Nixon deserves much of the credit for the Environmental Protection Agency

I'm watching Bill Maher with almost no attention because I wanted to write this thread after hearing Maher interview Gina McCarthy from the U.S. Environmental Agency. The EPA. This thread isn't about the EPA pro-and-con, and if it goes that way I won't keep up, not an area of expertise and I've never studied or researched exactly what it's accomplishing. But the Maher interview showed me that it probably has its head in the right place and that yes, some pretty large accomplishments have taken place.

So this thread is about pointing out that Richard Nixon was the Father of the EPA. He gets some of the credit for each and every good thing that it's done, is doing, or will do. On this one Richard Nixon might deserve a standing ovation from all the hippies and yippies and all the other ies who really didn't like this guy. On this one, I must admit although yikes, applause for Dick Nixon!

So that is the real reason he got shoved out of the White House?

Give him credit for the EPA? Not so much.

Blame him for the EPA and what they have become...

A dangerously non-pc thread, sir... on a pc!

Yeah, the old jack-ass did a few things right... and he approached China, too... for good or ill.

Nobody is all bad... even tricky Dick.

I remember him from my childhood (well, the news ...not personally... and how he bored me... still does. There's something inherently boring about guys in suits acting serious... and menacing).

I also remember how friggin scary it was having the president cry on tv... eeek.

Howdy, Al, btw.

a reply to: Baddogma

Hey Baddogma. Yeah, I felt like giving Nixon an applause thread after realizing how much he did by championing and really being a key factor in the EPA. Hard to praise the man, for all the harm he did to the presidency in America, but yep, EPA, not bad Dick. Talking of, have you seen the movie 'Dick' with Kirstin Dunst and Michelle Williams? A very good film, history lesson, and just fun to watch. Esp. the ending.

Nixon was a tragedy in America (but for ..... EPA!). I saw him in person once and got his autograph as he walked by. I am proud to have the autograph of the man who was the backbone of the creation of the EPA. That, at least.

a reply to: Aleister

So this thread is about pointing out that Richard Nixon was the Father of the EPA. He gets some of the credit for each and every good thing that it's done, is doing, or will do. On this one Richard Nixon might deserve a standing ovation from all the hippies and yippies and all the other ies who really didn't like this guy. On this one, I must admit although yikes, applause for Dick Nixon!

Nyet, comrade Aleister. This version of history can be disputed. Richard Nixon does not deserve the credit for EPA.

Nixon signed the EPA to take away political power from Edwin Muskie, the environmental champion in the Senate, and Nixon's probable adversary in the '72 election.

By signing the "tough" EPA agency Nixon riled up many of his Republican industrialist campaign supporters, those same industrialists who were literally pumping toxic waste into our back yards, for 70 years at least. The clear cutters and the open pit mining companies using all sorts of toxic chemicals... there was a lot of politics involved in how the EPA sent things over to the Justice Department who would be responsible for going after the corporate polluters destroying the environment.

With the EPA Nixon was able to pick and choose which corporate industrialists polluters would be attacked or left alone. There were numerous delays allowed and many industrial polluting corporations were given years to comply.

Jack Anderson - EPA finding it tough to prosecute polluters who are Nixon fund raisers Nov 10 1973
news.google.com...

Fuel Shortage May delay Clean Air Apr 5 1973
news.google.com...



Nixon, the careful and conservative poker player signed the EPA, he didn't invite Edwin Muskie, who wrote it.


Nixon never intended to support it but only to gain political advantages against Muskie, and gain economic advantages for the Republican industrialist base. That is pure capitalism right there baby. Nixon knows the facts of life.

a reply to: SayonaraJupiter

Thank you for your very informative post. By hook or by crook, the act was passed in some form, and became a law which future Democratic administrative officials could use to actually assist the environment. So if the fear of Muskie caused Nixon (always the opportunist, seldom the opportune) to do something, even if watered down, along these lines, then fear was a motivator Nixon needed. He still did something which deserves, now, when the EPA is needed more than ever, a pat on a back (other than the Pat he already had on his back).

a reply to: Aleister

a reply to: Aleister

even if watered down, along these lines, then fear was a motivator Nixon needed. He still did something which deserves, now, when the EPA is needed more than ever, a pat on a back (other than the Pat he already had on his back).

