For Whom Do You Lobby, Madame Secretary?

[Octafish]

22. Ask Cass Sunstein, the nuclear lobby is a really interesting thing.

Look what their bosses report:

Ties to Obama Aided in Access for Big Utility

By ERIC LIPTON
The New York Times
Published: August 22, 2012

WASHINGTON — Early in the Obama administration, a lobbyist for the Illinois-based energy producer Exelon Corporation proudly called it “the president’s utility.” And it was not just because it delivers power to Barack Obama’s Hyde Park neighborhood in Chicago.

SNIP...

Exelon’s efforts peaked in 2011, White House meeting records show. Mr. Rowe flew to Washington in March, and met with William M. Daley, then Mr. Obama’s chief of staff; Cass Sunstein, then the head of the White House office that oversees all federal regulations; Lisa P. Jackson, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency; and Gina McCarthy, the agency’s top air pollution official. Exelon’s competitors were seeking extra time to comply with the rule, which the administration was under a court order to issue. Exelon and its industry allies argued against any extension.

SNIP...

In the weeks before the draft rule was issued, Exelon lobbyists attended two other White House meetings, records show, giving it greater White House access than any other company or environmental group trying to influence the outcome. The Exelon meetings included Mr. Sunstein, who supervised the process, while utilities arguing against the regulations also made their case, but to lower-level staff members, the records show.

SNIP...

“It is a huge mistake to associate the number of meetings with the ultimate product of the rule-making process,” said Mr. Sunstein, who resigned his post this month. “And I want to put ‘huge’ in bold letters.”

CONTINUED...

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/23/us/politics/ties-to-obama-aided-in-access-for-exelon-corporation.html

Demonstrating balance, fairness and objectivity and a blonde disregard for its advertisers' not infrequent felonies, NYT even brings in an expert on the subject from the American Enterprise Institute at the end.

My 2 cents on Mr Sunstein.