CEI Weekly: An Optimistic Economic Growth Agenda

Friday, February 17, 2012

Feature: Wayne Crews presents an alternative to President Obama's proposed budget.

FEATURE: An Optimistic Economic Growth Agenda President Obama's proposed new federal budget would increase spending without boosting the country's chance for a true economic revival. CEI Vice President for Policy Wayne Crews critiques the President's plan and presents an alternative federal agenda in his Forbes column this week. Read the column here.  SHAPING THE DEBATE Making Sure Corruption Remains "Made in America" Bill Frezza's column in Forbes How is the FDA Really Doing? Henry I. Miller's article in Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News Orwellian Doublespeak Dominates Economic Policy Bill Frezza's op-ed on RealClearMarkets Obama's Contraception Compromise Doesn't Quell Debate Hans Bader's letter to the editor in The Washington Post Testimony on "Where the Jobs Are" John Berlau's Testimony Before House Subcommittee Comment Letter on Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Fuel Economy Standards Marlo Lewis' submitted comments to the EPA and NHTSA Heartland Burned by DenialGate Memos Myron Ebell's citation in Politico Highway-Oriented House Transportation Bill: Why It's Hated by Everyone Marc Scribner's citation in The International Business Times

CEI PODCAST February 16, 2012: Washington's Prescription Drug Shortage Patients are suffering from a nationwide shortage of more than 260 different prescription drugs, many of them for different types of cancer. Senior Fellow Greg Conko explains why the biggest culprit for the drug shortage is Washington. DEA and FDA regulations make it difficult to ramp up supply, or to change prices to more accurately reflect demand. BEST OF THE BLOGS Will Markey's Keystone Export Plan Come Back to Bite Him? By Marlo Lewis Lame Duck Sen. Herb Kohl Continues Quixotic Battle Against Rail Carriers in Senate Highway Bill By Marc Scribner EPA Publishes Absurd Mercury Reg; Sen. Inhofe Counters; House Sleeps By William Yeatman California Considers "Public Employee Bill of Rights" By Jack Mann

CEI Today: Political Corruption, the Highway Bill, and Drug Shortages

Friday, February 17, 2012
In the News Today

Media Contacts: Christine Hall 202.331.2258 Nicole Ciandella 202.331.2773 CEI Experts by Issue Advancing Capitalism Constitutional and Legal Issues Energy and Environment Finance and Entrepreneurship Health and Safety Labor Nanny State Regulatory Reform Tech and Telecom Trade and International Transportation   Also featuring... CEI IN THE NEWS THE "FRED WEEKLY" February 17, 2012

POLITICAL CORRUPTION - BILL FREZZA Forbes: Making Sure Corruption Remains 'Made in America' If the U.S. government really wants to use its influence to get the world of global business to operate on a level playing field, instead of terrorizing American corporations for doing in Rome as do the Romans, perhaps it should run training sessions for foreign governments on how to construct a legalized system of influence peddling as subtle and backhanded as the one we have here.     HIGHWAY BILL - MARC SCRIBNER OpenMarket.org: Lame Duck Sen. Herb Kohl Continues Quixotic Battle Against Rail Carriers in Senate Highway Bill Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wisc.), who will not be seeking reelection this November, decided that he would make one last-ditch attempt to get his awful piece of legislation from last year (the Railroad Antitrust Enforcement Act) passed by the Senate as an amendment to their highway bill. The primary purpose of the legislation is to remove the limited antitrust exemptions granted to America’s private railroads. Right now, the Surface Transportation Board, which is the watered-down successor organization to the tyrannical Interstate Commerce Commission, has sole authority in ruling over matters of competition policy within the railroad industry. HEALTH - GREG CONKO CEI Podcast: Washington's Prescription Drug Shortage Patients are suffering from a nationwide shortage of more than 260 different prescription drugs, many of them for different types of cancer. Senior Fellow Greg Conko explains why the biggest culprit for the drug shortage is Washington. DEA and FDA regulations make it difficult to ramp up supply, or to change prices to more accurately reflect demand. Ten Thousand Commandments By Wayne Crews Welcome to The Other National Debt -- The Cost of Regulation -> Read Today's Decrees CEI is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy group dedicated to the principles of free enterprise and limited government.  For more information about CEI, please visit our website, cei.org, and blogs, Globalwarming.org and OpenMarket.org.  Follow CEI on Twitter! Twitter.com/ceidotorg.

