Any new regulation the EPA introduces results in litigation. Some of the previously introduced PFAS regulations weren't done in accordance with how the Safe Drinking Water Act says they should be (regulations were introduced without the necessary public consultation), so they're applying to partially vacate the previous ruling. Notably, they're _not_ applying to vacate the regulation of PFAS chemicals where they say the process was followed correctly.
So, the legal reasoning might be to cut their losses litigating to defend rulings they think they'll lose due to the administrative error. I also suspect that being seen to roll back some regulations likely gives Lee Zeldin (the EPA admin) some political room to maneuver. He's historically be associated with anti-PFAS efforts (in Congress he represented a district with contamination problems and he voted for anti-PFAS legislation), but he's also part of an administration with a strong anti-regulation agenda, so he needs to walk a fine line.
> So, the legal reasoning might be to cut their losses litigating to defend rulings they think they'll lose due to the administrative error.
But they didn't start proper administrative procedures to reestablish the regulations, proving that these regulations are being removed on principle, whatever that is, while the "administrative error" is just an excuse.
There's a lot of outrage inducing judicial rulings that boil down to poor rule following. The main question winds up being: do we get to a good end point eventually or do these rulings look like steps backwards?
If you view all this through the lens of the goal of administration being to weaken the US both internally and as a world power, it all comes much more clearly into focus.
Then it can be seen as no longer a disparate collection of seemingly random political, social, and economic moves, but rather as a directed, intentional movement.
> If you view all this through the lens of the goal of administration being to weaken the US both internally and as a world power, it all comes much more clearly into focus.
And why would they want to do that?
Bonus challenge: Without relying on antisemetic tropes
Take a look at the administration's first term and all the involvement and ties (financial, political, etc.) there are to Russia (and Russian-related objectives like Ukraine). It sounds bonkers, but the more you dig in and see how closely tied the relationships have been, and then see how totally soft Trump has been towards Putin/Russia - including direct actions towards Ukraine like removing the long-term diplomats, stopping weapons sales and aid, and recently killing USAID (whose #1 beneficiary was Ukraine) - it all coalesces into a single coherent view.
just purely as a thought experiment and devil's advocacy: to create new avenues of growth and control for the oligarchy. The fall of the Soviet Union, for example, turned out to be a boon for them and they were able to replace the politburo with their own fiefdoms. By destroying the US goverment functions they will be able to privatize the profits (for their companies) and socialize the costs (pollution and shitty water) for the rest of the population. The price of clean water will go up and the people that can afford it will buy whatever anti-PFAS tech they're selling (providing growth for their companies), and the poor well...who cares. They will obtain greater leverage with the US government because they will be seen as saviors since the government will have no competent agencies left, including the military. And the government will helplessly cede more and more power over to them.
Some people are genuine psychopaths who derive satisfaction from destroying things or by hurting people who don't want them to destroy things.
Others are driven to destroy because they believe that there's some sort of higher purpose to this destruction, either religious or political in nature.
Stricter (but not looser) standards can be imposed on state level. Canada has no binding national drinking water law, they leave it to territories/provinces to decide how to implement guidelines.
What if instead we could all collectively agree that access to some amounts of fresh, running water is a fundamental human need? We figure a number, and the first N units are free. Additional units cost money, and perhaps you have two or three usage tiers where heavy users are disincentivized through additional cost.
You calculate the figures such that the higher usage tiers subsidize the costs of the basic needs users.
The answer is likely that the treatment is expensive, and most people aren't drinking tap water anyway.
My town completed it's pfas filtering system and water bill costs increased about 25% to cover it. I don't know one person in this town though who doesn't drink filtered water.
That being said, I do still support the filtering.
Is this a regional thing? AFAIK everywhere I’ve lived most people drink tap water. Certainly they cook or make coffee/tea with it. But I’ve been lucky enough to live in places with pretty good tap water.
That's from a non-representative online poll for people already searching the internet for information about whether or not their tap water was safe to drink.
> Those are findings from a recent survey of 2,800 visitors to EWG’s landmark Tap Water Database, updated in late 2021 [...] Although EWG ran the survey for only a few days, responses came from 2,800 people in about 1,580 unique ZIP codes in all 50 states and D.C., and even some from Canada and Mexico.
Here's an article, also from 2021, based on an academic study which suggests "Nearly 60 million Americans don't drink their tap water", which (US population being 331.9M in 2021) would still leave over 80% who do.
This is the reason. My city is struggling to fix its water supply that was broken over a decade ago (our water supply comes from a temporary system) since FEMA sent our funds to other things under the first trump admin.
