EPA administrator's "Dirty (Air) Bomb"

In a story reported on NPR and in the Washington Post, we learn today that EPA administrator Stephen L. Johnson overrode the advice of his own scientific advisory board in promoting, single-handedly, a far less dramatic change to air quality regulations for "fine particulate matter" (soot) than the board had recommended. Characteristically for shills of The Regime, Johnson praised his own proposal (which is something of an improvement) in glowing terms:

This proposal is yet another step in ensuring Americans have cleaner air and healthier lives. . . . I made my decision based on the best available science.

How exactly overriding the collective recommendation of his own board gives him access to the "best available science" is not immediately obvious. But as the Post's article makes clear, energy companies are better served by lower standards, and one energy company spokesman cited "many studies indicating that fine particles are not a problem for public health." Those are probably what Johnson calls the "best science": why am I not surprised? The best facts are those that serve corporate interests (or neocon imperialistic fantasies or religious fundamentalists) best .

According to the Post, the American Lung Association figures that 60,000 Americans "die prematurely" each year from air pollution. A "recent EPA analysis" indicates that the board-recommended standards "would have reduced air pollution-related deaths in nine U.S. cities by 48 percent"; but Johnson's proposal, only "by 22 percent." (It strikes me that looking for a reduction of only 48% of the anticipated deaths is already a compromise. Human life is not an absolute value here.) Let's see: 48% of 60,000 is 28,800 and 22% of 60,000 is 13,200: so the net number of people to be killed by Johnson's substitute proposal is 15,600. Each year.

Osama bin Laden would love this sort of American death toll: it adds up to about five 9/11s annually. Somebody should inform Homeland Security of this dangerous man loose within the Beltway. Maybe the NSA should be monitoring his communications. Maybe such bureaucratic decisions, resulting in massive loss of life, should be criminalized and subject to capital punishment (Tookie Williams was executed for the deaths of several less people than 15,000). But of course The Regime never really has been genuinely concerned for human life, or science, or health, now, has it?