Same Old Story

This clip from the CBS Evening News details how a new report by the Government Accountability Office (Congress’s Investigatory Arm) has found that significant political influence has been exerted by Bush administration officials on EPA scientific reports, staff, and processes. Specifically, the administration has slowed and convoluted the EPA’s chemical risk-assessment program, “to the point that the health of millions of Americans could be endangered.”

Much like a GAP-Union of Concerned Scientists report that came out last year detailing wide-scale political interference by the administration with the work of climate scientists (which boils down to increasing the human risk posed by climate change), this report shows the administration is politicizing other scientific departments (in this case, increasing American risk from toxic chemical exposure).

-- Dylan Blaylock