I'm not so sure that Nixon was thinking about clean air or clean water when he snatched the environmental issue right out from underneath Muskie.... Nixon back-stabbed Muskie, rather brutally, and then the USA went straight into an energy crisis mode after that.

America had really bad industrial sewage and waste treatment facilities at that time... the industrialist capitalists built those facilities in the first place... the federal government bailed them out with the over $10 billion dollars needed to update the infrastructure for the sake of the environment. I guess if Nixon were willing to spend $4 billion bombing the s@#$%^ out of North Viet Nam he would also be willing to spend $10 billion on American pollution problems.... which problematically, would mean he would have to back-stab his own financial supporters and probably be branded a traitor by the Republican party.

That's some heavy stuff on Nixon's shoulders. Check this out. The EPA was actually created under "Reorganization Plan No. 3" by Executive Order en.wikipedia.org...

Nixon signs on EPA because he's throwing democratic tax money at a republican industrialist problems and destroying his main political rival at the same time. That's three aces. His fourth ace is that the EPA is an executive agency and the president can put anybody in there and you can be sure that they will all be political appointments... 4 of a kind.

On his last day as president Nixon stabbed the EPA in the back one more time. He walks away the next day 9 August 1974. A free man.
news.google.com...

add courtesy thumb for larger version.

a reply to: SayonaraJupiter

Thanks again, some great history. Cut the agency's funding on his last day in office, what a gift to his creation. In any case, he set it up, even if it was to undercut Muskie's campaign (enough to make him cry? I know, it was snow melting). But the main thing is that he did it, with an executive order as you say, and so left the agency in place for future president's to use, abuse, or ignore. So whatever work it gets done can be attributed to Nixon's spiteful undermining of another's campaign. I wonder if Nixon thought this up himself or if one of his aides came up with it. In any case, it was his signature and his initiative to go ahead, so, ah, (cough), Yay Nixon!?

a reply to: Aleister

I wonder if Nixon thought this up himself or if one of his aides came up with it. In any case, it was his signature and his initiative to go ahead, so, ah, (cough), Yay Nixon!?

Nixon's closest staff would absolutely be involved in the preparation and signing and witnessing and photographing and filming of Richard Nixon's signing of the EPA.

The Assistant Press Secretary Gerald Warren confirmed that It was not the "Muskie bill" anymore. In fact Nixon was signing ""Reorganization Plan No. 3"" which sounds a lot like something Stalin would do! Nixon was surrounded by marketing experts so they renamed it the Environmental Protection Agency for Tv purposes and Nixon signed it.



When Nixon signed the "Reorganization Plan No. 3" he had the blood of his enemy Edwin Muskie on his hands!

They could not invite Edwin Muskie because that would mean photographers would have pictures of Nixon sitting at a desk signing the "Muskie Bill"... with Edwin Muskie looming over him, to the left or to the right, whichever way. That situation would be totally unacceptable to the expert marketing people in the White House acting as the closest aides to the president of the United States.

It wasn't the "Muskie Bill" anymore. It was Richard Nixon's new executive agency the EPA. Nixon carpet bombed Viet Nam and Laos and Cambodia forever. Nixon is not an environmentalist! (unless you count the failure of the family farm in his early youth) but he is more like Stalin by cloaking his power grasp in terms of ecologically progressive marketing, in other words, propaganda.

Take a look at Abuse of Power www.amazon.com...

Let me give you a short version:

Nixon meets with his closest aides frequently. They play out different scenarios, recorded on White House tapes, in effect they are role playing against each other, as devil's advocates because - they trust each other enough to do that.

But Nixon's staff also kept very detailed diaries. The Secret Service also kept daily diaries on Richard Nixon movements - which includes all the times he ate dinner with BeBe Rebozo and almost every film he watched at the White House, Key Biscayne, San Clemente or other locations. There is a huge massive pile of Nixon era/Nixon administration books out there. People are still writing books about Watergate and the JFK conspiracy to this very day!

Perhaps the only thing we can know for sure is that History is tricky and we often underestimate it's tricks.
This was a good thread Aleister. We all needed to be better informed about how America's EPA stopped the industrial sewage into the environment... it evolved into granting billions of dollars to industrialists to clean up their act so Nixon signed the sewage treatment executive order.

I'm interested if you can show that Nixon was a concerned environmentalist during the time of his presidency or at any time, for that matter.

