We have repeatedly written about our having to endure between now and November 2012 the intentional policy and political schizophrenia of the Barack Obama Administration.
For public consumption – with the perpetual assistance of his servile media – there will be the “new” President Barack Obama. The “shellacked,” humbled man who claims to get that his Party’s policies were historically rejected by the American people. Whose now moderated, bipartisan, Triangulated work with the Republicans will make former President and 1994 “shellackee” Bill Clinton look recalcitrant and amateur….
Going forward, in real terms, President Obama is incapable of a (President Bill) Clinton-esque move to the Middle. He will do his best to put on a public show, but his Big-Government-At-All-Costs agenda will continue unabated. It will just be done behind the scenes via rampant, abusive expansion of the vast regulatory authority at his disposal.
Every Commission, every Agency, every Board in the federal pantheon will ratchet up their orders, rules and directives. To impose via executive branch regulatory fiat what President Obama can no longer get done in Congress. In other words, bypass the obviously expressed will of the American people for smaller, more accountable government – so as to continue jamming through his on-all-fronts Titanic Government plan. And do so without the People’s representatives at all involved in the process.
The Administration’s first post-election, venomous bite at this secret apple was the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)’s December 21st under-cover-of-Christmas vote to illegally commandeer control of the wired Internet – so as to then impose Network Neutrality.
Which puts a regulatory hammer lock on the Internet free market.
About which former Obama Deputy Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors Susan Crawford just said:
“(R)egulating these guys into an inch of their life is exactly what needs to happen.”
Mission accomplished. And how very reassuring for our foundering economy – and the job providers who are the key to the recovery.
Yet nearly four months after the FCC’s power grab, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski has not yet filed the December 21st order with the federal registry.
After a bit of investigation, we now know why.
And it represents an inordinate abuse of existing law so as to maximize the FCC’s – and the entire Obama Administration’s – push to dominate as much as possible the American free market via executive branch regulatory fiat.
The law currently being abused by the FCC is 1980’s Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA). The intent of which is to:
Minimize the paperwork burden for individuals, small businesses, educational and nonprofit institutions, Federal contractors, State, local and tribal governments, and other persons….
The PRA exists to prevent the government from imposing new rules and regulations without the feds executing a thorough assessment of just how much damage to the private sector said rules and regulations will do.
Under the PRA, every federal Commission, Agency and Department must determine the impact of new regulations – including the number of potentially affected companies and the likely number of “burden hours” they will have to absorb to be in compliance therewith.
The PRA then provides the public with an opportunity to challenge the government’s estimates. If your business is about to get pounded, and the government is underestimating the pounding, you have an opportunity to challenge their evaluation.
The PRA is a somewhat tedious, time consuming process – which is a very good thing, and sort of the point. Better to – at least initially – make it harder for the government to make it harder on the private sector.
Great idea, right?
Indeed it is – or it would be, were the government going through the PRA process BEFORE creating new regulations.
Instead, the Obama Administration is FIRST jamming through myriad new rules and regulations – via the FCC and throughout the executive branch agency pantheon.
And only afterwards – as a behind-the-scenes after thought – going as quietly as possible through the PRA process.
Sort of misses the point, does it not?
And explains why the FCC is so tardy in filing its December 21st Internet power grab – they are only now in the process of complying with the PRA.
The people who were just hammered by the FCC are probably now too busy trying to undo said hammering – as is Congress – to even notice the PRA process the Commission quietly announced in February – let alone avail themselves of our role therein.
Which – it would seem – is just how the FCC wants it.
And does anyone doubt – that as the Environmental Protection Agency rams through the unpassed Cap & Trade, the Department of Labor and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) jam through the unpassed Card Check, and the myriad other wings of Obama’s Leviathan do their worst – that they are all also failing to preemptively comply with the PRA?
To comply with the law would indicate that the Obama Administration is concerned about damaging the free market – rather than intending it.
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