And what are some of those issues on which Obamacons will immediately find themselves in opposition to the new administration? A few present themselves to me right off the bat:
- Any attempt to reintroduce the so-called “Fairness Doctrine.” While I understand some in Congress might be interested in this, I’d be surprised to see the Obama administration make it a priority. It would sow a lot of division in the country without achieving anything substantial for the Democrats. After all, in today’s communications environment (Internet, satellite radio, etc.), it’s not like they could actually achieve what they want here: shutting up conservative talk radio. Obama has said he’s not in favor of reimposing the Fairness Doctrine, but he hasn’t said he’d veto such a bill if Congress sends it to him. He should veto it.
- Any sort of “card-check” legislation. Unions want to make it easier to pressure workers to unionize, eliminating secret-ballot elections and instead triggering a union when enough workers have been leaned on to fill out a card. Hopefully the less-than-60 margin in the Senate will force Democrats to compromise on something far short of this. But organized labor is waiting for its payoff, and an Obama administration is going to be eager to give them something. Unionization is tremendously destructive to the economy, and, on one of my pet topics, this would also be a disaster for charter schools (which Obama says he supports). Conservatives should fight this with everything they have.
- Installing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at the EPA. The guy is a nut and a conspiracy theorist (OK, maybe those are the same thing). It’s not that I’d expect to like any Obama EPA head, but he’d be a very bad appointment.
Those are just off the top of my head. There will, I’m sure, be more.
(On the plus side, I find the choice of Rahm Emanuel comforting. For all his Kumbaya talk, if Obama’s campaign taught us anything it’s that he’s a ruthlessly effective executive. And anyone who thought Obama would be weak on Israel, I just don’t see that happening when he’s flanked by Joe Biden and Rahm Emanuel.)
Keep RFK out of EPA
The job at the EPA calls for someone with a keen sense of both ethics and science. Kennedy is not that person.
The following letter was written in support of Robert H. Boyle (founder of Riverkeeper and author of “The Hudson River, A natural and unnatural history”) and others who resigned from Riverkeeper rather than support R. F. Kennedy, Jr.’s compromise of the principle that ethics must never be separate from science.
This letter was first published in the Putnam County News and Recorder, Cold Spring, New York, on August 30, 2000 and they have carried it on their website ever since for which they have my thanks. (AHS, 2008)
Letters:
Supports Former Riverkeeper Board Members’ Action
Editor,
The Fishkill Ridge Caretakers, Inc. supports Robert H. Boyle, former president of the Riverkeeper, Inc. and former Riverkeeper, Inc. board members John Fry, treasurer, Nancy Abraham, Kathryn Belous Boyle, Pat Crow, Theresa Hanczor, Robert Hodes, Ann Tonetti and Alexander Zagoreas in the action they have taken in resigning from Riverkeeper in opposition to the hiring of a convicted environmental felon to serve in the position of staff scientist on the staff of Riverkeeper.
In issuing this statement of support, The Fishkill Ridge Caretakers wishes to emphasize that ethics cannot be separated from science and that the environmental movement will prosper best in an atmosphere of demonstrated personal responsibility and earned mutual respect.
We encourage individuals as well as environmental organizations to join us in similar expressions of support for the principled stand taken by Boyle and fellow board members in their defense of the ethical integrity of the environmental movement here in the Hudson River Valley.
Boyle and 8 of the 22 Riverkeeper board members resigned from Riverkeeper, Inc. in protest of the hiring of William Wegner. For eight years Wegner operated a ring of smugglers who stole bird eggs directly from the nests of protected cockatoo species in Australia. Wegner and his ring then smuggled the eggs by air to the United States. Birds that hatched and survived were then sold for as much as $12,500.00 each. A federal judge accepted Wegner’s plea of guilty to charges of conspiracy and tax fraud and sentenced him to five years in prison. The judge also found that Wegner had attempted to obstruct justice by committing perjury at the trial of a co-defendant Wegner paid a $10,000.00 fine.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has stated that everyone deserves a second chance and notes that he himself had been given a second chance in that he had once been convicted of a drug offense.
We note, however, that Kennedy’s offense was essentially a victimless crime while Wegner’s offense was a crime against the environment, the people of Australia, the people of the United States and against the birds. In order to avoid detection during the flight, smugglers flushed newly hatched chicks down the plane’s toilet
Although Wegner has been convicted and served his sentence, nothing he or anyone else can do will correct the damage he has done or make his victims whole again.
Wegner’s prison sentence seems to have done little to improve his ethical sense. The resume Wegner submitted to Riverkeeper accounts for his period of incarceration without referring to the fact of the incarceration itself Wegner describes work he performed and omits the significant information that he performed this work while he was serving time as a prison inmate.
Kennedy overstepped his position as attorney for Riverkeeper when, in November of 1999, he hired Wegner. Boyle terminated Wegner after learning of the hiring and upon review of Wegner’s resume, court records and media accounts. The matter came to a climax at a board meeting on June 20th when Kennedy insisted that Wegner be rehired over Boyle’s objection.
While we hope Riverkeeper continues to work to produce changed human beings who think and act differently in regard to the Hudson River and all that pertains to it, we also recognize the primary mission of Riverkeeper is not the rehabilitation of Wegner or of those like him.
Sincerely,
Anthony Henry Smith
Fishkill
(for The Fishkill Ridge Caretakers)
(Fishkill Ridge Community Heritage, a separate organization, has also supported this letter from their beginning.)