Christie Todd Whitman is a huge part of why the EPA is such a disaster, but it's nice of her to be critical of herself.  Whitman is a total idiot, and she and her pal Bush have gutted over 30 years of EPA legislation in 8 years.  It will take another 15-30 years to fix their mess.

So Whitman needs to shut her big trap, because she is one of the least qualified people to speak on these matters, that isn't named Bush.  What does Whitman know about the Energy Department anyways?  Did she work in it.....NO!

Whitman promised Howard Stern that she would fix NY cities pot holes in exchange for his endorsement over 10 years ago.  This woman has ZERO credibility!

Not being a dumb, partisan hack, like most of Bush 43's appointees, Chu should do just fine.  Whitman can crawl back into her hole now.

EPA is "pretty deep in the hole" primarily because Ms. Whitman ran it into the ground.  She has fairly managed to rape the west in implementing the Bush-Cheney policies of the last eight years.  Environmental "protection" has been a joke under her watch.  

i think mr. obama has proven to be very good at selecting the right people for the right job. I listened to her statements. she has concern that he doesn't have management experience to her knowledge.

key here is to her knowledge.

mr. chu is extremely intelligent and a physicists. his team will have management experience. his insight to energy as a scientist and administrator will give foresight and forward thinking to the dept. of energy.

competence has been mr. obama's theme. it seems as though he will maintain that pattern and trait. ms. whitman may be concerned that mr. chu will do a much better job than she did when she was at the epa as the head of her dept.

i am impressed that the peotus has selected highly intelligent, competent and such a diverse cabinet to represent america as well as his administration.

Just because her favorite wasn't picked Whitman criticises Obama's pick. It is after all HIS Administration. He and his staff did the vetting and found what they believe to be the best person for the job. In case Gov. Whitman is not aware of it Dr. Chu heads one of the nations top laboratories that work in energy research. He has a Nobel Prize. Can she say that about Lisa Jackson? When Whitman becomes President (not) she can pick whoever she wants in her cabinet and we can all criticize her choices too.

Yes, there are probably picks on the new Administration team that we may not like but let's give them all a chance. I don't like Hillary at State but she is Obama's pick and so I honor that and will say no more about it.

Remind me again ... what, exactly, were Whitman's achievements as head of the EPA?  Is the water cleaner?  Is the air cleaner?  Have we saved any species that a federal court didn't order us to save?  Is global warming in check?  

Didn't think so.  Sit down, Ms. Whitman.

>>>"It's a big leap from the academic world to the administrative world."

==========
And she should know, shouldn't she?  Just as she should know there is a big drop from being the GOP rising star to being the party speedbump when you tell the administration something it does not want to hear.

40 Days Until Inauguration Day!
http://jawillie.blog.com

'...Chu is a Nobel prize-winning physicist and currently the director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory...'

That sounds like managerial experience

Opinions are just like noses.... Everybody's got one

But, thanks anyway, Christie (I thought it was Christine)

What do you think about Mike Griffin ??

'...it's led by an administrator who isn't sure if global warming is real, and believes we should ignore the crisis...'


'...TRANSITION TROUBLE AT NASA.... Almost immediately after the elections last month, George W. Bush publicly vowed a smooth transition, and for the most part, it's been going well. There is, however, a rather glaring example to the contrary. (via Ben Smith)

NASA administrator Mike Griffin is not cooperating with President-elect Barack Obama's transition team, is obstructing its efforts to get information and has told its leader that she is "not qualified" to judge his rocket program, the Orlando Sentinel has learned.

In a heated 40-minute conversation last week with Lori Garver, a former NASA associate administrator who heads the space transition team, a red-faced Griffin demanded to speak directly to Obama, according to witnesses.

In addition, Griffin is scripting NASA employees and civilian contractors on what they can tell the transition team and has warned aerospace executives not to criticize the agency's moon program, sources said.

NASA, as an agency, has struggled over the last eight years. It's reportedly muzzled scientists who disagree with the Bush agenda, and it's led by an administrator who isn't sure if global warming is real, and believes we should ignore the crisis, even if the evidence is right...'

Scientists manage people, materials and budgets everyday in their research labs, if they can't, they do not become Nobel-prize winning physicists.  To suggest that a scientist isn't qualified, because of a lack of managerial experience demonstrates a lack of knowledge about what scientists do and how they do it.  It is really not that big of a leap

What's with this "can he manage a department?" line that's going out? Is it perhaps even a bit racist? Steven Chu is the director of LBNL. That's not some tiny high school lab. That's a major laboratory working on top-secret projects for the United States government. It's got a budget of $650 million. I'm not buying Whitman's line.

Um, Dr. Chu is an an administrator. He has more management experience than any of the other Cabinet picks. I guess Christine Whitman doesn't pay attention to actual facts, kind of like her former boss.

This was really meant for the last blog entry, but oh well...

I don't dislike Obama, but this is the problem that I see...this guy has not been in the game very long, and yet he was just elected President of the United States.  His assent into Chicago politics was pretty remarkable, and, given the state of Chicago politics, any thinking individual would question just how Obama did it...especially when he has some pretty shady connections there.  

This isn't about a "smear machine".  The minute that people become complacent and stop asking questions, assuming everything that someone says to be the truth, we lose a very important part of our national tradition.  This is America...the land of free speech...nobody (and I mean nobody) should be criticized for exercising that right just because the subject matter happens to be one that you support.  Feel free to express your support...but do it without making accusations (i.e., that someone must be a "racist" to question Obama) that are completely unfounded.    