CEI Today: Highway bill, labor law reform, Obama budget and more

Tuesday, February 14, 2012
In the News Today

Media Contacts: Christine Hall 202.331.2258 Nicole Ciandella 202.331.2773 CEI Experts by Issue Advancing Capitalism Constitutional and Legal Issues Energy and Environment Finance and Entrepreneurship Health and Safety Labor Nanny State Regulatory Reform Tech and Telecom Trade and International Transportation   Also featuring... CEI IN THE NEWS THE "FRED WEEKLY" February 10, 2012: Fred at CPAC! Panel discussion of EPA over-regulation with Myron Ebell and Marlo Lewis

CONGRESS & LABOR LAW - RUSS BROWN & IVAN OSORIO Spectator.org:Busting Union Reform Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is touting the recent passage of his "compromise" bill reauthorizing the Federal Aviation Administration, the agency that oversees U.S. air transport. Unfortunately for airline workers, Congress missed a rare opportunity to enact needed reforms to America's labor laws. After months of heated debate, leaders finally reached a deal late last month when House Republicans' promised to drop controversial labor language from the bill in exchange for Reid's concession to remove some particularly onerous provisions. But those concessions amount to mere Band-Aids on a labor regime that systematically favors powerful unions at the expense of individual workers -- and the flying public.  > Read the full commentary on Spectator.org   > Interview Ivan Osorio TRANSPORTATION BILL - MARC SCRIBNER CEI.org:Coalition Letter Urges Congress to Reject Linking Drilling Revenues to the Highway Trust Fund The Competitive Enterprise Institute, Reason Foundation, National Taxpayers Union, Taxpayers for Common Sense, and Natural Resources Defense Council sent a joint letter to members of Congress urging them reject the unprecedented linking of onshore and offshore oil and gas revenue with the Highway Trust Fund. In their letter, the groups note that creating this new revenue stream would undermine the longstanding user-pays/user-benefits highway funding principle that has guided infrastructure investment for nearly six decades. Further increasing the reliance of the Highway Trust Fund on revenue streams not connected to use, they argue, would threaten the future health of America’s highways. > Read the coalition letter on the highway bill at CEI.org > Interview Marc Scribner   OBAMA BUDGET - WAYNE CREWS Forbes.com:How to Swap the Obama Budget for an Optimistic Economic Growth Agenda New spending in President Obama’s $3.8 trillion fiscal year 2013 budget would increase investments in education, manufacturing and R&D, transportation projects, electric vehicle incentives and the like. While those upticks apparently lie within discretionary spending caps he’s agreed to with Congress, taxes would rise regardless. This escalating “declaration of dependence” on federal dollars by our most crucial manufacturing, infrastructure and frontier industry sectors should concern us. Republicans will pounce, of course, but they too vote to boost government investment in “basic science,” technology and manufacturing (such as the America COMPETES Act). > Read the full commentary on Forbes.com > Interview Wayne Crews CEI COMMENTARY ROUND-UP Regulation of the Day 209: Playing on the Beach Global Biotech Crop Acreage Up, Plus Clayton Yeutter on the Miracle of American Agriculture Orwellian Doublespeak Dominates Economic Policy Government Thwarts Cancer Cures and Production of Life-Saving Drugs First, They Came For My Toilet Paper Doubling Down on DOE: President Puts Our Money Where His Mouth Is The Price of Obama's Fairness Openmarket.org      Globalwarming.org Ten Thousand Commandments By Wayne Crews Welcome to The Other National Debt -- The Cost of Regulation -> Read Today's Decrees CEI is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy group dedicated to the principles of free enterprise and limited government.  For more information about CEI, please visit our website, cei.org, and blogs, Globalwarming.org and OpenMarket.org.  Follow CEI on Twitter! Twitter.com/ceidotorg.

