Bush makes strides in dismantling EPA

Eric Shaeffer is no liberal tree-hugger. He's a former Republican congressional staffer who joined the Environmental Protection Agency 12 years ago .

That history lends enormous significance to Shaeffer's rancorous departure from the agency. In his resignation letter, Shaeffer, the EPA's chief of enforcement, denounced "a White House that seems determined to weaken the rules we are trying to enforce."

Shaeffer wrote that Bush has cut 200 positions from his enforcement staff and was undermining highly successful efforts to curb air pollution by nine major power companies that are responsible for one-fourth of the sulfur dioxide emissions in the nation.

Two of the power companies have refused to sign consent decrees they agreed to 15 months ago, Shaeffer said, because they sense impending relief from EPA rules out of the White House.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration is attempting to pull the rug out from under the Superfund trust fund that is used to pay for cleanup of toxic waste sites.

Weakening the Superfund program will result in a windfall to those companies and a serious slowdown in the rate of toxic site clean-ups.

The administration also sparked a public outcry when it sought to eliminate testing for salmonella in meat served in school lunches.

None of this should have been a surprise. Bush — far more than his father — has always been philosophically averse to government regulation of business — regardless, it seems, of the collateral damage.