New Trump Executive Order -- pointless grovel to polluters, a poke at our planet

The four-unit Colstrip power plant in Montana, located about 100 miles east of Billings. Puget Sound Energy is shutting down two old, dirty 1975-vintage units. Two newer units, Colstrip 3 and 4, are on life support. . less The four-unit Colstrip power plant in Montana, located about 100 miles east of Billings. Puget Sound Energy is shutting down two old, dirty 1975-vintage units. Two newer units, Colstrip 3 and 4, are on life ... more Photo: James Woodcock, AP Photo: James Woodcock, AP Image 1 of / 17 Caption Close New Trump Executive Order -- pointless grovel to polluters, a poke at our planet 1 / 17 Back to Gallery

Whatever dirty falsehoods flow from the Oval Office on Tuesday, when Donald Trump rolls back President Obama's Clean Power Plan, the flackery for fossil fuels cannot refute reality.

Trump is trying to kill, with an Executive Order, a plan designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions even while giving the coal industry a soft landing with old, dirty power plants.

The order will not restore America's coal industry, which is coughing and gasping about as much as a young child living downwind from a coal plant.

The reason: Economics. "King Coal" has lost a massive amount of its market to natural gas. Renewable energy sources are thriving. Once planned coal plants have been scrubbed by the dozens. Even China is shutting down its dirtiest coal pits.

Here in the Northwest, Washington's Centralia coal plant is being phased out. The Portland Gas & Electric Boardman plant, Oregon's only coal power plant, will close by December 31, 2020. Puget Sound Energy is due to shut its vintage Colstrip 1 & 2 power plants by July 1, 2022, possibly earlier. Colstrip 3 & 4 are on life support, or -- more accurately -- Montana Legislature support.

In pondering Trump's promises to Big Coal, one is reminded of a classic long-ago Bill Mauldin cartoon showing France's Gen. Charles DeGaulle in a hospital bending over a skeleton labeled "Colonialism." The caption: "Where there's life, there's hope."

The second truth is that, far from a hoax -- as the ignorant, blustering Trump once claimed -- overwhelming evidence supports scientific findings on rapid, human-caused global warming. The consequences are out there for the eye to see, or for the body to feel in heat waves and monster storms.

The U.S. Geological Survey has monitored the South Cascade Glacier since the 1950's. It has receded rapidly and dramatically. The Grinell Glacier, in Glacier National Park, has virtually vanished since the author climbed up to it a half-century ago.

As a kid, this writer worked at UW Prof. Dr. Arthur Harrison's measuring project on Mt. Baker's Coleman and Roosevelt Glaciers. Both were slowly advancing at the time.

The tongues of the Roosevelt Glacier was descending and curling around either end of a cliff., The Roosevelt was -- literally -- a bear to measure. A large black bear on Bastille Ridge took an active dislike to Harrison's bench marks, constantly knocking them down.

The glacier has since galloped in the other direction. Ice sheets advance and retreat, but the speed of its recession -- seen in glaciers from Alaska's Prince William Sound to South Georgia Island in the South Atlantic -- is remarkable and unprecedented.

The third truth is that Americans have not heard the truth, or not nearly often enough.

Scandalously, self-absorbed, self-important New York and D.C.-based TV networks have shortchanged reporting on climate science. Sunday talk shows dwell on trivialities of the latest power games. Leading researchers must share time time with scientific strumpets in the employ of Big Coal and Big Oil. Very little time, that is.

The nation's polluters have borrowed tactics used by the tobacco industry for decades to delay and confuse the public, and evade responsibility.

The House Science Committee has sought to investigate the investigators, taking out after those seeking to find out what Exxon knew -- and when -- about buildup of carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere and its consequences.

Earth Day 2017 is taking the theme, "A March for Science," with thousands of people in white lab coats likely to be seen in the streets on April 22nd.

Millions of Americans should join them. The first Earth Day drew 20 million people. A vast turnout is needed to breach the glacial indifference of the TV networks, and the toxic smokescreen of disinformation on Fox News.

President Trump is groveling to polluters, and playing to the cheap seats, with his Executive Order. It is time form citizens to stand, as members of human family, in defense of what the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer calls "the Earth, our island home."

Yes, island. And that's why we must keep it inhabitable.