Carol Browner, head of the EPA, had this to say about a May decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia: ``The courts robbed us of that opportunity [to `reduce pollution'], but we're not giving up.''

In a case brought by the American Trucking Association, the Court ruled that the EPA had exceeded its authority under the Clean Air Act with its sweeping new 1997 standards for particulate matter and ozone emissions. This edict concerned ``PM_2.5s,'' or particulate matter down to 2.5 microns, 28 times smaller than the width of a human hair. The rules would have cost at least $46 billion, destroyed businesses, and saved not a single life, according to economist Walter Williams.

The Court ruled that the section of the 1990 Clean Air Act upon which the EPA relied in issuing the regulations was an ``unconstitutional delegation of legislative power.'' In other words, the EPA was making laws rather than enforcing them.

Williams observed: ``Other government agencies are guilty of the same thing, so the court's decision could have far-reaching implications. The decision also sends a message to Congress that it should do its job of legislating, rather than passing it off to politically unaccountable agencies and courts.''

The National Resources Defense Council called the ruling a ``bad day for public health.'' The Sierra Club and the American Lung Association both ``expressed outrage that one of their most powerful tools had been broken,'' according to the Society for Environmental Truth (Torch, May-June, 1999).

The news media, ``with their typical economics misunderstanding,'' stated Williams, ``described the court's decision as a major victory for a broad range of industry groups from trucking companies to electric utilities....We can label it a business victory ... only if the rest of us don't benefit from lower-cost trucking and electricity.'' Three states (Ohio, Michigan, and West Virginia) were also plaintiffs.

Even though the panel of experts assembled by the EPA came to the conclusion that evidence for the claimed health benefits was lacking, the Court focused on the nondelegation doctrine and did not confront the issue of courts' tendency to rely on government-sponsored science.

The EPA requested the full court to rehear the case and is expected to appeal all the way to the Supreme Court. In the meantime, the EPA has possibly found a strategy to bypass the decision. This method relies on petitions from four states that claim they cannot meet older smog standards because of pollution blowing in from other states. On that basis, the EPA thinks it can force these states to reduce emissions further.

Some see the EPA's new standards, which put more than 700 counties out of compliance, as a way to the back-door implementation of the Kyoto Protocol without Senate ratification.

As controls tighten, it is increasingly urgent to investigate carefully the sources of ``air pollution.'' Even if the EPA managed to shut down all human sources, it could not thoroughly clean the atmosphere, as it has no jurisdiction over the primary source of tropospheric ozone and smog: plants, such as crops, trees, and grass.

No matter what the EPA does, the VOC level is likely to increase in coming years. NASA's projections of solar cycles indicate that we are on the upswing of a rather severe solar period expected to peak within the next few years. Additionally, there is a population explosion of trees in North America, with annual forest growth exceeding harvest by 37%.

In response, governmental agencies are attacking industry, especially the paint industry, which is responsible for 2% of the anthropogenic VOCs in North America, or 0.2% of the total VOCs. For example, the South Coast Quality Air Management District of Southern California is determined to proceed with Rule 1113. An estimated 85% of all coatings used to maintain infrastructure in southern California will be banned by 2006.

The lawlessness of the EPA dates back to June 14, 1972, when Browner's predecessor William Ruckelshaus made a one-man decision to ban DDT in the U.S., ignoring 8,300 pages of testimony and the findings of the hearing examiner and most scientists. Afterward, Ruckelshaus ruled on the appeal of his decision (in his own favor), refused to comply with the Freedom of Information Act, and defied the National Environmental Policy Act by refusing to file an Environmental Impact Statement on the disastrous consequences of his decision.

Now, the U.N. is considering a worldwide ban on DDT, relying on a Roll Back Malaria campaign that promotes development of [as yet nonexistent] new drugs and a vaccine, and does not even mention spraying houses with DDT. Meanwhile, a child dies of malaria every 12 seconds, and for every person who dies, 200 survivors are burdened by disease that saps their productivity. In South Africa, malaria rates are up 500% in recent years, and the disease kills far more people than AIDS. ``For the sake of a possible environmental threat to birds of prey in the `civilized' world, millions of people in developing countries are dying'' (Wall St J 9/2/99).

``Even when he stands by himself, the truly indoctrinated communist must be part of the collective. He must be incapable of hearing opposing ideas and facts, no matter how convincing or how forcibly they bombard his senses. A trustworthy communist must react in an automatic manner without any force being applied'' (E. Hunter, Brainwashing: The story of the men who defied it, Pyramid Books, 1956.)

``Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be heeded will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten....Every year fewer and fewer words, and the range of consciousness always a little smaller....The Revolution will be complete when the language is perfect....'' (George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four, 1949).