Favorite News Item of the Week

This one is from the USA! Meet Assistant Attorney General Sue Ellen Wooldridge:

Actually, she resigned last month as the top Justice Department enforcement official for environmental and natural resources. But just before she left, she signed two proposed consent decrees with oil giant ConocoPhillips, one of them giving the company up to three more years to install $525 million in pollution controls at nine refineries. Hold your breath, everybody -- they'll be done soon!

But that's not the naughty part -- heavens, no, that's just government valuing the interests of big corporations over the health and lives of its citizens, zzzzzz. The juicy bit is that, 9 months before she signed those decrees, Sue Ellen bought a $1 million vacation home in the gated community of Kiawah Island with ConocoPhillips' top lobbyist, VP Donald Duncan. That's right! The Bush Administration is LITERALLY in bed with the oil companies! And just to add a little kink, the third co-owner of the South Carolina love nest was former Deputy Interior Secretary J. Steven Griles, who has been linked to jailbird lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Hope they don't run into too many "conflicts of interest" when it's three in a hot tub!