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Conscripts in a Ponzi Scheme
June 13, 2011 | 127 comments
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Social Security and the Ghost of Ephram Nestor
April 6, 2011 | 21 comments
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Dracon for President?
February 22, 2011 | 48 comments
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Mitch Daniels and the CPAC Moment
February 14, 2011 | 78 comments
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The New America Firsters
February 7, 2011 | 43 comments
The Obama Watch
Getting Serious About Regulations — NOT!
Who does our president take us for?
In a piece in the Wall Street Journal, President Obama has written that he wants to ensure that federal regulations “protect our safety, health, and environment while promoting economic growth.” He made a similar claim in his State of the Union address.
Before anyone starts calling him the “deregulation president,” it’s worth taking a closer look at his piece. Hidden in the fluff, of course, is a lot of nonsense — even points he must think are nonsense. Like: “…we have, from time to time, embraced common sense rules of the road…” Only “from time to time,” Mr. President? You are so right!
How about this: “Over the past two years, the goal of my administration has been to strike the right balance” — the right balance, that is, between “placing unreasonable burdens on business — burdens that have stifled innovation and have had a chilling effect on growth and jobs” and “meet[ing] our basic responsibility to protect the public interest.”
What does he take us for? The past two years have been a time of unrelenting regulating without any attempt whatsoever to strike a balance, let alone “the right balance.”
Mr. Obama says he is ordering a government-wide review of the rules already on the books. Really? On December 31, 2010, the Federal Register, where those rules are hiding in plain sight, was 82,589 pages long. Raise your hand if you really think Mr. Obama’s people are going to review a significant portion of them.
“Where necessary,” he writes, “we won’t shy away from addressing obvious gaps …” including “efforts to target chronic violators of workplace safety laws.”
In a piece here last week, I referred to a CATO Institute graph of workplace fatalities that indicates that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has had no effect at all during its forty years of existence. Anyone who points to OSHA as a success story is either ignorant, not serious, or being deceptive (the reactions to Tucson caution against stronger language for a time).
Mr. Obama says he wants “disclosure as a tool to inform consumers of their choices, rather than restricting those choices.” What is that all about? One thing consumers are capable of doing is demanding information — when they want it. If companies discover consumers want information, they’ll provide it. That’s one way companies compete. What we have now is TMI — too much information — required by: guess who.
“[F]inally,” Mr. Obama writes, “I am directing federal agencies to do more to account for — and reduce — the burdens regulations may place on small businesses.”
Certainly the cost of regulations to small businesses is a lot greater proportionally than it is to big businesses. According to Nicole V. Crain and W. Mark Crain, businesses “with fewer than 20 employees incur regulatory costs 42 percent greater than firms with between 20 and 499 employees, and 36 percent greater than firms with more than 500 employees.” In addition, some of the legislation, e.g., the Americans with Disabilities Act, hurts precisely the people it is intended to help (surprise!).
Toward the end of his piece, Mr. Obama writes, “Despite a lot of heated rhetoric, our efforts over the past two years to modernize our regulations have led to smarter — and in some cases tougher — rules… Yet according to current estimates of their economic impact, the benefits of these regulations exceed their costs by billions of dollars.”
You have to smile.
Here are three actions the president could have taken if he were serious:
1. Propose the elimination of one major regulatory agency. OSHA would be a good place to begin. Meddling by OSHA is estimated to cost around $65 billion a year, and has been completely useless. Small businesses would applaud.
2. Propose that all regulations that impose their requirements on businesses with fifteen or more employees be amended wholesale to affect only businesses with fifty or more employees — the threshold, not incidentally, for ObamaCare. If fifty is good enough for socialized medicine (sorry, Tucson, time’s up) it ought to be good enough for all other regulations. A hundred would be better. But Rome wasn’t burned in a day.
3. Appoint a panel of experts, all skeptics of regulation, to estimate the real cost of regulations. The government’s estimates are just what you’d expect from… government. Nicole V. Crain and W. Mark Crain estimate the cost to be at least $1.75 trillion, or 14 percent of U.S. national income. By comparison, the income-tax burden is about $2.3 trillion. If people could wave the real figures at their congressional representatives, we might get real reform.
A good post-Tea-Party-election guess is that all three of these things will happen in the next ten years. A better guess is that they won’t happen on this president’s watch.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (26) | Leave a comment
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Ret. Marine| 2.2.11 @ 6:40AM
Now this write is funny, were it not so serious. This asshat calling himself the greatest thing since sour cream is about as clueless as my two pure breed mutts. This mutt really thinks he's all that and a few unregulated devices. His mouth and the ignorance of " those other people".
When We the People "regulate his sorry excuse of a regime to the history bin" , he'll know a regulation we can all agree upon. Just because he tries to be everything to " those other people" does not make even the laughter model for acceptance. The heart of a free enterprise should only be that of a stance we take when it becomes others problem, making wishful thinking is a very long way down to the same hole. By the way which regulation do you suppose his re approach is going to take to get him to release his life story, and a story is all it is. When the usurper-n-thief gets serious, without laughing at "those other people" I might consider sound advise from my elders, as it stands a person hiding his "story" is good at nothing else but story telling. But one must have an acceptance for a bullshaler first, tell that to 48% of the American population with their heads screwed on the right way. It ain't going to happen, mush like all the things he thinks we are not aware of.
