Pruitt Quietly Scraps Limit on ‘Super Polluting’ Trucks on Last Day

Pruitt Quietly Scraps Limit on ‘Super Polluting’ Trucks on Last Day


'Super Polluting' semi truck

7/7/18
Scott Pruitt reportedly gave a major victory to manufacturers of “super polluting freight trucks” in his final hours as Environmental Protection Agency administrator on Friday. Agency officials cited by The New York Times say Pruitt essentially lifted an annual cap on manufacturers of glider trucks, which use old engines lacking emissions controls and produce up to 55 times the amount of pollution as more modern trucks. While the annual cap of 300 gliders per manufacturer will remain on paper, an EPA spokeswoman told the Times the agency would use its “enforcement discretion” in 2018 and 2019 to allow manufacturers to ignore the rule. The agency also reportedly hopes to permanently scrap the limit by the end of 2019. Vickie Patton, the general counsel at the Environmental Defense Fund, accused Pruitt and Andrew Wheeler, now the acting EPA administrator, of “creating a loophole for super polluting freight trucks that will fill our children’s lungs with toxic diesel pollution” with the move, the Times reports.

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We've all seen them. Semi-trucks belching thick-stinky-clouds of black smoke from their double stacks. The Trump EPA just made them perfectly legal.

Remember this on November 6. The Republican Party is filling the lungs of you and your children with pollutants to curry favor with industry (campaign donations).

Related: ‘Super Polluting’ Trucks Receive Loophole on Pruitt’s Last Day

Rogue Valley said:

Pruitt Quietly Scraps Limit on ‘Super Polluting’ Trucks on Last Day

'Super Polluting' semi truck



We've all seen them. Semi-trucks belching thick-stinky-clouds of black smoke from their double stacks. The Trump EPA just made them perfectly legal.

Remember this on November 6. The Republican Party is filling the lungs of you and your children with pollutants to curry favor with industry (campaign donations).

Related: ‘Super Polluting’ Trucks Receive Loophole on Pruitt’s Last Day

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What should be questioned is how the executive branch can now make (or ignore enforcement of current) law.

This is little (if any) different than Obama (et al) deciding that DACA/DAPA was 'the right thing to do' despite the actual federal law addressing the matter. When 'enforcement discretion' simply amounts to we don't care what the actual law says, this is what the executive (of this administration) will/won't do.

Congress needs to grow a pair and say OK, if you are not (or are no longer) enforcing the 'law of the land' then we will not fund that department, agency or program at all because not enforcing the law, obviously, requires no funding.

Thank God Pruitt resigned!

I wonder if he has a favorite song?

My Guess -

ttwtt78640 said:

What should be questioned is how the executive branch can now make (or ignore enforcement of current) law.

This is little (if any) different than Obama (et al) deciding that DACA/DAPA was 'the right thing to do' despite the actual federal law addressing the matter. When 'enforcement discretion' simply amounts to we don't care what the actual law says, this is what the executive (of this administration) will/won't do.

Congress needs to grow a pair and say OK, if you are not (or are no longer) enforcing the 'law of the land' then we will not fund that department, agency or program at all because not enforcing the law, obviously, requires no funding.

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I hate to tell those too oblivious to figure this out...but Trump is driving us far closer to anarchy than we think. Use your heads...How easy would it be to grind this government to a halt and what sort of National Security risk does THAT represent?

The biggest cement headed element of the Alt-right is that once again all their blather is just blather. They want just the government they want where they want it. Its not at all about big government. Its about having the controls of government where they want them to be. They are willing to sell their souls and sell out the country as well as risk the country to make that happen. They are Americans in name only and the sooner we figure that out, the better for all of us.

Bubbas and Jim Bobs rejoice! Now you can ride your coal roller around town and show those kale-eating, Prius-drivin' lib'rals who the king 'o da road is!

Rogue Valley said:

Pruitt Quietly Scraps Limit on ‘Super Polluting’ Trucks on Last Day

'Super Polluting' semi truck



We've all seen them. Semi-trucks belching thick-stinky-clouds of black smoke from their double stacks. The Trump EPA just made them perfectly legal.

Remember this on November 6. The Republican Party is filling the lungs of you and your children with pollutants to curry favor with industry (campaign donations).

Related: ‘Super Polluting’ Trucks Receive Loophole on Pruitt’s Last Day

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DP


.

jnug said:

I hate to tell those too oblivious to figure this out...but Trump is driving us far closer to anarchy than we think. Use your heads...How easy would it be to grind this government to a halt and what sort of National Security risk does THAT represent?

The biggest cement headed element of the Alt-right is that once again all their blather is just blather. They want just the government they want where they want it. Its not at all about big government. Its about having the controls of government where they want them to be. They are willing to sell their souls and sell out the country as well as risk the country to make that happen. They are Americans in name only and the sooner we figure that out, the better for all of us.

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As I tried to make clear, it is not a right/left or republicant/demorat problem. The problem lies in little (or no) adherence to the constitutional separation of powers. From what I can determine, congress now passes 'laws' that allow the executive to fill in the blanks with 'the details' often called regulations. Regulations, in this case, are simply laws made, changed or deleted by executive whim.

