Congress would like a word with the EPA over that toxic mine spill thing

From Hot Air:

As I’m sure you recall by now, the EPA ran into a smidgen of trouble this summer when they went poking around in an abandoned gold mine and dumped three million gallons of heavy metal laden water into the local water supply out in Colorado. At the time I wondered if there was anyone who could hold the EPA accountable when they were the ones causing an environmental disaster. That seemed like more of a thought experiment than anything else because the EPA is supposed to be the ones policing such things. But now there may be a glimmer of hope. After stonewalling on all the questions being sent their way, the agency is being invited to come up to the hill for a little chat.

The focus on a toxic mine spill that fouled rivers in three Western states shifts to Congress this week as lawmakers kick off a series of hearings into how the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency accidentally unleashed the deluge of poisoned water.

Republican committee leaders in the House and Senate said EPA officials were frustrating their attempts to investigate the spill by withholding documents that could explain what went wrong when a cleanup team doing excavation work triggered the release of 3 million gallons of rust-colored sludge from the inactive Gold King Mine near Silverton, Colorado.

As this reports suggests, there are a couple of different angles being taken in the coming dog pile. The GOP members of the Science Committee are going to try to figure out why the documentation related to the Gold King mine has still not been released. As I’ve noted here before, the EPA isn’t generally sitting on sensitive national security documents which might endanger our readiness for a missile strike. In fact, the vast majority of their business involves things which are more likely to put you to sleep than alarm you. The fact that they don’t want to give up the goods seems to be a fairly persuasive indicator that there’s some serious butt covering going on here.

The exposure will do a lot of good. As a smart man once said, "sunlight is the best disinfectant."