When Republicans Run Against The EPA, They Are Running Against You And Me

GOP candidates are ginning up the base by bashing the Environmental Protection Agency.

And while that may play well with the Chamber of Commerce, or the Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, or the people who want to run a tar sands crude oil pipeline from Canada to Texas, it is a slap at everyday Americans who dislike asthma air, assume clean tap water, or expect their kids to be able to swim at a safe beach and haul in an edible fish.

And like having an ally to make sure these are priorities, not accidents or privileges available to the wealthy.

Tearing apart environmental protections that benefit the common good, whether at the EPA, or Wisconsin's DNR, make please special interests - - oil drillers, strip miners, utility executives, land speculators - - but they degrade everyday life and the landscape for the other 99% of us.

Candidates who use the EPA and "regulation" as straw men may win straw polls, but the do nothing good for the rest of us.