One example: the Great Lakes are seriously deteriorating in the face of a host of environmental problems including toxic contaminants, invasive species, polluted watersheds, loss of wetlands, and deteriorating beaches. In recent decades Congress has passed a number of bills aimed at restoring the Great Lakes, the most recent being the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative of 2010. Designed to address the environmental degradation of the Great Lakes, it began as an impressive effort that engaged in numerous projects from Minnesota to New York, which were beginning to make a difference. Now, however, according to a Politifact.com posting the recent cut-to-the-bone frenzy on Capitol Hill has adversely affected the funding of restoration projects sufficiently to render the whole initiative "stalled." Given the way our planet is progressively losing natural habitat after habitat, "stalled" is not really stalled. It represents just one more failure to effectively address the conditions that are destroying our natural environment.In the white heat of today's angry, irrational political environment, we have lost our sense of balance and put short-term irritations at the top of the agenda and long-term needs and solutions at the bottom. Those who are so desperate to reduce government spending drastically should realize what we are losing in the process—much that is good, worthy, and open to no other solutions than by that spending. The Great Lakes lay at the very heart of our continent, and their slow but evidently inevitable death will have a huge impact on all of us. Coupled with the horrific things we have done to the Gulf of Mexico, one can only feel a deep sadness at what we have already lost and troubled at what we are going to lose.
