I hate to be that cynic but it sounds like you need better conections like Dupont. You are probably not contributing political donations to the right people...etc. etc.
Sadly I don't think your cynicism is misplaced. I'm just back from a trip to Washington where the advice we got was essentially setup an industry group and hire a lobbyist. Am curious to see if it makes things easier.
Setting up and industry group and hiring a lobbyist is not at all the same thing as making wink wink campaign donations.
Having done work in the environmental space, I do think the cynicism is misplaced. EPA isn't constrained because of well placed campaign donations. It's constrained because a huge part of the country believes that God literally gave us the earth to use up and considers any environmental regulation to be unamerican. Not to mention that every attempt at regulation is met with the same response: "it'll kill jobs."
Do big chemical companies have lots of lobbyists? Sure. Their job is to point out to Congresscritters every bit of uncertainty in the science (of which there is a lot), to reinforce what they already believed. Those companies don't need to make big donations to get their way--they just have to tell Congresspeople how many good blue collar factory jobs they create in their district. It's the environmental groups that really benefit from lobbying.
