*Are evironmentalists caving in on stadium plan?

The Natural Resources Defense Council sure seems to be. Its senior attorney David Pettit sounded like an AEG sycophant on "Which Way, L.A." last night, pointing out that giving the developer special legal relief for the downtown stadium project was a good idea and that environmentalists need to "bend a little" at a time of high unemployment. Wowser - how that place has changed! What's weird is that a few days earlier Pettit was taking an appropriately aggressive position on the AEG bill (as have other environmental groups). The segment also featured the predictable parroting of AEG's inflated job estimates by State Sen. Alex Padilla, who has been dutifully carrying the developer's water this week. I'm guessing that with the AEG bill more or less a done deal, the NRDC is choosing to get whatever concessions it can and move on. To argue that the region could use some jobs is fine, but as we've pointed out the numbers will likely be way lower than what AEG is touting - and keep in mind these are short-term jobs. There's another issue to consider: It's the idea of making special accommodations to a single, politically-powerful company. Somewhere out there are litigants who have been making their way through the slow-moving appellate process and whose cases will be delayed for goodness knows how long because AEG is being allowed to move to the front of the line. Not fair, not right - and it's happening before our eyes.

*Update: The Assembly just passed the AEG bill by a vote of 59-13. Now it's onto the Senate.