If there is anything the Radical Right hates more than the New Deal (and all of FDR’s legacy), it’s the Endangered Species Act. mjh
ES&T Online News: Hidden ties: Big environmental changes backed by big industry by PAUL D. THACKER
Lobbyists and industry officials who once pushed for the president’s Healthy Forests legislation now collaborate with Rep. Pombo to alter the Endangered Species Act.
Since President Bush took office, Republicans have successfully pushed through major reforms that target regulations for power-plant emissions and the management of federal forests. During his 2004 campaign for reelection, the president praised his Healthy Forests initiative as “a good, common-sense policy.” This year, the Republican-led Congress is gearing up for yet another “common-sense” reform to a major piece of environmental legislation—the Endangered Species Act (ESA). …
The movement to alter ESA is being led in Congress by Rep. Richard Pombo (R-CA), a rancher from California and the powerful chair of the House of Representatives’ Committee on Natural Resources. …
To write the bill, Pombo called on the help of Steve Quarles, a lobbyist who works for the timber industry. “I spent a great deal of time with Pombo’s staff,” Quarles told ES&T, and during that time he helped write the bill. …
Practically a Washington, D.C., institution, Quarles has long worked to shape environmental laws to favor corporations. During the debate over the president’s Healthy Forests legislation, Quarles lobbied for its passage on behalf of the American Forest and Paper Assoc., the largest trade group for the forest products industry. Previously, he represented the American Forest Resource Council (AFRC), a group that lobbies for management of public lands to favor industry.
Wigley, too, has a long history with the timber industry. … For the 2002 elections, Wigley raised $327,100 from timber companies, such as Weyerhaueser and Boise Cascade. This money was then handed out to Republicans running for state offices in Oregon. Before joining OFIC, Wigley worked as a press officer for Georgia Pacific, one of the world’s largest forest-products corporations. His biography also states that he is a graduate of the American Campaign Academy, a group created by advisers to former Rep. Newt Gingrich to train Republican political operatives. …
Jim Peterson of the industry-funded Evergreen Foundation was quoted calling Project Protect a “hardball approach” to get the president’s bill signed. “It’s not a warm, fuzzy PR campaign,” he said. “It’s a fight to the finish. We intend to work behind the scenes with industry associations with much of the PR off the radar screen by design.” …
Wigley wrote in February 2005, he revealed his own views on Project Protect. “When I directed the healthy forests battle two years ago, I had to change the way the forest products industry talked,” he wrote. “We didn’t change our goals—just the way we communicated.” …
“Some people call it Astroturf,” said Ken Gross, a lawyer who specializes in ethics and campaign-finance cases. Unlike traditional grassroots groups that may consist of local activists meeting in someone’s living room, these new operations are backed by corporate money and run like professional political campaigns. “It’s not mom-and-pop; it’s highly sophisticated, with well-compensated people. …”
An October 2005 Harris Poll found that 74% of Americans believe that “protecting the environment is so important that requirements and standards cannot be too high, and continuing environmental improvements must be made regardless of cost.”
Senate urged to safeguard species act By Erica Werner, Associated Press Writer
As a Senate committee prepares to take up revisions to the Endangered Species Act, nearly 6,000 biologists from around the country signed a letter Wednesday urging senators to preserve scientific protections in the landmark law.
The House passed an Endangered Species Act rewrite last year that many scientists and environmentalists viewed as extreme. Interest groups are lobbying to ensure that legislation expected soon from the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will be an improvement.
“Unfortunately, recent legislative proposals would critically weaken” the law’s scientific foundation, said the letter organized by the Union of Concerned Scientists. The 5,738 signers included six National Medal of Science recipients.
“For species conservation to continue, it is imperative both that the scientific principles embodied in the act are maintained, and that the act is strengthened, fully implemented, and adequately funded.”