Is Glenda Owens right for the job?

by: Clem Guttata

Thu Apr 09, 2009 at 07:11:42 AM EDT

It's such a well-researched post, it's difficult to excerpt. I'll just set it up and encourage you to go read the whole thing:

From what I hear, President Barack Obama may be close to nominating a longtime Interior Department bureaucrat named Glenda Owens to be director of the U.S. Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement.

Now, Obama's got a lot on his plate.  Who knows if he's even got this little agency on his radar screen at all. Maybe OSMRE  isn't a big priority. But if the president really opposes mountaintop removal, favors green jobs and cares anything about the nation's coalfield communities, Obama will take this appointment (not to mention the nomination of someone to run the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration) very seriously.

But coalfield residents don't think that's what's happening. Earlier today, they started a call-in campaign to try to encourage Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to appoint either West Virginia University law professor Pat McGinley or Lexington, Ky., lawyer Joe Childers to run - reform, reinvigorate or rejuvinate might be better words - OSMRE. For coalfield residents and environmental advocates, picking someone promoting someone from within OSMRE is almost as bad as Obama turning to an industry lawyer or lobbyist for the post.

Ken goes on to recount a history of government actions that Ms. Owens has been involved with as a government bureaucrat. If for no other reason, the post is a valuable reminder of the duplicitous role that federal government "enforcement" agencies have played over the years.