Orwellian Newspeak on climate change

A report on the state of the environment that the Environmental Protection Agency
will release soon shows evidence of the Orwellian Newspeak that characterizes so
many Bush administration pronouncements. According to the New York Times, the
original E.P.A. draft of the report's section on global climate began with the words,
"Climate change has global consequences for human health and the environment
change."

That seems admirably clear and sensible.

After Bush's people did their linguistic massage, however, the section now reads,
"The complexity of the Earth system and the interconnections among its components
make it a scientific challenge to document change, diagnose its causes, and develop
useful projections of how natural variability and human actions may affect the global
environment in the future."

If one of my students gave me a paper with such babble, I'd recommend an emergency
visit to the campus Writing Center.

Evidently, the EPA report deletes any mention of the likelihood that pollution from
automobiles and industrial production contributes to climate change. Perhaps its
time to demand an immediate ceasefire in the Bushies undeclared war
on the English language.