Update 12-17: see video announcement here. At the press conference announcing his green team, Obama said he'd announce his interior secretary pick next week. That pick is Colo. Senator Ken Salazar. The interior secretary is in charge of conservation.
Dirk Kempthorne is the current interior secretary. Who knew. That's one of the reasons I keep this blog -- to learn more about who's leading this country. After Bush, I don't want to be in the dark anymore.
Politico:
Politico:
In Salazar, Obama sticks with the tradition of filling the interior post with a Westerner while adding a member of his team from a key electoral battleground, one that figured prominently in Obama’s victory strategy.
Salazar, who serves on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, is known for his past work as director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources, where he devised a way to conserve land by using state lottery earnings.
A former environmental lawyer, the first-term senator has backed numerous environmentally friendly policies. Just last week, for instance, he urged lawmakers to base the nation’s economic recovery package around clean energy infrastructure – a goal Obama laid out in announcing his energy and environment team Monday.
Salazar also recently called Interior’s decision to move forward on commercial oil shale development in Colorado, Wyoming and Utah “premature and flawed.”
