb. 2015. Web. 06 Mar. 2016.
Layzer, Judith A. HOW CONSERVATIVES HAVE UNDERMINED U.S.
ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY (2012): n. pag. Open for Business. Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, 2012. Web.
Adler, Jon. "The Conservative Record on Environmental Policy." The New
Atlantis. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Mar. 2016.
TRENDS IN GLOBAL CO 2 (n.d.): n. pag. PBL Netherlands Environmental
Assesment Agency. Netherlands. Web.
Layzer, Judith. "Open for Business." Google Books. MIT, n.d. Web. 08 Mar.
2016.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. "Climate Change Evidence:
How Do We Know?" Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet. NASA, n.d.
Web. 08 Mar. 2016.

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"America's Great Outdoors Initiative." American Great Outdoors Innitiative.

The White House, n.d. Web. 08 Mar. 2016.
AGO Initiative. America's Great Outdoors 2012 Update (2012): n. pag. White
House. Web.
White House. "President Obama's Plan to Fight Climate Change." The White
House. The White House, n.d. Web. 08 Mar. 2016.
White House. "President Obama's Plan to Fight Climate Change." The White
House. The White House, n.d. Web. 08 Mar. 2016.