Bush's environmental valentine. (Insider Report).

So you thought the global warming hysteria ended with the Clinton administration? Think again. The Bush administration is steadily amassing a record of environmental alarmist policies that's, well, Clintonesque. The infamous Kyoto Treaty, for example, which sought to impose uniform emissions standards and other regulatory burdens worldwide, and which the Clintons vigorously promoted, was declared dead in the water with the election of George W. Bush.

But reports of Kyoto's demise are premature. President Bush objects to the treaty's provisions not in principle but in the manner and severity of their implementation. On February 14th, President Bush sent environmentalists a valentine in the shape of Bush's proposed new Clean Skies legislation, which will, according to Bush in a press release, "[set] tough new standards to dramatically reduce the three most significant forms of pollution from power plants, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury.... This legislation will constitute the most significant step America has ever taken ... to cut power plant emissions...."

True to the form of "compassionate" (read: "socialistic") conservatism, Bush went on to explain that, as with the Kyoto Protocol, the Bush proposal intends to impose onerous and unconstitutional new controls on industry in the name of fighting the global warming chimera -- but will do it in a nicer way: "Instead of the government telling utilities where and how to cut pollution, we will tell them when and how much to cut. We will give them a firm deadline and let them find the most innovative ways to meet it. We will do this by requiring each facility to have a permit for each ton of pollution it emits. By making the permits tradeable, this system makes it financially worthwhile for companies to pollute less, giving them an incentive to make early and cost effective reductions."

Bush also reaffirmed "America's commitment to the United Nations Framework Convention and its central goal, to stabilize atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations at a level that will prevent dangerous human interference with the climate." The Bush administration's goal is to reduce America's greenhouse gas emissions by 18 percent within 10 years. "To achieve this goal," Bush continued, "our nation must move forward on many fronts, looking at every sector of our economy.... If, however, by 2012, our progress is not sufficient and sound science justifies further action, the United States will respond with additional measures that may include broad-based market programs as well as additional incentives and voluntary measures....

In other words, the environmental legacy of the Clinton years lives on. As President Bush makes increasingly clear, his environmental philosophy differs only cosmetically from his predecessor's and from that of UN globocrats eager to seize on environmentalist hysteria as a pretext for more international socialism.