Jefferson Policy Journal

By Paul Driessen and David Wojick
Part 1 of a 3-part series
It’s obscene enough when the Multilateral anti-Development Banks do it. But Trump agencies?!?
In a prime example of Deep State revanchism, despite the profound change in administrations, the US Agency for International Development is still funding and advancing anti-energy Obama-era climate change dogmas and policies for developing countries. USAID handles tens of billions of dollars a year, roughly half of all US foreign aid, so this climate alarmism puts literally millions of lives at risk.
USAID calls its “flagship” program “low emissions development.” Emissions of course means plant-fertilizing, life-giving carbon dioxide – but the term is intended to suggest dangerous climate changing pollution. The effect, if not the intent, is to deprive poor countries of the enormous life-enhancing benefits of abundant, affordable electricity and fossil fuels, which created the health and wealth Americans enjoy.
The President and Congress need to terminate this poverty-perpetuating carbon colonialism – which USAID prefers to describe in this deceptive, eco-virtuous language:
“Enhancing Capacity for Low Emission Development Strategies (EC-LEDS) is a flagship U.S. program that has forged partnerships with more than two dozen developing countries from Colombia to Indonesia to South Africa to Ukraine committed to and taking concrete actions to achieve low emission development. Under EC-LEDS, USAID, the State Department and other U.S. agencies work with partner countries to help develop tools and analyses to estimate GHG emissions and identify and pursue the best options for low emission growth.”
In fact, says the agency, “this new development strategy marks the first time climate change will play a central role throughout the entire agency’s development efforts.” [emphasis added]
USAID itself could never function under the low-emission standards it imposes on nations that struggle daily with rampant poverty, disease, malnutrition and premature death. Its employees could never run their own homes and lives under such standards. They would never tolerate having those restrictions imposed on them (though this might be a fascinating exercise that would bring out their true colors).
Eco-imperialist aid policies did not end with Obama’s exit
As we have noted (here, here and here), Multilateral anti-Development Banks use similar claims and language to justify their eco-imperialist, anti-fossil-fuel policies and lending practices. But especially during the Obama era, the State Department, its USAID operations and other US government agencies also prevented poor countries from using oil, natural gas, coal and modern farming technologies.
That this continues is despicable. That even Trump State Department representatives to the 2017 Climate Summit in Bonn, Germany were advancing Obama policies is intolerable. It needs to end, now.
The refusal of these “public servants” to be part of the new Administration is pure Deep State, guided in part by an Obama era document, “USAID Global Climate Change and Development Strategy 2012-2016.” Their plan is clearly based on climate alarmism that is increasingly rooted in computer models and hysterical claims that bear little resemblance either to global temperature trends over the past 20 years or to the actual history of droughts and extreme weather over the past century. The document asserts:
“Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our generation. USAID – as part of the broader [Obama] Presidential Global Climate Change Initiative (GCCI) – is addressing this challenge in ways that recognize both its severity and the opportunities clean economic growth presents to spur innovation and encourage investments that will have long lasting environmental and development benefits. If we support countries to build climate resilience and move towards a ‘low carbon’ economic growth pathway, we can help provide more stable and prosperous futures for the U.S. and for our partners, including new markets for clean technology and expansion of the green economy. Alternatively, if we are unable to meet this challenge, climate change could jeopardize many of the development gains the international community and the U.S. government have worked for decades to secure.”
The policy was implemented in 2012. But 18 months after Mr. Trump was sworn in, current USAID national and regional websites – as well as the strategy document itself – still say it remains in effect and still “guides our work helping countries transition to lasting and climate-resilient, low-emission economic development.” They say the policy is “Extended to September 2018,” and suggest that the “StratPlan” will be kept in force even if it technically expires in September.
“Clean energy activities help countries attract the private investment they need to scale up sustainable and cost-effective renewable energy, minimizing pollution and keeping pace with today’s changing energy landscape,” the documents claim. Moreover, the dogma will be “integrated” and implemented across all USAID activities: “Integration activities ensure climate change knowledge and practice is applied, where appropriate, across USAID’s development portfolio to protect U.S. investments from unforeseen risks.”
“Sustainable” energy thus ties into UN climate alarmism, alleged risks of “imminent resource depletion,” avoidance of “over-consumption,” and funding, guiding and imposing policies and programs that limit the number of people around the world who might achieve the middle and upper class living standards that USAID, UN, IPCC, World Bank and EU technocrats (and their environmentalist allies) already enjoy.
These governing elites fear that newly middle class families would want more stuff: cars, real houses, refrigerators, stoves, lights, and vacations to exotic locales now enjoyed mostly by UAID officials and other climate conference attendees. Extending these “privileges” to “middle class wannabes” would require taking more resources out of the ground, which would hurt Mother Earth.
Therefore, these billions of people who have electricity only a few hours a week, who “enjoy” life on the edge of the disease and starvation abyss, must be permitted to improve their lives only a little; only to the extent that it would conform to UN and USAID climate, sustainability and over-consumption guidelines; only as much as could be supported by wind and solar energy, subsistence farming and bed nets.
Trump USAID Administrator Mark Green should have terminated this travesty his first day at the helm. At the very least, he, the White House and Congress should now serve notice that it will be rescinded in toto August 31– and then make sure it is totally repealed, defunded and shut down September 1.
Rescission must be active, not passive. It must cover all US and overseas USAID budgets, personnel, strategic plans, policies, “guidance” and policy statements, websites and other items that advance these climate, sustainability and related agendas. Funds and personnel should be reassigned, and Deep Staters complicit in perpetuating the programs after January 2017 should be disciplined or let go.
The Foreign Operations Appropriations bills now pending in the House and Senate provide all USAID funding, and are obvious vehicles for issuing permanent pro-energy, pro-people, pro-development rules.

