Meg Whitman is a woman of the people. And by that, I mean she’s flexible, always willing to go with the flow.
Take AB 32. Meg Whitman is on record as wanting to suspend the landmark greenhous gas legislation. Well, it turns out that almost all of her foundation gave money to one of the big supporters of the legislation, the Environmental Defense Fund:
The Griffith R. Harsh IV and Margaret C. Whitman Charitable Foundation in 2007 contributed $100,000 to the Environmental Defense Fund, which is now at odds with Whitman over water policy. The foundation also invested $3 million in hedge funds based in the Cayman Islands – a Caribbean tax haven that’s been the subject of political controversy. (SJ Merc 11/6/09)
Meanwhile, the task that AB 32 seeks out to accomplish, reduce carbon levels to 1990 levels by 2020, is not impossible. In fact, San Francisco will achieve that goal by 2012, and is on track to beat that mark considerably. Mayor Newsom says that that the City will likely reduce total carbon emissions by 20 over the ten year period of 2002-2012. Sure, there are differences between SF and the rest of the state, the main one being the relatively stagnant population in our 7×7 mile corner of the Peninsula. However, going green is not nearly as challenging as Whitman makes it out to be.
And heck, she just ask some of her foundation recpients about that. As Robert pointed out, this is your Republican front-runner. W00t!