Washington ? Mike Leavitt deserves to be confirmed as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency — not so much because he’s a consensus-builder but because in trying to be one as governor of Utah he learned that environmental organizations can never, ever be satisfied.

Knowing this, Leavitt is relieved of two burdens: first, of spending too much time trying to satisfy a constituency — the largely left-wing environmentalist movement — that will never be pleased, and, second, of the expectation that he’ll ever get credit from environmentalists for doing any good, even if he does a top-notch job.

As Ronald Reagan used to say, there’s no limit to the good you can do if you don’t care who gets the credit. Or, as is inevitable in this case, the blame.

As an 11-year governor and former chairman of the National Governors’ Assn., Leavitt has another advantage: experience with bureaucracies. The EPA’s bureaucrats need to be tamed.

As James DeLong put it in his 2002 book on the EPA, “EPA maintains broad discretion to define what is and is not a violation of the law. It fights vigorously to avoid any checks on this discretion. It often exercises its discretion retroactively or arbitrarily. It makes examples of people who dispute the agency’s interpretation of power; it makes the laws that define its own powers, then investigates, prosecutes, adjudicates and penalizes. Judicial checks are weak and sporadic. This panoply of power breeds regulatory zealotry and a disregard for the rights of the regulated.”

The EPA, however, is lax about rules that apply to itself.

There’s the time the EPA wanted to spend $18 million to save $80,000 worth of fish. As this would violate cost-benefit rules, EPA officials revalued the fish. In other words, they dodged the rules.

The EPA even flouts congressional authority. The agency has been trying to set a standard for dioxin that is so low that a single serving of Ben and Jerry’s vanilla ice cream would contain 2,000 times the safe level.

But before you give up ice cream, be aware that the EPA is conspiring to acquire authority over a natural substance that is pretty much everywhere simply to increase its own power.

Aware of this, two years ago Congress asked the EPA to contract with the National Academy of Sciences for an independent, science-based review of dioxin’s effect on humans. The EPA ignored the request, so Congress asked again. No result.

The EPA needs a firm hand, and a three-term governor and strong leader like Mike Leavitt is as likely as anyone to provide it.

Leavitt is not without critics. The environmental group Earthjustice says he’s “no friend of the environment,” yet some Utah conservatives consider him so moderate they voted for the Democratic candidate for governor in the last election.

Leavitt is, however, gifted in public relations, a valuable skill when dealing with environmental issues, where demagoguery is the order of the day. The Bush administration has frequently made the right environmental decisions but has failed to aggressively explain why they are correct. This has left the administration undefended from unjustified criticism from environmental groups, and given the public a false understanding of the issues involved. Leavitt may be able to help set the record straight.

Thanks to the support of governors from both political parties, Leavitt’s appointment is likely to survive a grueling confirmation process that will be characterized more by environmentalist attacks on President Bush than on Leavitt’s ability to run the EPA the way a responsible agency should be run.

Confirmation will be the easy part. Dodging the snipers and doing the job will be Leavitt’s real challenge.

— Amy Ridenour is president of The National Center for Public Policy Research, www.nationalcenter.org.