THE TYRANNY OF THE GREENS.(ISSUES & INSIGHTS)(EDITORIALS)

Early on, President Bush suspended a stricter standard on arsenic in drinking water. The supposed defenders of the environment were enraged. Never mind there's no science that backs their fury. Behold the tyranny of the greens.

These defenders, of course, didn't want you to know that Bill Clinton had lived with the higher standard (50 parts per billion) for eight years; he ordered the lower limit (10 ppb) just days before he left the White House. Or that many Democrats (including Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle) last year opposed new rules that would cut arsenic levels in drinking water.

Arsenic is an element basic to life. In high concentrations it can cause harm, as countless mystery novels tell us.

But there's no science that says it's an immediate threat, no research that says 10 ppb is the magic number that will end all risk. There's just an estimate by the Environmental Protection Agency that the stricter limits would save three bladder cancer deaths a year.

But who pays to avert those three deaths? Water customers. They'd have to pay out an extra $605 million a year to comply with the stricter standards.

The costs go beyond money. A joint study by the American Enterprise Institute and the Brookings Institution reported: "After taking into account the indirect impacts of the cost of the rule on items like health care expenditures . . . we find that the rule is likely to result in a net loss of about 10 lives annually."

Hmm. Ten more dead if lawmakers bow and scrape to the green tyrants.