Offering frequent news and analysis from the majestic Evergreen State and beyond, The Cascadia Advocate is the Northwest Progressive Institute's unconventional perspective on world, national, and local politics.

Thursday, May 04, 2006

Washington State's priorities not important to Rob McKenna

Steve Zemke over at Majority Rules has posted a letter he wrote to Rob McKenna, asking why the state Attorney General's office isn't joining other states in a lawsuit recently filed against the Bush administration over weak fuel economy standards for SUVs and light trucks.

As Steve notes, Washington State passed clean car legislation in 2005 that the Attorney General is responsible for defending.
Dear Attorney General Rob McKenna,

Yesterday the California Attorney General and nine other state Attorney Generals and the District of Columbia and New City filed a lawsuit in Federal Court challenging the Federal fuel efficiency standards set in March for light trucks and SUVs. (1)

Almost all of the states in the lawsuit have passed Clean Car Legislation patterned after California's. Washington State passed such legislation last year.And Oregon is in the process of enacting similar rules.

As part of the final standards issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a 52 page memorandum was added by the current administration stating that the Federal Government, not the states , have the authority to regulate CO2 emissions.

It would seem to me that the state of Washington needs to respond to this issue, not just because it challenges legislation passed by the Washington State Legislature, but also because of the need for Washington State to do all it can increase fuel efficiency and cut gases that contribute to global emissions.

Thank you for your response.

Sincerely,
Steve Zemke
Steve's question is a good one: where exactly is Rob McKenna? Why isn't Washington State a party to this lawsuit? Is it because Rob McKenna doesn't want to upset his friends in the automobile industry?

In instances like these, we're reminded of how wonderful it is to have a decent Attorney General. Unfortunately, in 2004, of four Republican and Democratic candidates, we got the worst one - Rob McKenna.

Even Republican Mike Vaska, who ran in the 2004 primary against McKenna (and who received our endorsement for the Republican primary) would have been a better Attorney General.

To his credit, McKenna ran an aggressive campaign, helped by his right wing friends at the BIAW (Building Industry Association of Washington - currently attempting to buy the state Supreme Court), and easily defeated the winner of the Democratic primary, Deborah Senn, who ran a poor, below the radar campaign for the general election.

We would have liked to have seen Mark Sidran win the primary and go on to run in the general, but unfortunately, he didn't win - in part because of meddling in the race by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

As we noted in our primary endorsement, he would have been a stronger candidate and likely would have had a great shot at defeating McKenna:
Two Democrats are running for the position of Attorney General: Mark Sidran and Deborah Senn. Since we like both of them, this endorsement was a tough decision. We gave it to Mark because of his excellent legal background, which will serve the state well, and his opposition to Tim Eyman. Mark has been willing to stand up to Eyman on talk radio, even challenging him, which is the kind of leadership we need. Sidran is a likeable, nice guy, who will hopefully be more progressive as Attorney General than he would have been as Seattle Mayor. Vote Mark Sidran for his leadership experience and his willingness to take on Tim Eyman.
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer concurred with us, observing:
In leading a huge law firm, the attorney general must balance strong advocacy in defending the state's interests against outside claims with strong internal risk management to avoid claims in the first place. Sidran struck that sort of balance as city attorney
And perhaps not surprisingly, even Republicans conceded that they were hoping for a Senn victory in the 2004 Democratic primary:
Republicans, who seem to respect Sidran as a Giuliani-like figure who tamed the liberal beast as city attorney, clearly prefer the match-up with Senn. King County Council Member Rob McKenna, the early Republican frontrunner, admits as much, saying he believes he will be able to draw sharper contrasts should she become the Democratic flag bearer.
The point is, it would be nice to have an Attorney General who would go to court to protect the state's interests. We believe Mark Sidran would have been a competent, effective Attorney General who would have provided meaningful leadership and service to the people of Washington State.

Instead, we're stuck with Rob McKenna, who doesn't seem to be paying attention (perhaps because he's too busy mulling a run for higher office?) and apparently doesn't care about adequately defending our state's government.

The people of the state of Washington and their representatives clearly want stronger environmental protections, but obviously Rob McKenna is concerned only with his priorities - not theirs.

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