One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

Year in review: week 14 (April 1-7), 2014

A winding path in Zierikzee

Just imagine for a moment that we are in April 2025, and you would read a press announcement like:

"The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced new emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks, buses and other large vehicles. The rules will avoid up to one billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions over the next three decades and provide 13 billion dollars in net benefits through fewer hospital visits, lost work days, and deaths".

In April 2025, Americans may be lucky if the EPA still functions (or even exists) since the majority of the voters preferred a president who seems set to dismantle at least some of the EPA programs, especially those related to climate and pollution control. His desire to "restore energy dominance" does not seem to align with environmental and health considerations for his voters.

Yet, this press announcement was made only half a year ago, in the first week of April; we're midway between those two moments that feel like opposite sides of a coin.

Vladimir Lenin is not a likely inspiration for Donald Trump. Still, when I looked at that announcement of last April and considered the prospect of Trump's environmentally destructive plans, I thought Lenin best captured my sentiments about nonlinear American progress: "One step forward, two steps back; it happens in the lives of individuals and in the history of nations."