Jim Inhofe: “I have to admit that I do not read the New York Times cover to cover each day. But from time to time, items in that…”

“I have to admit that I do not read the New York Times cover to cover each day. But from time to time, items in that paper do catch my attention. For instance, when a group runs a full-page advertisement, one cannot help but at least glance at the ad. A couple weeks ago, one such advertisement caught my attention. It was a full-page advertisement placed in the New York Times by two special interest groups: the Natural Resources Defense Council and Moveon.org. These two special interest groups are especially vocal and devoted solely to disparaging the environmental record of the Bush administration. I have an enlarged version of that advertisement that ran in the New York Times. It is chart 1. As you can see, it states, in large print: 'First Arsenic, Now Mercury.' It has pictures of President Bush alongside a powerplant billowing with smoke. The ad makes such claims as: the President's policies are the source for mercury contamination in fish and that the President is simply following the wishes of industry contributors. The ad makes direct statements such as: 'So why is President Bush trying to weaken controls on mercury pollution?'”