Chip Taylor

The power of the regulatory machinery

The Washington Post starts a three-day series on the way the Bush Administration has used the regulatory bureacracy to advance its policy priorities:

The changes within OSHA since George W. Bush took office illustrate the way that this administration has used the regulatory process to redirect the course of government.

To examine this process, The Washington Post explored the Bush administration's approach to regulation from three perspectives. This article about OSHA traces the impact on one regulatory agency. Tomorrow's story will look at a lobbyist's 32-line, last-minute addition to a bill that created a tool for attacking the science used to support new regulations. Tuesday's article will document a one-word change in a regulation that allowed coal companies to accelerate efforts to strip away the tops of thousands of Appalachian mountains.

I don't have any comment. But I'm taking two courses that deal with this sort of issue. The articles might come in handy later, so I'm linking them for future reference.

UPDATE: Second article in series here.

UPDATE: Third article in series here.