Cuyahoga River on fire - Photo by Cleveland State Univ Library

On a Dark Road to Nowhere

Teddy Roosevelt is rolling over in his grave. The progressive conservationist and one-time republican knew that healthy air, clean water, and stewardship of natural resources are tantamount to a high quality of life. Fifty years before Donald Trump drew his first infantile breath, Roosevelt was championing national parks and cities beautiful. America gained stature in the world – not only from economic might – but from noble ideas and values shared. Roosevelt was a visionary.

The ideals he sowed led to further cultivation of good. From Aldo Leopold to Rachel Carson, we learned that ecology includes humans. Everything is interconnected; everything has consequence. Ignoring the science of climate change and elementary cause and effect will have dire consequences.

In just a few days, the new president has wrought unprecedented carnage on laws and institutions created to protect our land and its people. The Center for Disease Control cancelled a long planned conference on climate change and health. An executive order was signed to clear the way for the Dakota and Keystone XL pipelines – potentially locking-in carbon pollution for decades if the projects move forward. The administration imposed a freeze on EPA grants and contracts and may be considering legislation to ban the EPA from generating its own internal science. The EPA is the federal agency charged to “protect human health and the environment.” Leadership with our best interests in mind would encourage scientific inquiry and requisite oversight, not silence it.

Economies thrive and civilizations rise when challenged to adapt and improve. Prosperity is on the rise in states with high expectations and greater public investment. The mantra of cutting regulations is gross deception. We can’t forget silent springs and burning rivers (photo top), Love Canals or the gulf spills. Attempts to roll back environmental laws and agreements – some enacted decades ago with bipartisan support – can’t go unchecked. Which safeguard enacted to protect life and property is too much? Should billionaire-funded anti-regulatory agendas trump civil rules designed to benefit mankind?

Conservation, restoration, green infrastructure, clean energy, and smart public expenditure pay huge social and economic dividends:

Fighting climate change fuels innovation. Research grows jobs. Cutting pollution reduces healthcare costs. Creating open space and public amenities retains and attracts a motivated, productive workforce. Sustainability nurtures hope.


Other countries will build the renewable energy future if we don’t. They already are. We can be in the top tier or risk sliding into a dirty and dangerous, carbon-dependent oblivion. If that sounds alarmist, take a look at the basic impacts we’ve seen from fossil fuel extraction and distribution nationwide. Hundreds of thousands of abandoned oil and gas wells lay strewn across the country, 200,000 in Pennsylvania alone. Thousands of miles of streams have been contaminated by coal mining. Volatile and potentially explosive oil trains and pipelines pass by our homes, across sacred tribal lands, and through highly populated cities. Refineries pollute the very air we breathe. Degradation and injustice is un-American.

These strange and troubling times require a loud and unified chorus. Roosevelt said “It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.”

There is no choice but to resist. And we will.

On a Dark Road to Nowhere – By Brook Lenker, Executive Director, FracTracker Alliance


Feature Image Credit: Cleveland State University Library. The Cuyahoga River is a river in the United States, located in Northeast Ohio, that feeds into Lake Erie. The river is famous for having been so polluted that it “caught fire” in 1969. The event helped to spur the environmental movement in the US – via Wikipedia

2 replies
  1. John Dawes
    John Dawes says:

    Brook, you are so right about our environmental champions like President Theodore Roosevelt. Thank you for your inisight.

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