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David Wojick is a former consultant with the Office of Scientific and Technical Information at the U.S. Department of Energy in the area of information and communication science. He has a Ph.D. in the philosophy of science and mathematical logic from the University of Pittsburgh and a B.S. in civil engineering from Carnegie Tech. He has been on the faculty of Carnegie Mellon and the staffs of the U.S. Office of Naval Research and the Naval Research Lab.

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Restaurant owners may know that open-faced sandwiches are regulated by the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA), part of the Department of Health and Human Services. But if a second piece of bread is added on top, it is regulated by the Department of Agriculture (USDA). That’s because the USDA has a very specific definition of a sandwich: two slices of bread with the meat in the middle. So, is a hot dog a sandwich? The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council says no, but the State of California says yes. How about a burrito? Massachusetts ruled that a burrito is not a sandwich, but New York says it is. A cheese pizza is regulated by the FDA, but add pepperoni and it becomes a USDA matter. When you make an omelet, FDA regulates the eggs you crack, but if you pour liquid eggs from a carton, it’s USDA.
Regulations can be confusing, sometimes because of vague wording, but often because of overlapping jurisdictions. It is not always obvious who is in charge. Clean water rules are under the jurisdiction of the EPA, but projects that might affect stream water require permits from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. A salmon or sturgeon swimming in the ocean is under the jurisdiction of the National Marine Fisheries Service, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce. But if the same fish swims upstream into a river, it becomes province of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, part of the Interior Department.
Pundits have made fun of such regulatory silliness for years. Hillary Clinton joked about the sandwich rules when running for the Senate 18 years ago. At least two presidents have cited the weird pizza rules, yet nobody did anything about the regulatory mess.
That is the impetus behind a new Trump Administration government reorganization proposal, which could have a dramatic effect on management of Interior, Commerce, USDA, and HHS, among others. In some areas, jurisdictional lines would become much clearer. For instance, all agencies that regulate food safety would be consolidated under the USDA, covering virtually all the foods we eat.
The “civil works” programs at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers would be moved to the Transportation and Interior Departments, which would better align those missions and eliminate much duplication. The Corps of Engineers is an unusual creature, a military agency headed by angeneral, which reports to a civilian at the Pentagon (Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works), and regulates economic activity that has nothing to do with the Army. The Corps owns and operates dams and water infrastructure, exactly like Interior’s Bureau of Reclamation does.
As an example, in my home State of Colorado, the Corps has Chatfield and Cherry Creek reservoirs, but Reclamation has Blue Mesa, Granby, McPhee, Ridgway, Rifle Gap, and a couple dozen others.
The Corps has always filled a vital military mission, from building fortifications at Bunker Hill, to pontoon bridges for Eisenhower to cross the Rhine. Over the decades, though, Congress also assigned numerous non-military projects like the Panama Canal and Washington Monument, simply because the Corps had engineering expertise. Congress never expected the unfathomable growth of government that resulted in duplicated expertise and conflicting standards across numerous agencies. The Corps is no longer the only agency with such expertise; today it is duplication – costly duplication.
The jurisdictional lines are perhaps most inexcusable in enforcement of the Endangered Species Act. Assigning virtually identical duties to the Fish and Wildlife Service (Interior) and the Marine Fisheries Service (Commerce) never made sense. The theory was that ocean species would be under one agency, land species another. But in practice, it isn’t nearly that clear. Interior has jurisdiction over endangered marine mammals such as manatees and sea otters, and for all sea birds. Commerce has jurisdiction over seals and sea lions, even when they go on land. But a sea turtle on land is under Interior until it jumps into the water, when it becomes a Commerce Department turtle.
Don’t bother trying to make sense of something that makes no sense. This is why such a reorganization is long overdue. There are other aspects of the proposal that might complicate the debate, and it is not at all certain that Congress will agree to any changes. The Obama Administration also tried, unsuccessfully, to consolidate at least the wildlife agencies.
Any change in DC always faces resistance. One report said, “The Washington inertia machine swung into inaction immediately following the release of the report.” Opposition is predictable, but wouldn’t it be nice, in at least some of these situations, to know who is in charge?

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