John Daniel| 2.2.11 @ 7:43AM
Lesson learned. Never elect anybody president who hasn't had to make a payroll.
PaulD| 2.2.11 @ 7:54AM
"What does our president take us for?" Inferiors.
martin j smith| 2.2.11 @ 8:18AM
Obama is a chronic liar and very little of significance can be believed as to what he says-its what he does. Except if he raises his hand to go to the bathroom.
Mike| 2.3.11 @ 12:55AM
If he raises his hand to go watch out for the direction he is facing as he unzips his pants lest you become his target.
WilliamInWien| 2.2.11 @ 8:27AM
Shadow Congress/Shadow Regulators: Before any new law or regulation can be passed or put into effect, the Shadow Congress/Regulators will offer up two/three existing laws/regulations that will be stricken from the "books". This shadow group of everyday people (no "Experts, please) will also shadow the BHO cadre of Czars and their activities. Expenses will be covered by reducing lawmaker/regulator/czar salaries by 10%, especially since they, the shadowers, are performing part of the lawmaker/regulator responsibilities. Then a "shadow" IRS.....
Redstateboy| 2.2.11 @ 8:30AM
ask yourself.. would the Oil Wildcat'ers of the late 19th and early 20th Century be able to succeed in today's America? If this new Congress only had the Balls to reduce Gov't regulation to what we had then.. why would we not exploade economically again as we did at that time?
Consertive View| 2.2.11 @ 8:50AM
Actually the idea of a "panel of experts" to review regulations is not such a bad one. Let us take Obama at his word and create a commision to review each and every regulation of the Federal Government, and then have it submit a list of regulations that are to be struck down. The list would be taken as a whole, for an up or down vote by Congress.
Gosh, that would put a whole lot of Congressmen on the spot. Getting rid of unnecessary regulations would offend all kinds of people. Not getting rid of them would offend even more.
If we can close military bases with such a commision, why not close down useless and expensive regulations?
Stan Redmond| 2.2.11 @ 9:44AM
You can't expect government employees that rely on regulations for employment to be let go from the federal payroll can you? I mean, where else would these people get jobs? If a liberal arts major can't get a job filing papers at a government office where can they work?
Harry Flashman| 2.2.11 @ 9:09AM
American voters of all political persuasions can recall the Obama 2008 campaign repeatedly promising that their administration would uphold the highest ethical standards with a particular emphasis on transparency.
A vast majority of these voters believe that the process of running for the office of President of the United States should be the toughest public job interview on the planet.
The sad fact remains that the current president, according to longstanding government clearance protocols, could not be hired as a janitor in a federal building with the amount of verifiable personal background information that he has provided.
Barack Obama's original typewritten long form birth certificate, school records, SAT and LSAT scores, college and law school admission records and grade transcripts and thesis papers, medical records, passport history, Illinois state senate tenure records, presidential campaign foreign donor lists, complete White House visitor logs and other relevant records and documents have all never been released or allowed to be subjected to any sort of scrutiny, despite several years of repeated requests for disclosure by numerous individuals and non-traditional media organizations.
The Obama 2008 campaign and subsequent administration have to date spent a considerable sum on legal fees, estimated in the millions of dollars, to fight Freedom of Information Act filings and other requests to examine this material. The powerful international law firm Perkins Coie has been their primary provider of these services.
A computer generated laser printed short form version of a birth certificate that a child could have forged was posted on the Obama 2008 campaign website, but it only served to intensify the filings and requests to see the original typewritten long form document, which has never been released or allowed to be scrutinized, if in fact it does indeed exist.
They also provided a one page letter from a physician attesting that Barack Obama was in excellent health for a man of his age.
This constitutes the complete extent of any release or disclosure of any records or documents from Obama's past.
Virtually the entire paper trail of the current president's existence, from birth to the White House, continues to remain deeply hidden away in a tight shroud of secrecy.
Astute observers in corridors of power around the world as well as other quarters consider that the infamous original typewritten long form birth certificate, the most widely discussed item from Obama's hidden paper trail, is actually the least relevant of all of his concealed records and documents, again, if in fact it does indeed exist.
They believe that the truth about Barack Obama's place of birth and parentage is far less important to the future of the United States than the truth about what makes him tick and who is pulling his strings, so to speak.
Whether the current president's biological father was the late Kenyan Barack Obama "Sr." or the late CPUSA member Frank Marshall Davis or the late "grandfather" Stanley Armour Dunham (arguably the likeliest candidate - see cashill.com among many other sources) or some other man, pales in significance to the truth about his past associations and ideological convictions and behavioral influences and ongoing relationships.
This is the sort of information about their presidential candidates that postwar modern era American voters had become accustomed to having the mainstream media provide for them, until 2008 when Barack Obama was given an astonishing special exception from the traditional expectation that such candidates should allow for the release and scrutiny of the substantive body of their personal records and credentials.
