Here's my spin:
You've got Chu and you've got Baca. Figure it out people! CHU-BACA! -g-
forum.colbertnation.com
Read about an Interior Secretary, who worked for BP, and then, went back to the Interior Department.
The article in question is "INFLUENCE GAME: Govt regulators hired by companies."
McKay also cited Sylvia Baca as someone who went from BP to Interior. She made the switch twice. In the Clinton administration, she served as the Interior Department's assistant secretary for land and minerals management and worked as the department's acting director of the Bureau of Land Management.
In 2001, Baca joined BP, where she worked in several senior management positions. Last June, Salazar brought her back to Interior, tapping her for the position of deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management.
So, I begin digging. I find that Sylvia Baca, was the Assistant Secretary for Land and Mineral Management at the department of the Interior, from 1995 to 2001. (source: U.S. department of Interior) After taking a job at BP, she held several key positions; Vice president for Social Investment Programs and Strategic Partnerships (source: zoominfo.com); Global HSSE & emergency response director (source: BP.com's "steering a cleaner course" )
Now, that should raise some eyebrows, an Interior assistant secretary of mineral management, becoming BP's emergency response director, when the company wasn't required by Mineral Management Service, to file an emergency response plan. But that's just scratching the surface. The Valles Caldera Preservation Act of 2000, purchased the Caldera, through a trust held by the Interior Department, funded by oil companies. It was the largest purchase through this trust, at 101 million dollars.
Here's where it get's alarm bell ringing strange.
Enter Brian Baca. Brian Baca, who's on the California State Mining and Geology Board, used to work for Union Oil Co. from 1980, to 1989. Union Oil was developing the Valles Caldera for a geothermal generator plant, from 1979, when it stopped in 1982. The California State Mining and Geology Board is tasked with utilization and conservation of mineral resources.
Now, two different Baca's, being involved with oil companies, and directing mineral management at State and Federal levels, both being involved in the Valles Caldera (Which sits on a "Baca Ranch"- I'm not making this up...)seems to be a cosmic lottery, but it get's further twisted.
After the purchase, Los Alamos National Laboratories revisits the Valles Caldera geothermal potential.
Sylvia Baca returns to the Interior department, six months after a Federal judge values the condemned Preserve mineral rights. Condemned so that the owner of the 12.5 percent of mineral rights not purchased by the government, couldn't build a geothermal power plant in the Caldera.
Considering the scope of the Gulf spill, that great alternative energy source is going to be invaluable. I wonder what that 12.5 percent mineral rights will be worth, when it is proposed for use after this disaster. I don't have any information on who owns those rights yet, but I'm looking.
Now, it appears that the person responsible for not filing an emergency response for the Deepwater Horizon, is back in the Interior Department. Not as assistant secretary, but as DEPUTY assistant secretary.
We've got a massive oil spill, with the company responsible dragging it's feet, creating an outcry for alternative energy sources. And the person who's job it was to prevent it, purchased a giant alternative energy source, the Valles Caldera, for the Government. And as soon as things were set, she's back at the Interior department, with a promotion.
Only in America... |
