Quick Picks: BPA's Big Biz Boost and Obama's Big Biz Lobbyist — ProPublica

Quick Picks: BPA's Big Biz Boost and Obama's Big Biz Lobbyist

by Alexandra Andrews

Feb. 5, 2009, 11:10 a.m. EST

Quick Picks focuses on a select few of the day's stories from "Breaking on the Web."

The U.S. is of two minds when it comes to BPA, a chemical that’s in everything from dental fillings to baby bottles: An NIH panel found “some concern” that BPA is dangerous to human health, but the FDA declared it safe (even though FDA scientists questioned the rigor of this investigation). According to Fast Company, the chemical industry has employed “big tobacco’s tactics” to sow doubt about BPA’s health hazards and evade regulation.
Even as Obama fends off criticism about his ethics standards, he might be set to welcome another lobbyist into his administration, reports today’s Los Angeles Times. Until last year, Mark Gitenstein, Obama’s likely nominee to head the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Policy, was a lobbyist for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has pushed hard for judicial nominees and legislation that “would make it harder for plaintiffs to sue large corporations.” The Office of Legal Policy oversees legal policy and judicial nominations, reports the Times.

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