I considered posting this in the GQ forum, but I know it can’t last there. Instead, I will embed the question in the folds of a blatantly partisan post, which seems more appropriate here.
Not long ago, I received an e-mail that stated that Senator Slade Gorton (R-WA) was being considered by the Bush camp for the office of Secretary of Interior if he loses his senatorial reelection bid. I was unable to confirm this story through wire services, and have some doubts as to the e-mail’s veracity. That’s the question part: does anyone have any hard information on this? As an added bonus, some lucky Doper has the opportunity to disprove this rumor and completely nullify this post.
Now, for the debate part. I do not like Senator Gorton. In my several years as a shameless, filthy, scum-sucking-elitist lobbying pig, I have only come across one member of Congress for whom I feel a genuine antipathy, and that’s the right honorable senator from Washington State. That’s my humble opinion, and these are some of the reasons why.
However, my opinion aside, I think there are several excellent reasons why Sen. Gorton should not be considered at all for the position of Secretary of Interior. Here are some of them, which are more fully covered in the above (unapologetically partisan) links:
-
Slade Gorton has an environmental track record that should concern a lot of people. I think I can safely go so far as to say that his interests are so blatantly influenced by the logging, mining, and fishing industries as to make the man not qualified for the position.
-
As Attorney General of Washington, Gorton openly defied a decision in Federal Court by refusing an Indian tribe treaty fishing rights on racial preference grounds. The 1978 rejection of Gorton’s appeal is one of the most sarcastic and thinly veiled threats by the Supreme Court in the last thirty years. Therefore, I submit that this man has demonstrated contempt for our justice system and should be considered unqualified for the position. I’ll find Justice Stevens’ (I think it was he) quote and post it when I have access to the case tomorrow.
-
One possible reason why Slade Gorton is all about denying treaty fishing rights to Indian tribes, denying funding to Native Alaskan villages, and increasing fish harvests in the Pacific Northwest in the face of declining populations is because he is the heir to the Gorton fisheries empire. I invite anyone interested to dissuade me from the belief that Slade Gorton is working in his own self-interest when it comes to fisheries law, and therefore should not be considered for the position of Secretary of Interior.
As SecInt, Gorton would have ultimate control over the National Parks, the Bureau of Reclamation, Fisheries, Surface Mining, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and a host of other underfunded bureaucracies that have languished largely as a result of Gorton’s own parsimonious and outright malicious use of his position as Chairman of the Subcommittee on Interior Appropriations–the position which is cited as Gorton’s “qualification” for the job by the Bush spin-doctors in the maybe-true e-mail that I recieved.
So here’s the mission, readers: help me prove the veracity of this consideration, then tear me a new one for what I have written. I would like someone to convince me that this man is not outright evil, as his nickname on the hill suggests, and that a possible Bush administration is not completely insane in their consideration. It’ll help me sleep better at night–which I’m obviously not doing right now.