Gale Norton

* I was extremely disheartened to hear that President-elect George W. Bush has nominated an ardent proponent of drilling the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, Gale Norton, to head the Interior Department. In doing so, Bush has broken his pledge to work in a bipartisan fashion and in a way that will unite our nation. Studies show that a great majority of Americans support protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and consider it one of our most treasured landscapes. Norton’s career-long support for oil drilling in this pristine wildlife refuge reflects a land management philosophy that favors special interests over our children’s natural heritage and conflicts with the mission of the department she has been appointed to lead.

VANESSA MARVIN

Glendora

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All of those Greens who voted for Ralph Nader, thus ensuring Bush’s questionable win, had better pony up with significantly increased donations to environmental advocacy organizations. With Bush’s nominee Norton running the Interior Department, we’re going to be battling his administration, takings advocates, mining companies, livestock-grazing freeloaders, lumber companies and many others who are champing at the bit to undo the progress made during the Clinton years.

If there were elements of compromise in the last eight years, they were always in the direction of progress for environmental protection. Our Green brethren will get nowhere with Bush and his oil-drilling cronies. When will they learn that ours is not a parliamentary system of governance? They get no say in legislation or administration for their paltry 4% of the vote.

JOHN WRIGHT

Los Angeles

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I have been perplexed by Bush’s Cabinet appointees in light of his campaign rhetoric. He consistently billed himself as a “Washington outsider” and said that his administration would not support the status quo. However, the majority or his Cabinet appointees have either been recycled from his father’s and Reagan’s administrations or are, like John Ashcroft, Washington insiders. In his acceptance speech, he also said that he would seek to unite this country, and yet a number of his appointees are anything but unifying. Ashcroft and Norton, in particular, are very much on the fringes of the American belief system and encourage divisiveness.

DONNA ENGBERTSON

Riverside