I suppose that the next phase (step?) is for congress to simply hand the executive a huge check (omnibus spending bill?) and say do what you will with it and create, change or delete regulations since we are too busy raising campaign cash to write actual laws (legislation that includes 'details') any more.

AtlantaAdonis said:

Bubbas and Jim Bobs rejoice! Now you can still ride your legally modified coal roller around town and show those kale-eating, Prius-drivin' lib'rals who the king 'o da road is!

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Almost true, but I added the bolded above for accuracy. The reality is that the 'law' Obama (et al) made up (proposed yet never implemented) was superseded by the 'law' that Trump (et al) made up (simply not doing what Obama allegedly wanted done after he left office) while congress was too busy doing other things to ever directly address that specific issue. This is what happens when the executive can make, change or delete 'law' and congress is 'too busy' (raising campaign cash?) to notice or care about it.

ttwtt78640 said:

What should be questioned is how the executive branch can now make (or ignore enforcement of current) law.

This is little (if any) different than Obama (et al) deciding that DACA/DAPA was 'the right thing to do' despite the actual federal law addressing the matter. When 'enforcement discretion' simply amounts to we don't care what the actual law says, this is what the executive (of this administration) will/won't do.

Congress needs to grow a pair and say OK, if you are not (or are no longer) enforcing the 'law of the land' then we will not fund that department, agency or program at all because not enforcing the law, obviously, requires no funding.

Click to expand...

The left did plenty of rejoicing when Obama vowed to use 'prosecutorial discretion' and 'his pen and his phone.' I even remember warning them that they were being shortsighted and should contemplate what that would mean were a republican president to use the same methods. They didnt care about that then, but they sure seem to care about it now. Sort of like Reid ending the filibuster rule for judges. They loved it then but hate it now.

Fletch said:

The left did plenty of rejoicing when Obama vowed to use 'prosecutorial discretion' and 'his pen and his phone.' I even remember warning them that they were being shortsighted and should contemplate what that would mean were a republican president to use the same methods. They didnt care about that then, but they sure seem to care about it now. Sort of like Reid ending the filibuster rule for judges. They loved it then but hate it now.

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Yep, congress remains in (permanent?) stand by (and campaign fund raising) mode and lets the (temporary?) POTUS, take the credit/blame for the actions of the (permanent?) ruling elites (career civil servants?) making federal regulations (the latest substitute for actual federal laws).

The reason that congress critters do this is that, besides being easy (working about 100 days/year?), it just plain works - witness the congressional re-election rate of over 90%. We the sheeple are now being told that a huge change of power in congress (a massive blue/red wave?) is when 25 (or so) out of 535 congressional seats actually change hands.

ttwtt78640 said:

Yep, congress remains in (permanent?) stand by (and campaign fund raising) mode and lets the (temporary?) POTUS, take the credit/blame for the actions of the (permanent?) ruling elites (career civil servants?) making federal regulations (the latest substitute for actual federal laws).

The reason that congress critters do this is that, besides being easy (working about 100 days/year?), it just plain works - witness the congressional re-election rate of over 90%. We the sheeple are now being told that a huge change of power in congress (a massive blue/red wave?) is when 25 (or so) out of 535 congressional seats actually change hands.

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Congress should reign in some of the powers of the agencies that they created, but they show no eagerness to do so. Major decisions should be made by elected representatives, not political appointees. The head of the EPA has way too much power. The republicans know this, and democrats are finding this out. But neither side is going to change it.

ttwtt78640 said:

As I tried to make clear, it is not a right/left or republicant/demorat problem. The problem lies in little (or no) adherence to the constitutional separation of powers. From what I can determine, congress now passes 'laws' that allow the executive to fill in the blanks with 'the details' often called regulations. Regulations, in this case, are simply laws made, changed or deleted by executive whim.

I suppose that the next phase (step?) is for congress to simply hand the executive a huge check (omnibus spending bill?) and say do what you will with it and create, change or delete regulations since we are too busy raising campaign cash to write actual laws (legislation that includes 'details') any more.

Click to expand...

I think I have said this since I got to this forum. I should probably just save the line of text and drop it in where appropriate. Congress after Congress now for decades has been abdicating its Constitutional Legislative responsibilities for decades, just tossing them over the wall to the Executive with the SC literally standing so mute on the topic that people do not even bring cases any longer. The SC won't hear them. But I actually do not think this is an example of that.

You can blame the obstructionist Congress during the Obama years for its Newt Gingrich view of how legislation should be considered. You can blame Obama for being somewhat less than capable as a negotiator with Congressional leadership. But at the end of the day cutting the number of these belching beasts on our roads while not simply chopping them off at the neckline was a good thing and simply allowing all anybody might want on our roads is a bad thing. As I have also said in this forum, we needed sound, logical, well thought out deregulation. What we have is willynilly deregulation and when the bill comes in for that nobody is going to be talking about the glories of the Trump economy which is not really even a Trump economy yet.

Between the tariffs idiocy and willynilly deregulation and stripping the government of the money it needed to function, the bills just from 2 years of Trump and gutless Elephants in the Congress should be enough to bring back tar and feathering.