In their eagerness to "make history" by covering the campaign of the man whom they were clearly very interested in helping to become the first black president, the mainstream media failed in their essential national responsibility, namely to report on significant events with thoroughness and impartial objectivity. They ignored their duty to search for the truth and should be regarded with disdain by all people who value information in a free society.
Democratic incumbents at all levels of government, as well as rank and file voters, might well demand to know exactly how Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and the rest of their party leadership allowed a person who was obviously given only the most cursory sort of vetting to become their presidential nominee.
Barack Obama and his handlers were able to successfully hide his past and explain away and minimize his associations with highly controversial individuals and groups during their 2008 campaign.
Will they be able to successfully repeat this deception between now and 6 November 2012?
Only if you let them.
Gretchen| 2.2.11 @ 5:24PM
"[U]phold the highest ethical standards . . . particular emphasis on transparency. " As I recall, Billyjeff Clinton promised something very similar.
Q.E.D. If a candidate promises an ethical, simon-pure, transparent administration, expect the opposite.
Al Adab| 2.2.11 @ 10:30AM
The world view of President Al Naqis takesd it on faith that central planning is superior to free markets. To his mind all regulation protects. What he and The Left forget is that his oath is to the Constitution not to the agencies which think they work on our behalf. It is this same world view which renders him incapable of comprehending the situation in Egypt and elsehwere. Most nations and peoples of the world do not share his (or our) concepts of proper order and societal organization. He will mismanage the international situation just as he mismanges our nation one.
A. C. Santore| 2.2.11 @ 11:08AM
What does he take us for? There isn't enough space to list all of the possible answers.
In simple terms, however, he takes us for stupid, uninformed, malleable dupes. He believes that we will continue to believe his words (which are worth their weight in gold) instead of believing his actions - which are invariably contrary to his glowing promises.
Invariably contrary to his glowing promises.
Gretchen| 2.2.11 @ 5:29PM
". . . worth their weight in gold"? More likely worth their weight in organic fertilizer!
wodiej| 2.2.11 @ 12:45PM
OSHA -something else to add to Stossel's list. I don't think Obama thinks we're stupid. I just think he thinks he is smarter than he really is.
Wayne | 2.2.11 @ 1:00PM
Please include the onerous FDA. It may have been among the first. But I can decide for myself what is fit to put in my body. I don't need the FDA. And without it, just imagine how much drug prices will drop.
hunter| 2.2.11 @ 1:36PM
Not his fault! He can't help it. When his mouth opens his ears close, and his mouth has rarely shut in the past three years.
Oldefarte| 2.2.11 @ 2:40PM
I'm almost completely against governmental regulation, since, as this editorial states, it too costly, and also since the government and its imbicilic employee base is simply not professionally qualified to knowledgably administer these regulations. As stated, private business will regulate themselves due to customer satisfaction concerns [those who fail or refuse to do so will economically fail in the long run by being replaced by those that do do so]!!!!!
kiltmaker| 2.2.11 @ 3:44PM
From the op-ed:
the right balance, that is, between "placing unreasonable burdens on business -- burdens that have stifled innovation and have had a chilling effect on growth and jobs" and "meet[ing] our basic responsibility to protect the public interest."
The problem is what does he call an unreasonable burden. Apparently, all that he has done is reasonable. Therefore is not subject to change under this review effort. In fact, it sounds like he will increase regulation to close the gaps that are found.
GENE HAUBER| 2.2.11 @ 4:26PM
AS EACH DAY PASSES, OBAMA LOOKS MORE LIKE THE CHIMPANZEE THAT'S GONNA BITE OFF ALL OF OUR FACES.
THE CONSTITUTION FAILED IN ONE RESPECT.
IT DIDN'T ALLOW FOR US TO REMEDY ELECTING A MORON FOR PRESIDENT.....a well loved, by some, MORON
Uli Kunkel| 2.2.11 @ 4:41PM
Oh my, my, yes---
Obonehead is a prolific exponent of unintelligible gibberish of misdirection and obfuscation!!! He's traitorous -- I say arrest him, lock'em-up!!!
Timely Renewed | 2.4.11 @ 1:52AM
If the federal government really wants to help business, how about an across-the-board exemption from all federal regulations for the real innovators and job creators - small business? Because federal regulations are designed for (and all too often by) big companies, "one-size-fits-all" national regulations impose far higher compliance costs per employee on small businesses than on big business, which can afford to absorb the costs of large internal staffs and armies of lawyers to comply with massively complex federal regulations. Let the states regulate small businesses so the federal government can focus on the big corporate malefactors. Following the original meaning of the Constitution’s interstate commerce clause and freeing small business from federal regulation will do far, far more to unleash the job-generating power of small business than a dozen of Mr. Obama's token regulatory reviews. See http://www.timelyrenewed.com
Dennis Klein| 4.24.11 @ 9:58PM
Please, the man simply talks, there is no meaning except to manipulate and control people. He is a classic narcissist pathological liar. I would not waste a moment listening to him speak, what for?
العاب بنات | 4.11.12 @ 4:10PM
candidate promises an ethical, simon-pure, transparent administration