Cheney Takes Aim At…
Endangered Whales (It’s No Joke)

THIS IS NOT A PARODY

Congressman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) just sent a letter to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs detailing how White House officials, including the office of Vice President Cheney, questioned proposed rules to protect the endangered North Atlantic right whale from collisions with ships.

Cheney’s office doubted whether new speed limits planned for large ships would help reduce the amount of collisions.

Only 300 of these animals remain alive today. (The lacerations in the whale carcass pictured above were caused by a ship’s propellor.)

From the letter (waxman.doc):

White House Objections

Internal Administration documents received by the Committee indicate that the delay in protecting the right whale appears to be due to objections raised by White House officials, including officials in the Office of the Vice President. The documents show that White House officials have repeatedly required NMFS and its parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), to respond to objections to the scientific justification for the right whale rule. In some cases, White House officials have apparently conducted their own analyses using questionable assumptions to delay the final rule.

One document obtained by the Committee staff is a response from NOAA to objections raised by the White House Council of Economic Advisors. According to this document, officials working for the Council of Economic Advisors questioned “the reliability of analysis in the published literature on which NOAA is basing its position.” After reconstructing a database of collisions with right whales and conducting their own “sensitivity” analysis, the White House officials informed NOAA that they had concluded that “the relationship between [vessel] speed and [whale] injury … may not be as strong of a relationship as is suggested in published papers.”

The White House analysis was rejected by the expert scientists at NOAA. They found that the White House officials used a “biased sensitivity analysis” that was “unlike any formal sensitivity analysis NMFS biometricians are familiar with.”

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 30th, 2008 at 10:11 am and is filed under Environment, Hot Stories!, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

4 Responses to “Cheney Takes Aim At…
Endangered Whales (It’s No Joke)”

1. bob Says:
   April 30th, 2008 at 3:58 pm

   Change the damn shipping routes !!!!!!!!!!!!

2. Andrew Milner Says:
   April 30th, 2008 at 5:10 pm

   We’ll keep a welcome in the hillsides,
   We’ll keep a welcome in the dales,
   This land you love will still be singing,
   When you come home again to Wales (whales)
   whatever…

3. Small Cnc Milling Machine Says:
   May 16th, 2008 at 2:58 pm

   Small Cnc Milling Machine…

   I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you….

4. Gucci Accessories Says:
   May 21st, 2008 at 4:04 pm

   Gucci Accessories…

   I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you….