Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: Watt protege in Cabinet

Tuesday, Jan. 2, 2001 | 9:11 a.m.

Mike O'Callaghan is the Las Vegas Sun executive editor.

President-elect George W. Bush will become our new president this month. Despite receiving at least 539,000 fewer popular votes than his opponent, he is the winner with 271 electoral votes. This is the tried and true U.S. system used to select our presidents.

With his victory comes the power to nominate the members of his Cabinet. Although he promised during the vote-counting fight in Florida to include some Democrats among his selections, this isn't binding. By the time this column is read he will probably have named somebody who proclaims to be a Democrat. Only the most naive people should expect the appointment of a Clinton, Carter or Johnson-style Democrat. Why should a president allow a fox inside his chicken house? It's his show for the next four years, and he will succeed or fail with what he produces or fails to produce.

A couple of Bush's appointments have and will draw fire, but will be approved by the Senate. One, Gale Norton, as interior secretary, has shaken the roots of conservationists all over the nation. Are some of these whiners the same greenies and tree-hugger extremists who voted for Ralph Nader because the Clinton-Gore team hadn't torn down enough dams or saved enough fuzzy worms?

The Wilderness Society says that the year 2000 was the best American land-protection period since 1980, when Jimmy Carter was in the White House. Society President William H. Meadows tells us that, "Bill Clinton now ranks as one of the most conservation-minded presidents in U.S. history."

So does the appointment of Norton, a protege of President Ronald Reagan's first Secretary of Interior James Watt, surprise the conservationists? It shouldn't, because even The Wilderness Society report recalls the recent campaign. "As we celebrate all these achievements, many conservationists wonder if the new year will bring a reversal of the momentum. On the campaign trail, George Bush and Richard Cheney expressed opposition to the roadless protection plan and the establishment of national monuments. They urged oil drilling in the Arctic Refuge. Sometimes, once elected, public officials adopt policies that differ from campaign rhetoric. Once the new administration considers its stewardship duties, we hope it will work with the conservation community to preserve our public lands and protect wildlife."

Lots of luck to the wishful thinkers. Sierra Club spokesman Allen Mattison views Norton as "James Watt in a skirt." Few public officials in our history have made environmental groups less happy than Watt as a Cabinet member and a founder of the Mountain States Legal Foundation, where Norton got her start.

According to the New York Times, not everybody is upset with Norton's appointment. The newspaper reports that, "Among the most enthusiastic responses to Ms. Norton's nomination today was from the Independent Petroleum Producers Association, whose 5,000 members represent 85 percent of the oil wells drilled in the United States. It said that Ms. Norton 'understands the issues in the West where federal land so dominates access to the natural resource base,' and that the organization was 'looking forward to working with her to address the energy supply problems that are so significant in our nation today.' "

Tell the caribou in the Arctic Refuge to move over so more oil can be produced and shipped to Japan, along with that already going there from other Alaskan wells.