Regulations? Fuck'em!

The Environmental News Network brings us some actions from der monkey that could go underreported this week, given the reasonably much larger story of Clarke and the 9/11 panel hogging all the attention.

Bush administration eases logging restrictions on logging old-growth forests.

...Allow[ing] forest managers to begin logging without first looking for rare plants and animals.

...The change was prompted by a timber industry lawsuit and is intended to increase logging on 24 million acres of public land.

The timber industry had complained for years that so-called "survey and manage" rules are intrusive and can take years to complete. Those rules require study of the potential effects of logging on about 300 plant and animal species.

And who would have thought Bush colud give two shits about the ozone layer.

U.S. fruit growers in Montreal this week will push for an increase in their use of a pesticide known to destroy the ozone layer, claiming that exemptions for developing nations on the chemical are unfair.

...The George W. Bush administration last year attempted to exempt farmers from the 2005 ban.