They don't want to put the cost on the consumer, but there is no other choice. If our government was smart (it's not) they would make these rules and fund the changes.
Most people low and middle class people I have met my whole life drink unfiltered tap water unless there is a reason not to (safety or particularly foul taste). you might be in a bit of bubble. Not that it matter though as most bottled water is just bottled tap water anyway.
Also known as the, "I got mine. F*** you." philosophy. Maximize exploitation in the short run because by the time the long run comes around, they'll already be dead.
It doesn't speak well of their feelings about their own children, but, well, there isn't a lot speaking that well of them in general.
Ironically, PFAS levels have been found to be higher in wealthy people. People with money own more furniture and clothing with stain resistant treatments, for example.
I'm not convinced that this is the correct answer. These policies also affect wealthy individuals and wealthy individuals want to be healthy (I assume).
An examination of the individuals in the EPA pushing this change might reveal something. Perhaps it's ideological? I don't know, I'm at a complete loss.
>These policies also affect wealthy individuals and wealthy individuals want to be healthy (I assume).
They get to move to whatever enclave they want and buy expensive RO filters.
Or, they don't believe in science broadly and believe they won't be impacted. If scientists are so smart, why aren't they rich like me and exploiting everyone and everything to the maximum potential profit??
This debate style is pretty frustrating to me. Use a talking point for the other side and act like it is why the reason it the decision is made. It really does not lend itself to getting to the root of issues and finding what compromise is.
In my opinion this added nothing to the conversation when in theory the op asked for a real answer.
I understand this may look dismissive or blamey, but sometimes (actually a shocking amount) there aren’t equal merits to both sides…
I’ve looked into this a lot and there isn’t any strong argument I’ve seen that this is good for humanity, and let’s not pretend every political action is a sincere attempt to improve the world for all equally.
If you look into all the abuse heaped upon the man who discovered leaded gasoline was bad it helps give context on just how far some people will go for their own profits.
There is also a social water cooler like aspect. Historically brakes were only provided to those that smoke so people took up smoking so they could get a brake. Some companies still follow this asinine ideology and do not provide brakes to non-smokers.
Well, the facts are that this administration will always, without fail, without a single exception, do the opposite of what has been shown to be good for the US people. This isn't a property of authoritarianism either, no other authoritarian state is so uniformly across the board against science, medicine, and technology.
If you have any other suggestion than the reason they do this is something related to money, please be my guest and volunteer. Because otherwise it is the most baffling and self destructive policy making that has ever been documented in the history of humankind.
The populist wave is global and its causes are complex. But in the case of the US on top of it all, our populists happen to be clowns and morons.
I think the reasonable mind struggles to deal with the current obvious stupidity even within a populist frame, and hunts for a hidden explanation. It’s a lot scarier to believe that the world’s biggest economy and military and nuclear arsenal are somehow in the hands of not just authoritarians, but crooks and morons.
But it’s true. Britain did it too, it happens.
So why do they do it? To play out some idiotic meme-driven culture war, reduced through these people’s small minds to caricature. They don’t think about second order effects, they lack the sophistication for that.
It seems like the PFAS rules were set in prior administrations [1]. In fact, even in the article you've linked above, the text states:
> retaining its maximum contaminant levels for PFOA and PFOS but pulling back on its use of a hazard index and regulatory determinations for additional PFAS
Key word being "retaining," indicating the maximum contaminant levels were already in place prior to the change mentioned here. Putting aside allegations of "political bias," can you point to a source which clearly indicates the PFA limits were put in place by the current administration? Would like to learn if I'm wrong.
Trump's first term. February of 2019. Andrew Wheeler's EPA.
You'll also notice that the document lays out planned action dates bleeding generously into Biden's term, and for which Biden later took credit in the document you shared. This is shameful, and sadly normal presidential behavior, taking credit for their predecessor's wins.
If you'd truly like to learn if you're wrong, it's recommended to seek information that disproves your hypothesis rather than proves it. Both this and the previous article I shared were very easy to find and within the first 2 or 3 results.
Giving municipalities more time and money to enact change aligns just fine with what I think most people would call good faith. You just can't please some people, I guess.
It's not out of the realm of possibility that one side of a issue is not acting in good faith. If that's the case, compromise isn't really a viable option; trying to work with someone within a system doesn't work if they literally don't support the system itself. Obviously not everyone agrees that's what's happening here, but not everyone agrees with your premise that there's guaranteed to be some reasonable compromise to every possible issue either.
