EDITORIAL: Kempthorne Goes to Washington: a Report Card

By The Times-News, Twin Falls, Idaho

May 25–Last June, The Washington Post asked Idaho Conservation League executive director Rick Johnson to predict how Dirk Kempthorne would fare in his new job running the federal Department of the Interior.

“The administration was looking for someone to keep a steady hand on the tiller,” Johnson said. “I don’t think he’ll have that much of an impact.”

A year ago Saturday, Kempthorne became the 49th U.S. interior secretary, inheriting an agency damaged by his predecessor’s ties to scandal-ridden lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

The former Idaho governor faced a long list of lawsuits — including one accusing the government of cheating Indians out of as much as $137.2 billion — and confronted issues ranging from a massive maintenance backlog at national parks to a bruising debate over endangered species.

So, how much impact has Kempthorne had in his first year in Washington? Here’s our report card:

–Endangered species: B

On the plus side, Kempthorne on Dec. 27 proposed adding the polar bear to the endangered list, a bold move in an administration that often seems philosophically opposed to the Endangered Species Act. It was also a notable change for Kempthorne, who as governor resisted the reintroduction of grizzly bears into the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness (he labeled them “flesh-eating”) and called for eradicating wolves in Idaho “by any means necessary.”

But Kempthorne unaccountably refused to link the polar bear’s plight to global warming, instead arguing that shrinking polar sea ice was the reason for listing Ursus maritimus. (It baffles us what factor other than climate change could cause polar ice to melt on such a scale.) And earlier this year an internal memo surfaced instructing Interior Department employees in Alaska not to discuss global warming and the polar bear’s predicament with foreigners without getting Washington’s OK first.

Dismissing the impact of climate change seems to be an article of faith within the Bush administration, but the Interior Department’s explanation made the agency look as if it wasn’t interested in the science.

Yet to his credit, Kempthorne announced in March that the government would investigate the relationship between global warming and species extinction. Better late than never.

–Offshore oil drilling: C

In April, Kempthorne proposed expanding offshore oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coasts of Alaska and Virginia. Adding Virginia to that list would effectively end a 25-year-old congressionally mandated moratorium on drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

Kempthorne argued that new drilling in federal waters would create jobs, lower energy prices and reduce dependence on imports.

That makes sense when it comes to pumping fossil fuels out of the Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska, but the Virginia proposal appears to be a non-starter politically. Even the governor of that state is skeptical.

Worse, it muddies the issue and makes the prospect of the additional drilling that the administration seeks — and that America needs — less likely to happen.

–National parks: A

Last summer, the Interior Department issued new management rules for national parks that drew praise from environmentalists but angered off-road vehicle users.

“When there is a conflict between conserving resources unimpaired for future generations and the use of those resources, conservation will be predominant,” Kempthorne said.

“The only conclusion you could draw … is Secretary Kempthorne has taken a keen interest in national parks,” Ronald J. Tipton of the National Parks Conservation Association told the Post. “This is a priority for him.”

For any secretary of the interior, it’s the right priority.

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