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NEWS ARCHIVE - OPINION FROM THE RIGHT

Obama on Pace to Match Bush’s Lengthy Federal Register Record: Ryan Young

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Federal regulations keep piling up under President Barack Obama, who’s on pace to surpass the regulatory zeal of George W. Bush, writes Ryan Young, the Warren T. Brookes Journalism Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

The Federal Register, the government’s book of new rules, currently stands at 50,842 pages in Obama’s first term. At this pace it would reach more than 80,000 pages. Bush left office with a Federal Register of 80,700 pages.

The record belongs to President Jimmy Carter (87,012 pages).

Young argues that Obama should appoint a bipartisan commission to find “harmful or obsolete regulations” and remove them for good.

“The time for this regulatory stimulus package is now,” he writes. “Today’s sky-high regulatory costs are one reason for the economy’s sluggish recovery. Doing business in America becomes more expensive every year, discouraging job-creating entrepreneurship. Keeping Federal Register page counts in check is important. Keeping the contents of those pages in check is even more important.”

-Noel Brinkerhoff

Federal Register Hits 50,000 Pages (by Ryan Young, Daily Caller)

State Dept. Trafficking Report Shows Bad Shift: Janice Shaw Crouse
Saturday, August 07, 2010
	Janice Shaw Crouse, a former speechwriter for George H. W. Bush and now political commentator for the Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Committee, is not happy with the latest Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report, issued by the State Department. Crouse takes exception with the State Department’s decision to lump sex trafficking and labor trafficking together. She writes that this change is significant because it “conflates the two types of trafficking, and the phrase is used by those who see prostitution as ‘sex work.’ Instead of focusing on commercial sexual exploitation, the term links the two forms of human trafficking as ‘forms of employment’, requiring proof by the employer that force, fraud, or coercion was not used in the ‘hiring.’” Crouse says the 10th anniversary edition of the TIP report “signals a shift of focus” by the current administration on the problem of human trafficking. For starters, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton writes in her introductory remarks that the U.S. is more interested in being a “partner” rather than a leader in confronting the “global scourge.” The report also references the U.N.-generated Palermo Protocol (2000), instead of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act that Congress approved in the same year. This represents a “shift away from U.S. law to an international United Nations ‘law.’” Finally, the report seems to downplay the importance of requiring the TIP office “to coordinate anti-trafficking efforts across the Federal agencies, thus ensuring compliance with the legislation’s provisions, including a new model law for states that would make all acts of pandering and pimping per se crimes regardless of whether or not there is proof of fraud, force, or coercion and whether or not the victim is a minor.” -Noel Brinkerhoff The Administration Picks Weak Path to Fight Sex Trade (by Janice Shaw Crouse, Weekly Standard)

Where is FEMA in the Gulf Oil Crisis?: Rich Galen
Thursday, June 24, 2010
	During the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, Americans have heard from or about the U.S. Coast Guard, the Minerals Management Service, and even President Barack Obama. But the one agency that has not made an appearance—the one whose mission is all about responding to disasters—is the Federal Emergency Management Agency, writes conservative Rich Galen. FEMA is still operating, in case anyone was wondering. Galen points out that FEMA’s website says it has responded to 47 declared disasters, so far, in 2010. But the environmental mess threatening states from Texas to Florida is not on FEMA’s list. Galen notes that “the only element of FEMA’s webpage dealing with the oil spill in the Gulf is a button labeled ‘Oil Spill Guidance.’ The link merely redirects visitors to another site, www.disasterassistance.gov. “However … we are spending $5.5 billion on FEMA and, if the agency is not authorized, not qualified, and/or not equipped to be in charge of a disaster then perhaps a good re-think is in order before the FY 2011 appropriation is adopted,” he concludes. -Noel Brinkerhoff Where's FEMA? (by Rich Galen, Mullings)

Don’t Reform Campaign Financing Behind Closed Doors: Jeff Patch
Saturday, May 08, 2010
	You can’t really trust Democrats or Republicans when it comes to campaign finance reform, argues Jeff Patch, communications director for the Center for Competitive Politics. Both liberals and conservatives, while in control of Congress, have demonstrated a knack for reforms that limit free speech. In 2004, GOP lawmakers tried to limit the ability of liberal-minded groups to criticize President George W. Bush. Meanwhile, groups ranging from Common Cause to U.S. PIRG have taken in millions of dollars in “soft contributions” while decrying the very same types of money accepted by politicians or political parties. That’s why the Center for Competitive Politics has worked with libertarians (Institute for Justice) and liberals (ACLU) to “combat the notion that if Members of Congress shut everyone else up to give themselves monopolistic control of the debate in elections, a utopian democracy free of corruption will sprout from the ashes of our flawed constitutional republic,” writes Patch. Patch insists any real, meaningful change to campaigns must be founded on the basic principle that everyone—“no matter if the speakers are billionaires or busboys”—have the same rights under the First Amendment. -Noel Brinkerhoff Grass(Roots) Dies When Sun Shines Too Brightly (by Jeff Patch, Daily Caller)

The Big Winners in Arizona’s Immigration Law? Lawyers: Michael Gerson
Friday, April 30, 2010
	Michael Gerson, adviser and speechwriter to President George W. Bush, wants to see the United States establish “effective border enforcement” for the Southwest. But the new immigration law adopted by the state of Arizona is not the way to go, Gerson argues. The country needs a guest-worker program that allows immigrants from Mexico to enter the U.S. in an orderly manner so they can provide for their families while at the same time “allowing border authorities to focus on more urgent crimes…,” he writes. But the chaotic state that today characterizes the border has resulted in Arizona going too far in trying to take control of “American immigration policy—an authority that Arizona has seized in order to abuse.” The new law is likely to result in legal immigrants and American citizens being harassed by law enforcement—a development that only will lead to expensive litigation. “If this vague law is applied vigorously, the state will be regularly sued by citizens who are wrongfully stopped,” Gerson insists. “But if the law is not applied vigorously enough, it contains a provision allowing citizens to sue any agency or official who ‘limits or restricts the enforcement of federal immigration laws.’ Either way, lawyers rejoice.” -Noel Brinkerhoff A Test of Arizona's Political Character (by Michael Gerson, Washington Post)

