I am David Sandretti, Communications Director with the League of Conservation Voters -- the independent political voice for the environment. You can find out more about LCV at www.lcv.org.
I joined LCV earlier this year after serving in the Senate for ten years as Communications Director for Sen. Barbara Boxer and two years as Press Secretary for Sen. Russ Feingold.
LCV Names First Two Members of 2008 Dirty Dozen
A couple weeks ago, kos wrote about LCV’s successful Dirty Dozen campaign for the 2006 election cycle. Among the members of that ignominious class were Senators Rick Santorum and Conrad Burns and Rep. Katherine Harris. We even helped take out the Chairman of the House Resources Committee, Richard Pombo -- a feat which may be the most important development for the environment this decade. In all last year, we helped beat nine of the baker’s dozen.
Well, we are back for the 2008 elections. Today we announced the first two members of the Dirty Dozen for 2008... They are... (drum roll)... Senator James "the Hoax" Inhofe and Rep. "Say It Ain't Joe" Knollenberg.
The choice of Inhofe was really a no-brainer. He has been the last of the great deniers of global warming (he calls it "a hoax"). And he's cast as many anti-environment votes as anyone in his time in the Senate.
As for Knollenberg, he calls himself an environmentalist — his website actually says "protecting, preserving, and providing for the health of our environment is one of his top priorities," but his record says something else. He has repeatedly voted for corporate polluters and against environmental protections, earning him a lifetime LCV score of only 7 percent. Recently, he strongly opposed all attempts to raise fuel economy standards for cars and trucks. In 1998 and 1999, Knollenberg attached a rider known as 'the Knollenberg amendment' to congressional budget appropriation bills to prevent government agencies from doing anything that would regulate global warming pollution, including forbidding the EPA from holding educational seminars about global warming. In August 2007, he voted against a provision that would increase the amount of renewable energy produced in the United States.
You can read more about Inhofe and Knollenberg and their sorry records at: http://lcv.org/... On this site. we track the members of Congress who receive the most dirty money and how they vote on the key issues of global warming and clean energy.
Two down, ten to go. And that’s where you come in. We're asking for your help to nominate members of LCV's 2008 Dirty Dozen. Sign up at http://www.lcv.org/... Tell us who you think should make the list and why. You will then have a chance to vote for the nominees in the coming months.
This is one list the politicians DO NOT want to be on. And just so you know our success in 2006 wasn't due to the prevailing political winds, consider this: Since 1996, over half of the members of LCV's Dirty Dozen have gone down in defeat while incumbents have been re-elected at a rate of 97%.
Thanks for your input.
As a long time reader and first time diarist, I am very excited to open and continue this dialogue.