CEI Today: Barriers to jobs, economic growth, foreign bribes, Obama contraception mandate and more

Wednesday, February 15, 2012
In the News Today

Media Contacts: Christine Hall 202.331.2258 Nicole Ciandella 202.331.2773 CEI Experts by Issue Advancing Capitalism Constitutional and Legal Issues Energy and Environment Finance and Entrepreneurship Health and Safety Labor Nanny State Regulatory Reform Tech and Telecom Trade and International Transportation   Also featuring... CEI IN THE NEWS THE "FRED WEEKLY" February 10, 2012: Fred at CPAC! Panel discussion of EPA over-regulation with Myron Ebell and Marlo Lewis

JOBS & THE ECONOMY - JOHN BERLAU Today's Testimony Before House Subcommittee With unemployment still stubbornly high and the economy still in tenuous shape, the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade is seeking answers to those problems, launching the first in its series of hearings entitled, “Where the Jobs Are.”  Wednesday's hearing features John Berlau, Director of CEI's Center for Investors and Entrepreneurs. "Of all the regulations out there facing entrepreneurs, among the most important are those affecting access to capital," Berlau explains in written testimony submitted to the subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Berlau notes recent research showing that firms less than five years old are responsible for nearly all net job growth. Yet these are the very firms hit by crushing regulations that make it very difficult to raise capital by going public. > Read the full testimony by John Berlau   > Interview John Berlau FOREIGN BRIBES VS.DOMESTIC INFLUENCE PEDDLING - BILL FREZZA Forbes.com:Making Sure Corruption Remains "Made In America" If the U.S. government really wants to use its influence to get the world of global business to operate on a level playing field, instead of terrorizing American corporations for doing in Rome as do the Romans, perhaps it should run training sessions for foreign governments on how to construct a legalized system of influence peddling as subtle and backhanded as the one we have here. I sat in on such a training session in the winter of 2008 run by the venerable K&L Gates LLP, the nation’s ninth largest law firm, which boasts on its website of its ability to “seamlessly integrate lobbying and regulatory implementation.”  > Read the commentary on Forbes.com > Interview Bill Frezza   OBAMA CONTRACEPTION MANDATE - HANS BADER Openmarket.org:Misconceptions about the Obama Administration’s Contraception Mandate for Religious Employers There are a number of misconceptions about the Obama administration’s recent rule requiring employers’ health insurance policies (including those of religious schools and hospitals) to cover contraceptives and certain abortifacients. First, as a commentator notes, it’s not true that states in general already require such coverage. Second, it’s just not true that the Obama administration’s rule must be legal because it is supposedly modeled on state insurance rules in states like California. Under basic principles of federalism, there are things that states can require, but the federal government, which has only enumerated powers, cannot. > Read the full commentary on Openmarket.org > Interview Hans Bader CEI COMMENTARY ROUND-UP The Hidden Cost of Fuel Economy Regulations: Constitutional Vitiation Strange Bedfellows Coalition Urges Congress To Drop Drilling for Roads The Problems with the STOCK Act Maryland Weighs Discriminatory College Child Support Mandate Openmarket.org      Globalwarming.org Ten Thousand Commandments By Wayne Crews Welcome to The Other National Debt -- The Cost of Regulation -> Read Today's Decrees CEI is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy group dedicated to the principles of free enterprise and limited government.  For more information about CEI, please visit our website, cei.org, and blogs, Globalwarming.org and OpenMarket.org.  Follow CEI on Twitter! Twitter.com/ceidotorg.

