As I read about the people who Bush is appointing to key environmental
positions, I am reminded of the folks who during the campaign said there
was no difference between Bush and Gore regarding the environment.
Daryl Smith

Jack Eastman wrote:
>
> Bush Picks Industry Insiders to Fill Environmental Posts
>
> By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE
>
>
>
> Expanded Coverage
> Politics: White House
>
> Join a Discussion on The Environment
>
> ASHINGTON, May 9 Ð President Bush has filled several senior
> environment-related jobs in his administration with pro-business advocates
> who have worked on behalf of various industries in battles with the federal
> government, largely during the Clinton years.
>
> Mr. Bush has announced his intent to nominate a mining industry lobbyist as
> the No. 2 person at the Interior Department. He has chosen a lobbyist for
> the National Cattlemen's Beef Association to be the department's chief
> lawyer.
>
> His choice for No. 2 at the Environmental Protection Agency was a lobbyist
> for Monsanto, the chemical company now devoted to agribusiness. He wants as
> chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality a lawyer who represented
> General Electric in its fight with the E.P.A. over toxic waste sites.
>
> Many of these candidates share a pro-property rights philosophy as well as a
> libertarian leaning, and conservatives find this just the right approach.
> Supporters also say that the individuals selected are deeply familiar with
> the issues that will come before them, and that they will know how to
> balance environmental protection and economic interests.
>
> "We're real happy with the team that Bush is putting in," said Mike
> Hardiman, legislative director of the American Conservative Union.
>
> "After eight years of the extremist, anti-people, anti-access policies of
> the Clinton administration and its overzealous application of the Endangered
> Species Act and the shutdown of recreational access to public lands as well
> as the commercial access, we're now going to have more of a balance," he
> said.
>
> The list of intended nominees Ð most have not been officially nominated Ð is
> notable for the absence of picks from the environmental movement. Mr. Bush
> was considering John Turner, president of the Conservation Fund, for the No.
> 2 job at Interior, but Mr. Turner was dropped after strong opposition from
> Mr. Hardiman's group and others.
>
> In Mr. Turner's place, Mr. Bush has nominated J. Steven Griles, a mining
> industry lobbyist who once worked in the Interior Department under James
> Watt, President Reagan's first Interior secretary.
>
> "They are lawyers and lobbyists who built their careers by helping industry
> get out of environmental regulations," said Maria Weidner, policy advocate
> for the Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund. "Now, assuming they're confirmed,
> they will be doing the same thing, only the taxpayers will be paying for
> it."
>
> Business advocates assert that the industry credentials of the nominees does
> not necessarily foreshadow their approach in their new jobs.
>
> William L. Kovacs, vice president for environment, technology and regulatory
> affairs at the United States Chamber of Commerce, said that critics had
> portrayed the Bush team as anti-environment even as the president let
> stricter standards concerning diesel emissions and reporting on lead
> emissions go into effect.
>
> "I don't think that just because these people worked for business, you can
> call them pro-business," Mr. Kovacs said. "They're not as clear- cut as the
> enviros would like to paint them."
>
> Guided by the tone set at the top Ð from Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick
> Cheney to Gale A. Norton, the Interior secretary, and Christie Whitman, the
> E.P.A. administrator Ð these nominees will help determine what policies to
> advocate, what regulations to enforce and what litigation to pursue.
>
> They replace Clinton loyalists who came largely from strong environmental
> backgrounds. When President Bill Clinton took office, for example, his
> Interior secretary, Bruce Babbitt, was a former governor of Arizona but also
> head of the League of Conservation Voters. Mr. Babbitt put George Frampton,
> a former head of the Wilderness Society, in charge of fish, wildlife and
> parks; Mr. Frampton ended up in charge of the White House environmental
> council.
>
> Now, some former Clinton officials Ð many of whom work for environmental
> lobbying groups Ð complain that the Bush team generally views the
> environment as resources to be mined, logged and drilled.
>
> "Their collective orientation is clearly pro-development and
> pro-exploitation of public resources for the personal profit of various
> industries," said Dave Alberswerth, who worked at the Interior Department
> under Mr. Babbitt and is now at the Wilderness Society.
