PJ: The decline of America, perhaps surprisingly, can be traced directly to the Nixon administration. Surprising, because the Left hated Tricky Dick with a passion that can only be compared with the passion that animates the never-Trump crowd: sheer, animal loathing. Surprising, because Nixon was the most domestically liberal, if not actually leftist, president we've had until Obama. Surprising, because to this day old Nixon-haters still foam at the mouth at the very thought of the man who took down the "pink lady," Helen Gahagan Douglas, and saved Israel in 1973; a year later, of course, they finally sacked him over Watergate.
But it was during the first Nixon administration that the hideous monstrosity of the Environmental Protection Agency came into being by executive order, along with its ugly twin, the Occupational Safety and Health Act. Seemingly innocuous and well-intentioned at the time, both agencies have metastasized, their original missions completed and now forever on the prowl for something else to meddle with. They're both unconstitutional, of course, but what's even worse is that they've turned into rogue agencies, issuing edicts, orders and regulations largely devoid of congressional scrutiny -- pure instruments of executive power, with none to gainsay them.
To get an idea of just hoe obnoxious and intrusive these do-gooder agencies have become, get a load of this from Lou Ann Rieley, who owns a farm in Delaware: (continue)
10 comments:
The President who does that, and there are plenty of other agencies that should suffer the same fate (TSA, most recently), would be doing the country a huge favor.
Pissy's use of executive orders and EPA regs has probably made the agency riper than most for abolition.
"these do-gooder agencies"? According to whom? Remember the Administration czar who reveled in how the Romans crucified a few people when they conquered a new province? That's what outfits like EPA are for - to make examples of people. It's why the IRS has gotten so big.
The govt. across the board needs to be cut in half. Adjust for 2 years, then cut it in half again.
You can't have a country with 325 million people and run it with adhoc rules and regulations.
AJ Lynch said...
You can't have a country with 325 million people and run it with adhoc rules and regulations.
I'll take my chances against the amount of laws passed daily that criminalize everything I do from the moment I'm asleep till the moment I wake up and probably anything in between sleep and wakefulness. How many laws did I break getting to work this morning? Beats me and it's the ad hoc arbitrary application of those laws against me that make the whole system even worse because it's the idea that, another person perceives I have broken the law and in that perception I get thrust into the legal meat grinder trying to find a way out when I probably shouldn't have ever been there to begin with.
I have memories of those Nixon days and I think that the enviroment has gotten better. No rivers have caught fire lately. Maybe the heavy industry (steel mills and foundries and chemical) have all moved overseas. Maybe those industries have become cleaner on their own. Maybe the EPA has helped clean up toxic sites and improved the air and water.
I have a libertarian streak in me, but I can’t get past the pollution problem. Yes, you have every right to do whatever on your land, but if your factory puts out pollution, and damages the water shed not just for me, but for everyone downstream. Yes I could try and prove a tort and sue you, but I think we have seen a company just fold up and run away in the night, leaving a brown field that cannot be redeveloped cause of this or that toxin. I think there is a legit role for government here.
Reform EPA, bring it under congressional oversight, and then hold congress accountable. Limit its scope and reach, but I would not say to scrap it.
Jim,
Would you be saying the same thing about the EPA considering they've caused probably more harm than good. Especially since they've been caught and admitted and lied about the extent to which they polluted several river ecosystems by releasing toxic waste in the Animas and San Juan Rivers. How about the several superfund sights they've utterly made worse? Who is going to go to jail for what they've done? Who in that department is going to pay? Oh wait, they are immune from their own harm. Oopsie, it was an accident. Our bad, move along.
Or when they classify any water on the ground anywhere in America as a function of the Clean Waters Act as a means to seize and/or fine private property. Case in point is about a private property owner who built his own pond and the EPA has fined him upwards of $16 million for doing so. On his own property. There are numerous cases of the EPA going so far beyond their regulatory mandates that this department is beyond being limited in it's scope and reach and should be scraped. It can never be redeemed.
Meth- You are quite right about overreach and out of range power grabs by federal agencies. You could have doubled your list of abuses and I'd say amen to each one. But I think the good governance pov should be to fix the problems, increase accountability, legislate the scope, increase oversight.
Baby / Bathwater
Every Gov bureaucracy has a shelf life of 20 years. They should fire everyone and start over right about that time its reason for being becomes self-sustainment instead of its original purpose. EPA, for example, did great things until the early 90's when it became just another Gov cudgel.
Some Seppo- Like the Bicentennial commission of 1976? They started out to commemorate the revolution, then moved on to commemorate the constitution, then the bill of rights. They are still around today- with a staff and budget and lord knows what they do in some department of interior backwater.
LOL, I'm sure they'll still be around if the USA reaches its tricentennial.
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