By the way, I'm a Democrat.  :-)  

No problem. Chu handles the research and science and hires a deputy to handle the managment end of it, and a point person to push for the implentation of the correct science. Simple as that.

That's the problem with folks like Whitman. They think the experts (scientist) need to be wasting their time handling the management end of an agency or preoject rather than spending their time heading the scientific team to resolve the issues at hand. Imagine requiring Thomas Edison to manage all the time rather than spending his time in his lab working on the light bulb. Imagine requiring Salk to manage all the time rather than experimenting and analyzing his work on the polio vaccine.

Leave the management to managers and the science to the scientist. Something I guess Whitman does not understand.  

Whitman is just showing the republicans general distaste for academia. If a republican does not understand something, it has to be bad. Anyone that is smarter than a fifth grader is not to be trusted.

Conducting Nobel prize winning research, running a lab of over 4000 scientists/personnel and overseeing a budget over $600 million dollars. Where does this woman get off challenging Mr. Chu's administrative credentials? Thats insane. He is a leading force in alternative energy and the country should be ecstatic that the DOE will actually someone who believes in science and has the knowledge and experience needed to run the department. Mr. Chu is an outstanding choice.

Obama will never please everyone. Choosing a well-balanced, competetant cabinet is the best he can do and so far it looks as though he putting a thousand times more weight in intelligence and understanding than our current president.

The biggest joke was appointing Witman, the Governor of the Great STate of New Jersey, with its toxic rivers and acid rain, with its choking "air" and dirty shores, a state that is an environmental disaster zone, as the EPA Administrator.  Heck of a job there Chistie!

Whitman did some questionable things as governor of NJ; trust me because I am finding out first hand since I work here.  I don't think that she was much better in the EPA.  How can she still defend the air quality as acceptable after the terrorist attack in NYC?  

I was going to add something to this blog, but it looks like you all have said all that needs to said about Whitman. Thank you.

Jill F, Tulsa
  ANYONE who so much as QUESTIONED Bush was labeled anti-american, against the troops, traitor ect.ect. Don't give us the "lets be objective crap". Troll.
I was a life long republican until 7.8 years ago. Didn't take long to see things were WRONG. Open your eyes & see. If Obama screws up, we'll vote him out, but USE YOUR FREAKING HEAD!

And wasn't she the one after 9/11 told all the workers at ground zero "not to worry", "no danger in breathing the fumes".  Nice.  And she has room to critize.  Typical Bushy crap...40 days until the U-haul pulls away from the White House headed for Texas!

Jill F., Tulsa, OK - time to get over it!  Go find something to do for your community; he is PE and to his credit he has been making great picks (whether we agree with them all or not).  How is your post relevant to this topic?  You guys are a waste of space! Based on what we were told he is not involved in the Gov's sale of his seat.  Allow him to be found guilty of something before you get on your soap box.  How did all pols get to where they are?  Deals and luck!  It is politics, not church!   Oh, by the way, I am a Democrat :-)

Christine Todd Whitmann?  The Bush appointee who famously annouced that the EPA would fight global warming, then had to backtrack on orders from George Bush?  

Are now going to get tips from Dick Cheney on how to run a transparent executive, and how to comply with congressional subpoenas?

Does anyone but the idiots on the right care what some washed up flack from the Bush wasteland has to say about anything or anyone? I mean really

MSierra, SF (Sent Thursday, December 11, 2008 3:46 PM)

Most likely Mike Giffin is not cooperating or supplying information because he is afraid that Obama will finally tell the people the truth that yes, UFOs do conduct Space Shuttle fly bys, and yes, they do have some little alien people hidden away that were discovered at Rosewell. Then again perhaps Griffin is an alien himself and is afraid of being found out.

Or could it be that Nasa's current moon project has some serious problems and Griffin does not want the word getting out for fear of losing government funding under Obama who might think it is best to first bail out those homeless and jobless human beings here in the U.S.  

I think little Miz Whitman stink-bombed in her efforts to run with the big Repukikan dogs....so,  totally ineffective, now she's trying to become a CONSULTANT, an EXPERT, i.e. a former little squirt some distance from home.  If I were the President-elect, I'd pay about as much attention to her as does an elephant to a house fly on the rump. She's part of the greater problem, with no answers, that thrust Obama to power.  These sick, sour grape, mean-spirited, do-nothing, asshole types aren't due public note & shouldn't receive free publicity.  Please write about someone and something more positive...soon!!!    

To Jill, the 'democrat' in Tulsa, are these racist accusations screamed by white or black Obama supporters? Since he's as white as je is black, the racist thing is ambiguous, not to mention tiresome.

If being a successful manager of 4000 people and $650m a year budget for the past 4 years isn't enough...what about former senators and congress people, whose management experience is confined to a dozen people or so, expect during campaigns when that may extend to a few dozen paid staff? I believe her misgivings may be that he isn't a politician or a bureaucrat - but isn't this the point of bringing in fresh perspective and knowledge from outside a circle where everyone talks only to one another and then claim to know everything?

What exactly does Whitman know about Chu's management skills and shouldn't she proudly include her "accomplishments" in this post. What a moron and what an incredibly silly blog to give this woman ANY credibility to criticize!!

Whitman is just another in a long line of bushies who thinks anybody wants to listen to them. If the EPA is in ahole under her watch,,well enough said.

Okay then, Christie... please explain why YOU were qualified for running the EPA other than being a loyal Bushie? .... that's what I thought. It's nice to know in a few weeks we won't have to listen to shrill, partisan hacks like Whitman anymore and real grown-ups with real expertise will be back in charge of govt.

Is it just me or does describing you OWN agency as "pretty deep in the hole" more or less destroy your credibility?

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