In some ways, you're kind of arguing the same thing but in reverse by claiming that the comment you're responding to isn't being made in good faith. You're certainly entitled to hold that opinion, but only because of the exact same logic that entitles the parent commenter to hold the opinion that they express in the first place (and for what it's worth, I don't think it's actually being made in bad faith; not everyone will agree about where to draw the line, but at least to me it seems like we're long past the point of giving the benefit of the doubt on policies like the one described in TFA).
I think it is just venting, rather than debate. Realistically we’re locked in for about a year and a half of full Republican control of every branch of government before literally anything at all can be changed (and even then the main achievable goal for the midterms would be for Democrats to take the House, right? Which gives them at least some ability to do some oversight, but is pretty limited).
Im sorry if you’re naive about life but the Republican Party has shown nothing but contempt for life in general. Ideological coherency is not something they have cared about, hence debating them as if their arguments has any weight whatsoever is not useful.
Whenever they propose something, just ask yourself which lobbyist stands something to gain. That will be a sufficient explanation.
The media would have a much harder time collecting ad dollars if they didn't use strawman arguments and misrepresentation to lock in an audience.
Ask a liberal about conservatives or a conservative about liberals and they have abso-fucking-lutely no idea what the ideals of the other side are. None whatsoever. Thanks silo'd media.
What are the current ideals of so-called conservatives? Being a libertarian who can entertain both left and right approaches to problems, I thought I had a decent handle on where they were coming from. But then they seemingly went bat-shit insane during Covid. I try to appeal to what I thought were some of the underlying values (eg belief in institutions, America as a force for good in the world, individual liberty, slow and measured change), and always get written off like I just don't understand or something. But never any explanation for what I'm actually missing. The best I've been able to come up with is that they've set aside actually living those values in favor of thinking that we need some massive societal cataclysm to get back to a place where those values have more of a draw, but that's clearly not itself conservative.
This nonsense meta comment is pretty frustrating to me. Use a counter argument rather than wringing your hands and whining with no apparent critique other than “I don’t like that this person is being mean”
Take one step backwards. Do cockroaches debate with the boot heel that comes to squish them? The billionaires are not “debating” anything with the “little people”
I don't get the environmental poison stuff. These rich people and their families breathe the same air and drink the same water as everyone else. Why would they poison themselves and their families with environmental pollution?
Also, there's likely to be a few years between the policy being enacted and people having health issues, so the chances are that the people pushing for this won't be around to catch the blame.
An insurance company CEO was famously shot in broad day light just before he went into a meeting to celebrate his accomplishment of denying people healthcare for his company's profits. Nobody felt bad except other CEOs and the people they directly pay because everyone has a story of the insurance company putting profit over people. They did not get rich by treating more people.
USA HealthCare insurance companies are the _Death Panels_, run by CEO, accounts, and investors, that work to maximize profit over keeping people health. They pay _specialist_ to contradict the actual practicing doctors on why some procedure or medicine is needed.
A firm's sole responsibility is to increase profit and a maximize returns for shareholders. [0]
Then you'd be wrong. Insurance companies are limited to the amount they can collect without paying back out.
It's a fixed percentage. That means the more expensive treatment gets, the higher they can raise rates, and the more revenue they get from that fixed percentage.
It's a response to municipality associations' requests. People appear to have forgotten that Trump's EPA created these rules in his first term. Here is a summary directly from the organization pushing for this.
Look to a better source for some nuance. You may still disagree, and the court might as well, but there is more complexity here than "Trump bad, Zeldin worse, poison everyone".
While the reason is not stated, Occam's razor demands we look for the simplest explanation that ties together all actions of this administration.
And that seems to be dismantling the US as a military and technological superpower - a self-inflicted Morgenthau plan, if you will. We are left to speculate why a US government would want to dismantle the US, and who would benefit.
The reason is stated! The source article links to the request they sent to the court, explaining in detail why the EPA is doing this. Perhaps you think they’re not being honest, but Occam’s Razor doesn’t demand that we should spin grand unifying theories of government behavior in preference to evaluating the stated motivations of individual actions.
So, the legal reasoning might be to cut their losses litigating to defend rulings they think they'll lose due to the administrative error. I also suspect that being seen to roll back some regulations likely gives Lee Zeldin (the EPA admin) some political room to maneuver. He's historically be associated with anti-PFAS efforts (in Congress he represented a district with contamination problems and he voted for anti-PFAS legislation), but he's also part of an administration with a strong anti-regulation agenda, so he needs to walk a fine line.