Big Business Exploits Tort Reform: Ken Connor
Monday, April 19, 2010
	Conservative attorney and author Ken Connor is not willing to go along with reforms to the legal system that big business and many on the right have been advocating. Using the recent mining disaster in West Virginia as an example, Connor points out that “there is a dangerous move afoot to immunize corporate malefactors from full accountability to their victims.” Companies like Massey Energy, owner of the Upper Big Branch mine, have already been getting away with safety violations that have put Americans in harm’s way. To adopt tort reform proposals pushed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce would only make it that much easier for certain businesses to continue their irresponsible and dangerous behavior. Installing caps on non-economic and punitive awards in civil cases would rob individuals from serious recourse when corporate wrongdoing has occurred. Connor insists the country needs “robust legal mechanisms” to send a message to companies that it is not cheaper to cut corners and risk people’s lives. -Noel Brinkerhoff Subsidizing Bad Behavior: The Injustice of Tort Reform (by Ken Connor, Center for a Just Society)

Obama Gladly Embraces Bush’s Anti-Terrorism Powers: Eli Lake
Sunday, April 18, 2010
	Regardless of the rhetorical attacks Republicans have lobbed at him for being soft on terrorism, President Barack Obama is continuing much of his predecessor’s policies and strategies for the war on terror, argues Eli Lake at Reason.com. Sure, Obama allowed the FBI to read the Christmas-Day airline bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, his constitutional rights. And his attorney general, Eric Holder, said he wanted to try 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed in a New York criminal courtroom. But there are many decisions by Obama that are in line with the “9/14 presidency”—named after the legislative powers Congress granted to President George W. Bush just three days following the September 11 attacks. “When it comes to the legal framework for confronting terrorism, President Obama is acting in no meaningful sense any different than President Bush after 2006, when the Supreme Court overturned the view that the president’s war time powers were effectively unlimited,” writes Lake. “As the Obama administration itself is quick to point out, the Bush administration also tried terrorists apprehended on U.S. soil in criminal courts, most notably “20th hijacker” Zacarias Moussaoui and shoe bomber Richard Reid. More important, President Obama has embraced and at times defended the same expansive view of a global war against Al Qaeda as President Bush.” The Obama administration has also embraced the plan to hold suspected terrorists indefinitely without charge, “try them via military tribunal, keep them imprisoned even if they are acquitted, and kill them in foreign countries with which America is not formally at war (including Yemen, Somalia, and Pakistan).” -Noel Brinkerhoff The 9/14 Presidency (by Eli Lake, Reason.com)

Rebranding Needed—Rename the Republican Party the Conservative Party: Myra Adams
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
	With fewer and fewer Americans willing to identify themselves as members of the Republican Party, it’s time to change the name, argues conservative Myra Adams. Instead of the Republican Party or the GOP, the political party should reflect its philosophy—conservatism—in its name. A rebranding to the Conservative Party could take advantage of the fact that 40% of respondents to a recent Gallup Poll referred to themselves as “conservative.” Contrast that with the only 24.4% who say they’re Republicans. Also, Adams argues that half of the 36% who say they’re moderates are likely to vote with the new Conservative Party. That would give the rebranded party 58% of the electorate. -Noel Brinkerhoff Memo to GOP: A Name Change Would Do You Good (by Myra Adams, Daily Caller)

Legalize the Selling of Bone Marrow: Steve Chapman
Monday, March 15, 2010
	It is for good reason that there are laws on the books preventing people from buying and selling organs in the United States, writes Steve Chapman of the Chicago Tribune. But concerns about ghoulish markets developing around dying patients should not apply to those in need of bone marrow transplants to combat cancer. Unlike livers or kidneys, which can’t be replaced by a donor, bone marrow is naturally restored in the body after it is extracted. Chapman argues that bone marrow should be treated similarly to blood and sperm donations, for which people are compensated. Allowing donors to be paid for giving marrow would encourage more Americans to step up and give, providing more patients with a fighting chance for survival. -Noel Brinkerhoff Dying People Shouldn't Have to be Beggars (by Steve Chapman, Creators.com)

Education…Let Parents Choose: John Stossel
Saturday, February 20, 2010
	Leaving education in the hands of the government has resulted in rising costs and flat-lining tests scores, notes Fox News television correspondent John Stossel, who wants to give parents the choice of sending their kids to private schools. He says government spending on education has nearly doubled over the past 30 years, but hasn’t resulted in greater achievement by students. Furthermore, teachers’ unions have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo with public schools so their ranks don’t dwindle as a result of parents sending their kids to private institutions. “Today we spend a stunning $11,000 a year per student—more than $200,000 per classroom. It’s not working,” writes Stossel. “So when will we permit competition and choice, which works great with everything else?” He adds that education experts who have studied other countries’ schools found “two factors predict a country’s educational success: Do the schools have the autonomy to experiment, and do parents have a choice?” Stossel believes the United States should encourage voucher systems to give parents of all economic backgrounds more freedom of choice. -Noel Brinkerhoff Education: Too Important for a Government Monopoly (by John Stossel, Creators Syndicate) Advocates Protest Elimination of DC’s Voucher System (by Amira Elmallah, AllGov)

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