>
> Some holdovers Ð like Dale Bosworth, the new Forest Service chief, who was a
> regional forester in Montana Ð have not drawn environmentalists' fire. And
> Mr. Bush has yet to name picks for a handful of key posts.
>
> But many of those he has named at Interior, E.P.A. and other agencies with
> environmental oversight have corporate backgrounds and appear skeptical of
> the regulatory process. Most candidates declined to discuss their
> prospective roles before their Senate confirmation hearings.
>
> One of Mr. Bush's most influential choices would be John D. Graham as
> administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the
> Office of Management and Budget. If confirmed, Mr. Graham, a Harvard
> professor who has argued that the costs of most environmental regulations
> exceed their benefits, would be in charge of reviewing all regulations
> proposed by federal agencies.
>
> As he said in a 1996 speech at the Heritage Foundation, "environmental
> regulation should be depicted as an incredible intervention in the operation
> of society."
>
> Mr. Bush has also said he would nominate Linda J. Fisher to be deputy
> administrator of the E.P.A. Most recently she headed the government affairs
> office at Monsanto. Ms. Fisher served at the E.P.A. in the Reagan and first
> Bush administrations as director of the office of pesticides and toxic
> substances; assistant administrator for policy, planning and evaluation; and
> as chief of staff.
>
> Phil Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust, called her a
> "moderate, corporate-style Republican, not a hidebound conservative" and
> said Ms. Fisher was seen as "pretty reasonable by environmentalists" during
> her tenure as head of the agency's pesticide office.
>
> "But afterward," he said, "she headed Monsanto's lobbying operation while
> the company was trying to head off any government oversight of genetically
> engineered crops."
>
> Mr. Griles, the mining lobbyist picked as deputy Interior secretary, worked
> in the Reagan Interior department at a series of jobs, ending up as
> assistant secretary of lands and minerals management.
>
> He then became an executive at the United Company, a coal, oil and gas
> development company. Until recently he was a lobbyist for National
> Environmental Strategies, with clients including the National Mining
> Association, Occidental Petroleum, Edison Electric and the Coalbed Methane
> Ad Hoc Committee.
>
> John Grasser, a spokesman for the National Mining Association, said that Mr.
> Griles's industry experience was an important asset for his new post.
> "You've got to get the people who understand the issues," he said.
>
> And he disputed the complaint of environmentalists that the candidates were
> captives of industry. "When they get into these jobs, they have to walk
> somewhat of a middle line," Mr. Grasser said.
>
> William Geary Myers 3d is Mr. Bush's choice to be solicitor for the Interior
> Department. As lobbyist for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association and
> the Public Lands Council, Mr. Myers advocated pro-rancher positions. While
> most issues involved land access and water allocation, he also opposed
> reintroducing wolves in Yellowstone National Park and Idaho and supported
> the state of Montana in the killing of bison that wandered out of
> Yellowstone.
>
> Mr. Myers said this week that as the potential lawyer for the department,
> "my primary clients will be the president and the secretary." He said he
> would not characterize himself as pro-industry or anti-industry.
>
> For chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, Mr. Bush
> has picked James Connaughton, a partner at Sidley & Austin, a law firm that
> advises corporate clients and trade groups on environmental law. He has
> represented General Electric and Atlantic Richfield in fights against the
> E.P.A. about cleanup of Superfund sites.
>
> Mr. Bush's choice for assistant attorney general at the Justice Department
> for the environment and natural resources is Thomas Sansonetti, a lawyer
> from Wyoming who specializes in minerals and energy and is a member of the
> libertarian Federalist Society. As the solicitor at Interior in the first
> Bush administration, Mr. Sansonetti helped negotiate the Exxon Valdez
> oil-spill settlement.
>
> Other Interior nominees include Bennet William Raley, a lawyer who has
> represented farm interests, as assistant secretary for water and science,
> and Lynn Scarlett, president of the Reason Foundation, a libertarian group,
> as assistant secretary for policy, management and budget.
>
> "I don't like to tell people how to live their lives," Ms. Scarlett said.
> "If that means I'm gun-shy of mandates, where they'll undermine
> environmental performance, stifle innovation and heighten conflict, then
> I'll say so. But I think too often we judge environmentalism as being the
> equivalent of adherence to a particular statute rather than achieving
> specific results, and they're not the same thing."
>
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