Ask the President for the day

Meet an Asshat

The EPA (whose administrators seems to think the acronym stands for “the Environment is Perfectly A-okay) is back in the news, along with its asshat appointees. A few days ago, four senators called for the resignation of Stephen L. Johnson, sycophantic asshat and the current EPA muckety-muck. Johnson is no stranger to controversy; his confirmation in 2005 was something of a battle because of his views on human subjects and various kinds of chemical tests (especially the CHEERS program, which involved studying developmental problems in children 0 – 3 by paying families that lived in suspected pesticide-laced areas to allow researchers to see how fucked up their kids got because of the pesticides… you know, instead of relocating them or cleaning up the chemical mess). Johnson finally suspended the program as a bargaining chip to get confirmed.

Johnson used to work for a company called Hazelton Laboratories (prior to his stint at the EPA, he worked in the biotech industry), which had many high profile problems with their alleged poor treatment of animal subjects in their labs. On a fun note, he did his undergraduate degree at Taylor University (not too far from where I grew up), which is a batshit crazy Christian evangelical private college.

One of the larger controversies has come in the wake of his sabotaging of state efforts to regulate carbon dioxide emissions. The EPA fought Massachusetts’s right to regulate emissions all the way to the Supreme Court; the EPA lost. Nature has a great article chronicling the whole debacle, including entreaties from his staff to sign the waiver to allow states like California to regulate. My favorite line from the article:
"It is also worth noting that his refusal documentation, made official on 29 February, extensively quotes an industry trade association, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers."

It has gotten so bad at the EPA that most of the agency’s professional staff, aided by their unions, sent an open letter to Johnson detailing the egregious lapses in judgment he has shown in his unwavering deference to the Bush Administration. Among the most serious charge is his alleged repeated ignoring of the EPA’s Principles of Scientific Integrity.

This brings us back to the here and now; EPA staff have reportedly been told they are not allowed to cooperate with any Congressional investigation, talk to reporters, or even cooperate with the agency’s own internal office of investigation. Johnson has even refused to appear before a Senate committee. It appears they are trying to stonewall the investigations until at least after the election. Apparently enough is enough; the four democratic senators that have called for his resignation include one my senators, Barbara Boxer, who is something of Johnson’s arch-nemesis in the Senate. I’m not particularly hopeful he will actually resign—it looks like we’re stuck until January. This ridiculous situation with one of the country’s most important agencies really hits home the disaster that would be a McCain administration—more asshat industry shills in high places (Erik dealt with this eloquently in his post from a few days ago regarding Nixon, the EPA, and political control of environmental regulation).

Pesticides, bad state laws, a worthless EPA, dead bees, class warfare, and workers' rights…

I feel so welcomed to California. Yesterday they held an earthquake just for me, about 20 miles from where I live, and now I’m learning about the litany of problems facing my state’s agricultural industry.

This started this morning while I was listening to NPR; they were doing a story about a coalition of groups in Sacramento that is suing the EPA to outlaw the pesticide endosulfan in commercial agriculture. This particular pesticide has been linked to a variety of reproductive disorders and other health problems, and is banned in the EU and many other countries. The EPA, being the toothless shell of a regulatory body it ought to be because of its asshat appointees, has done little to regulate any pesticide manufactured by the Bayer Corporation. Today’s LA Times has an article about Bayer’s Gaucho and Poncho pesticides and their possible links to the death of large swaths of the California bee population (I’m not even going to get into the racist nature of Bayer’s nicknames for these farm chemicals…)

Why does the EPA need to be involved? In California, there is a fantastically horrible state law that bars local governments from enacting any kind of control over pesticides. Since the state agency refuses to do anything about endosulfan and local governments are prohibited by laws to protect themselves, the EPA is needed. Currently, there is a bill in the California Assembly to change this 25 year old law (bill AB977 for all of you Californians who want to send a quick message to your reps), but until this industry orchestrated law is changed, the EPA could (and should) be forced to help out.

Oh yeah, and for the real kicker—endosulfan is not legal for use in lawns and golf courses. This neurotoxin is only used in commercial agriculture (i.e., your cute little kids and your golfing buddies at the country club have nothing to worry about, but the EPA and State of California don’t give a shit about the people working the fields). So often the environmental questions of the day are framed in opposition to working class issues, but this example reinforces what is becoming increasingly obvious to more and more people—the survival of the working class and the environment are often tied together in the same struggle.

Commodities Markets: Now with Artificial Filler!

I posted a while back on the recent rise in food prices. The trend continues, and today the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (the commodities version of the Securities and Exchange Commission) announced an investigation into the manipulation of commodities prices.
Recently, the CFTC has been expending most of its energy on oil futures, but this announcement heralds an expansion of focus into the rising cost of food, cotton, and other important commodities. Some minor reforms to the futures markets have been proposed, and the CFTC (under pressure from Congress, including several prominent Democratic leaders) seems poised to implement them. As much as I applaud the rethinking of certain rules and procedures, I don’t think these efforts will do much to stabilize the markets, nor do I have much confidence in the CFTC’s leadership (see below).

The biggest contributing factor to the price volatility is not fraud or manipulation—it is simple economics. As reported by the AP’s Rachel Beck, over the past five years, investment dollars have been heavily poured in to commodity index funds, rising from $13 billion per year to $260 billion per year. In that same time span, the price of basic commodities (25 of which comprise the index) has risen 183%. Oil has a lot to do with this, as many “capital I” investors (institutional investors that handle unfathomable amounts of money) are pouring money into oil (as well as food), betting on a continued rise in price.

Before a Senate hearing, George Soros suggested that this rise in investment in commodities “mostly on one side” (up!) has the effect of distorting “the otherwise prevailing balance between supply and demand”. The above mentioned AP article contains a very telling quote from the chief market strategist at LPL Financial:

“The rise in the price of oil has weakened the demand for the physical commodity, but it has boosted the demand for the financial commodity since more investors are chasing returns”.

Exactly. And since commodities indexes have fantastically outperformed stock-based indexes, it may be some time before a correction comes. Many investors are slogging money into commodities to offset stock losses and hedge inflation, but the very act of inflating commodities prices is driving inflation. With all of this information, much of it fueled by Michael Master’s excellent research and congressional testimony, you’d think the CFTC would listen.

But, no. The CFTC’s chief economist has stated in a rebuke to Masters that “fundamental economic forces and the laws of supply and demand” are solely to blame. Not that he isn’t somewhat correct—fundamental economic forces are the issue, but because they are affecting the laws of supply and demand.

It is my hope that in a new administration, with new presidential appointees to oversee the CFTC, that we take a long and hard look at the volatility of the commodities market. It is vastly and inherently different from the stock market. Changes in the former affect nearly everyone in the world (and most acutely the poor and working class). It needs to be regulated much tighter, and at this point, it just doesn’t look like it’s going to happen.