NY Times: Is Ken Salazar Too Nice?

The word on Ken Salazar, tapped by President-elect Barack Obama to run the Interior Department, is that he is friendly, approachable, a good listener, a genial compromiser and a skillful broker of deals. That is also the rap on Ken Salazar. What the Interior Department needs right now is someone willing to bust heads when necessary and draw the line against the powerful commercial groups — developers, ranchers, oil and gas companies, the off-road vehicle industry — that have long treated the department as a public extension of their private interests. Conservationists and pretty much everyone else exhausted by the Bush administration’s ideological rigidity and deference to commercial interests have welcomed Mr. Salazar’s appointment. The Colorado Democrat has a solid voting record on issues involving wilderness and wildlife protection and can be expected to bring a strong conservation ethic to the top of the department. Yet that will not be nearly enough to reform and reinvigorate the department....