CEI Today: $26 billion foreclosure settlement, STOCK Act muzzling, Solyndra scandal latest and more

Monday, February 13, 2012
In the News Today

Media Contacts: Christine Hall 202.331.2258 Nicole Ciandella 202.331.2773 CEI Experts by Issue Advancing Capitalism Constitutional and Legal Issues Energy and Environment Finance and Entrepreneurship Health and Safety Labor Nanny State Regulatory Reform Tech and Telecom Trade and International Transportation   Also featuring... CEI IN THE NEWS THE "FRED WEEKLY" February 2, 2012: McDonald's and Pepsi's Different Response to Pressure CEI Podcast for February 2, 2012: The FDA’s Latest Power Grab Fellow in Consumer Policy Studies Michelle Minton breaks down the FDA’s behind-the-scenes push to regulate dietary supplements nearly as strictly as prescription drugs. >Listen at Libertyweek.org

SOLYNDRA SCANDAL - MYRON EBELL Globalwarming.org: House Ratchets Up Probe of White House Involvement in Solyndra Scandal Fourteen Republican members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, led by Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) sent a strongly-worded, five-page letter to the White House on 9th February setting a 21st February deadline for turning over documents related to the White House’s involvement in the Solyndra scandal.   The letter also demands that five officials be made available for interviews by 17th February. > Read the full commentary on Globalwarming.org   > Interview Myron Ebell, Director of CEI's Center on Energy and Environment FINANCIAL REGULATION & THE "STOCK ACT" - JOHN BERLAU OpenMarket.org:The STOCK Act’s Muzzle and How to Fix it in Conference Both the Senate and the House have now passed to STOCK Act aimed at stopping insider trading by lawmakers and staff.  But, as CEI's John Berlau warns, the bill as presented to the conference committee contains dangerous, excessive restrictions on communictaion: "Both bills must go to “conference” to produce a final identical bill to be voted on by both houses, giving members an opportunity for a fix to help make sure that whistleblowing and routine communication with outside groups from being caught in the law’s web." > Read the full commentary on Openmarket.org > Interview John Berlau, Director of CEI's Center for Investors and Entrepreneurs   BANK FORECLOSURE SETTLEMENT - HANS BADER Openmarket.org: $26 Billion Mortgage Settlement Rips Off Investors to Trim Banks’ Massive Costs of Bailing Out Deadbeat Borrowers On Friday, the Justice Department and state attorneys general announced a settlement agreement, perhaps the largest federal-state civil settlement in American history, with five banks including Bank of America Corp. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. over foreclosure practices. CEI's Hans Bader explains why investors and others will now get ripped off: "By ripping off mortgage investors, this deal will make investing in mortgages more risky, which will in turn drive up interest rates that homebuyers have to pay in the future.  This deal only covers borrowers at certain banks, not those borrowers who mortgages are held by the government-sponsored mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which (unlike the private banks) have never repaid their bailout, and are currently still being bailed out at an ever-increasing tab of $170 billion. This deal is not the only way that federal and state officials are messing up the housing market.  The Obama administration is forcing banks to make risky loans (in the name of 'fair lending'), thus planting the seeds of a future financial crisis. The Justice Department is suing banks that refuse to do so, and forcing them both to award preferential loans based on race, and to cough up money in 'settlements,' some of which goes to left-wing 'community' groups. > Read the full commentary on Openmarket.org > Interview Hans Bader CPAC Roundup CEI co-sponsored this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Thursday, February 9 to Saturday, February 11 in Washington, D.C. CEI speakers addressed a range of provocative topics, from energy regulation to immigration, labor union politics to government regulation of the Internet.  We'll be posting video soon.  Today, video for the immigration debate is now available: CPAC panel featuring Alex Nowrasteh: Immigration - High Fences, Wide Gates: States vs. the Feds, the Rule of Law & American Identity Saturday, February 11, 2012 > View the video > Read more by Alex Nowrasteh > Interview Alex Nowrasteh Ten Thousand Commandments By Wayne Crews Welcome to The Other National Debt -- The Cost of Regulation -> Read Today's Decrees CEI is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy group dedicated to the principles of free enterprise and limited government.  For more information about CEI, please visit our website, cei.org, and blogs, Globalwarming.org and OpenMarket.org.  Follow CEI on Twitter! Twitter.com/ceidotorg.