Richard Nixon didn't have an environmental compass. He let other people guide him on that issue. Sorry, no pat on the back from me!

a reply to: SayonaraJupiter

Another fine post. No, I don't claim Nixon was an environmentalist. This was his major environmental accomplishment, but still deserves a Pat (pun intended) on the back.

originally posted by: Aleister
a reply to: SayonaraJupiter

Another fine post. No, I don't claim Nixon was an environmentalist. This was his major environmental accomplishment, but still deserves a Pat (pun intended) on the back.

Aleister, If you have 2 more hours to spare for Tricky Dick....!


This is the back slapping Richard Nixon rightfully deserves. Three former Nixon appointees spoke at the Richard Nixon Foundation. They really don't say that Nixon was an environmentalist... they agree that Nixon created a very contentious centralized bureaucratic agency, his legacy was "he institutionalized the environment." - Dr. John Whitaker

Don Ruckleshaus actually said "He deserves a lot of credit... if he had not taken these initiatives... think if we had done nothing versus what we had done... well we would really be in the soup.... we'd be in terrible shape today." Ruckleshaus created a silly fallacy by saying "if we had done nothing". The American people demanded that something be done.

The first Earth Day on April 22, 1970 was a "seminal event", "part protest, part festival" represented a profound shift in the "public's attitude." The public's attitude was not shared by Richard Nixon.... Nixon didn't even take the time to have one of his aides type out a proclamation for Earth Day! "Domestic policy was secondary to him" - Christopher Demuth, who was only 22 years old at the time he served in Nixon's White House. Reorganization Plan No.3 was not signed until July 9.

"History is written from the perspective of the present day. We always rewrite history according to our own perspectives which is constantly in flux." - moderator of the panel, Dr. J. Brooks Flippen. Wow, that's some statement from the moderator, whoa horsey! We have the news clips on google news!!

In my personal opinion, this is what they do over at the Richard Nixon Foundation... they carefully rewrite Nixon's legacy. (they do it at all the other presidential foundations, too).

According to the publication "The Guardian: Origins of the EPA," President Nixon declared his intention to establish the Environmental Protection Agency with Reorganization Plan Number 3, dated July 9, 1970. Reorganization Plan Number 3 can be found in the Congressional Record, Vol 116, H 6523 (91st Congress, 2nd Session). After being cleared through hearings in the Senate and House of Representatives, the EPA came into being on December 2, 1970. Source publicaccess.supportportal.com...

"The president said he wanted me to figure out what was going on with these programs, he knew a little bit, he didn't know much about it," "Just go out and figure out what these programs are doing." - paraphrased by Christopher Demuth.

"I want to have a program that is bold that permits us to make real improvements in air & water pollution," The president said, "But, I don't want to go as far as Muskie. " - paraphrased by Christopher Demuth.

"Senator Edmund Muskie was a leading democrat in the US Senate.. he was one of the two or three Senators, all of them democrats... who had seized a leadership position in these early days of environmentalism, the other was Henry "Scoop" Jackson of Washington state."- paraphrased by Christopher Demuth.

"Muskie would close down all of American industry. I won't do that." "But, I do want to have a strong program." "He wanted to put himself in the middle." - paraphrased by Christopher Demuth. After this very small mention of Edmund Muskie there was no more talk about Muskie or the democrats, "the Muskie bill" or of the Muskie threat to Nixon's 1972 campaign.

Nixon told Demuth "I'll cover for you."

Again, just my personal opinion, what they are doing over at the RNF is to forge a new bronze bust of Nixon with an inscription that reads... "Nixon the Hero of the Environment"... when in fact Nixon is more like an anti-hero.

And then there was the Cohen scandal at the EPA in 1972...


Cohen wrote some memos that got leaked out. The gist of the memos was that Nixon was ready to accept "weakening amendments" to the EPA during the re-election year. This was considered helpful to Republican candidates, including himself, in the farm states.

Ruckleshaus was the one who fired Cohen at the EPA for the memos (there were seven of them). But, Cohen was in turn rewarded by Chuck Colson, one of Nixon's hatchet men, and soon (seven weeks later) hired back on the White House staff.

I think this is shows once again that Nixon was primarily interested in the environmental issues mainly for political advantages against his political enemies, imho.