It may be the sort of birthday where someone shouts, “50 candles blazing on the cake? Are you crazy? Why don’t we just fill a pinata with cow methane while we’re at it???”

I’m speaking of the 50th anniversary of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). President Richard Nixon proposed the independent executive agency on July 9, 1970 (fun fact: “EPA” was the only term on that particular Nixon tape with fewer than FOUR letters) and it began operation on December 2, 1970.

(This was mere weeks before Elvis Presley’s famous meeting with Nixon in the Oval Office. Nixon would mai...