Who Is John Skvarla?

We were reminded last night that John Skvarla, McCrory's appointment to head the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), apparently believes the far-right fringe theory that oil and natural gas are actually renewable resources, that the earth is continually making more of it and that the federal government is covering up the truth, and he's the guy who told the employees at DENR that they must be more "customer friendly," which means "be very accommodating to polluting industries," and so how is that working out for you, North Carolina?

Skvarla is also not sure whether global climate change is real, echoing the opinion of his boss The Guv.

That genius of science John Skvarla has said, of the current crisis on the Dan River (and of every other leaking coal ash pit in North Carolina owned by Duke Energy -- there are 13 of them, and they are ALL already leaking toxins into ground water), that it would be scientifically unwise to relocate those ash pits to lined landfills away from water sources.

What he meant to say was that relocating Duke Energy's toxic waste would be injurious to Duke Energy's profit margin, but, hey! what's a little slip of the tongue among renown scientists?