WHAT HAND? WHAT COOKIE JAR?

That seems to be the tactic of the Office of the Solicitior and the Office of the Secretary of the US Department of Interior.

In our May issue we printed Dr P. Metzger's letter on the incestuous backroom deal between "plaintiff" and "defendant" concerning federal coal leasing, the plaintiffs" being NRDC whose lawyers then moved into the Carter administration to "defend" against the suits filed by their own organizations, the whole revolting affair ending up with a settlement out of court in which the federal government, in effect, signed away its leasing rights to SRDC, a private environmentalist lobby.

Some of our readers informed their congressmen of this sleazy deal, and at least two of them, Sen. Chiles and Sen. Stone, both of Florida raised the matter with the Dept. of Interior. They received almost identical answers, one signed by US Dept. of the Interior Solicitor Krulitz and Deputy Solicitor Ferguson, the other by Assistant to the Secretary Catron.

"Contrary to the allegations in the [AtE] article" writes the Assistant Secretary with his free hand, "this Department has relinquished no coal leasing rights ... to the NRDC, co - plaintiffs in winning an injunction against further federal coal leasing. . . "

"The modified order includes a provision for public notice and receipt of public comment. . . ," continues the DOI Solicitor as he munches away happily. "NRDC is given no special right to participate in this procedure."

Oh no? The stipulation by US District Court D.C., Civil Action 75 174, signed by federal "defendants" and their bosom buddy "Plaintiffs" on Feb. 25, 1978, says: "Federal defendants will notify plaintiffs [NRDC] not less than 21 days before the Secretary of Interior's approval of a lease sale... The federal defendants are authorized to process 20 preference right lease applications. The. . . applications are to be those which the Federal Defendants and the Plaintiffs [NRDC] mutually concur would cause the least environmental impact... If [they] are unable to agree, the Federal Defendants shall submit a list of appplications two times the number of disputed applications, but not less than 20 for final consideration.

And so forth; that is what they call "no special rights." It is an unchallenging task to list all the flat contradictions.

But where is that glorious watchdog, the American press?

If Carter had appointed a Westinghouse lawyer to the NRC, who settled the Seabrook matter out of court by leaving the licensing of nuclear plants to the PSCo of New Hampshire, the press would have been silent, too; right?