As we all know, the focus on our environment is a huge part in politics. It wasn't until January 6th, 2009, that our president Bush, 2 weeks before leaving office, decides to safeguard areas totaling 195,280 square miles. According to the first article, before this decision, he resisted imposing mandatory curbs on greenhouse gas emissions that have to do with climate change and has opened large areas of the nation's drilling, mining, and other use of resources. Why wasn't this done before he's about to leave office?
From the way I see things, I feel that he wants to leave The White House wanting to save his reputation. I mean let's face it, I highly doubt that 10 years in the future he will be viewed as one of the best presidents in the history of America. However, I don't think him being president was a waste. He's only human and of course humans make mistakes, so upcoming presidents can learn from those mistakes and change the ways they govern from what they've seen. Through Bush's new decision of ocean conservation, I think that adding this will only add another distraction to our economy and leave America in more debt than it already is. If Bush is trying to protect his reputation, I don't think that such a rash decision as this will help anything, it'll only make things worse.
The second article, titled "Bush's seven deadly environmental sins," has me leaving with different questions. Bush's first sin is listed as, "Bush Sin 1: Blew hot air on global warming." This is when he refused to agree to mandatory greenhouse gas emission reductions. My question is why didn't he do anything about this environmental issue before putting his focus on a whole new one? Bill McKibben, an author and climate activist says, "The most shameful thing we've done of all is to walk away from the international debate on climate, which has crippled the debate and caused everyone in the world to think that we're hypocritical and deluded." Personally, I disagree with statement. The reason is because climate isn't everything. Sure it affects the earth and we should know about the weather and all of that, but there's also other focuses in life that are more important. Maybe it's time to educate people about climate so that they know where they're money is going as well as the effects of climate change, but for now I just think were spending way too much money on an issue that not many people feel passionate about or even know about. Bush made a quick decison, he made promises that he didn't fulfill, but once again people make mistakes and I applaud him for his courage and perservation and sticking out his term till the very end, considering all the bashing he was getting from literally all directions.
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