Tag: bureaucracy

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free trade & free markets regulation

Regulating Restrooms

Perhaps you remember the good old days — when men were men, women were women, and private establishments could maintain men’s restrooms and women’s restrooms for the men and the women without worrying about totalitarian edicts from a Human and Civil “Rights” Commission.

Those days may not be gone forever. But it sure must feel like it to the owners of the Hideout Arcade Bar & Grille in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware.

The restaurant refused the request of a man, what news reports call a “biological man,” who wanted to use the woman’s bathroom at the restaurant. His reason was that — well, I’m not sure his exact rationale matters. Anyway, the restaurant said no, doubtless feeling that it had a right to protect the sensibilities of the women using its bathrooms and to establish rules for their use.

He must have complained, because the Delaware Human and Civil “Rights” Commission got involved and, ignoring any common-​sense defense the restaurant offered, has fined the restaurant $2,000 and imposed “anti-​discrimination training” — i.e., reeducation — on its employees. 

No word on whether they’ll be forced to wear dunce caps, as were some unfortunates during China’s Cultural Revolution.

Commission members might say they’re merely following the law — they just work there. Delaware enacted an Equal Accommodations Law mandating that “All persons within the jurisdiction of this state are entitled to full and equal accommodations, facilities … regardless of … sex.”

Notice that the law did not say “heedless” of sex, however.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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national politics & policies too much government

Elon & Vivek to Cut Government?

Will it happen this time?

Even the most profligate taxers and spenders sometimes talk about making our federal government “more efficient” or about “cutting waste.” Commissions are set up, reports issued, and then — we still see the same runaway trajectory.

This time, former President and President-​Elect Donald Trump has announced that two heavy hitters, entrepreneurs Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, will be heading up a Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to do the job. They’re already planning and hiring.

Trump says that DOGE is determined to “dismantle government bureaucracy, slash regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure federal agencies.”

The project of cutting wasteful expenditures is the same going-​nowhere notion that we have seen before. If we get actual demolition of merely destructive agencies — which would require congressional cooperation, I believe — this would be great.

I can provide a list. But that would make me a part-​timer in this endeavor, and “We don’t need more part-​time idea generators,” DOGE says.

“We need super high-​IQ small-​government revolutionaries willing to work 80+ hours per week on unglamorous cost-​cutting. If that’s you, DM this account with your CV. Elon & Vivek will review the top 1% of applicants.”

Let us see what happens. Trump would have to push this forcefully and continually, getting his supporters to forcefully and continually pressure Congress, to get enough done fast enough to actually reduce Leviathan. And he’ll have a lot of other stuff to cope with.

But … boy, do we need it.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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regulation too much government

Wait, What?

SpaceX, FAA, regulations, bureaucracy

The Federal Aviation Administration wants to fine Elon Musk’s spacefaring firm SpaceX $633,000 for various alleged infractions of FAA regulations. In response, Musk says he’s suing the agency for “regulatory overreach.”

One set of fines pertains to using an “unapproved control room” and failure to “conduct the required T‑2 hour poll” during a June 2023 launch: 350,000 smackers.

Another set, totaling $283,000, is for using an “unapproved rocket propellant farm,” i.e., tanks for storing fuel until it’s pumped into the ships, back in July 2023.

Meanwhile, the Justice Department has sued SpaceX for hiring “only U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents” (wait, what?) and failing to take into account currently prevailing political winds. Perhaps the FAA should sue the Justice Department for expecting SpaceX to focus on anything but its missions.

The initial reporting doesn’t make clear whether there’s any merit to the FAA’s complaints — wrong specs for fuel tanks or whatever. The mere deviation from some regulation is meaningless if what SpaceX did instead is as safe or safer than what the bureaucrats stipulated.

Large enterprises must navigate an infinite number of regulations, and federal agencies are certainly selective enforcers. If you’re Boeing, it seems you can get away with shoddy practices for years, at least until the fit hits the shan.

I’ll wait to hear more, but I suspect that the FAA’s attempt to grab hundreds of thousands of dollars from Musk is indeed a symptom of regulatory overreach.

And just possibly motivated by … politics.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment national politics & policies regulation

Stop the Work Stoppers

Labor Department, gig economy, freelancing

Republican Representative Kevin Kiley of California has introduced H.J. Resolution 116 to block “the rule submitted by the Department of the Labor relating to ‘Employee or Independent Contractor Classification Under the Fair Labor Standards Act.’ ”

116 is a legislative attempt to thwart legislation by regulators.

Labor’s rule is modeled on the AB5 Act passed in California several years ago. Catering to unions, AB5’s idea was to kill the livelihoods of many gig workers or freelancers by making it much harder for companies and independent contractors to deal with each other.

The new rule, too, aims to kill competition with unions and expand the pool of employees who can be unionized.

AB5 caused a firestorm, leading to citizen initiatives, court battles, and victories and setbacks for besieged employers and freelancers. There’s been some backtracking of AB5, in part because sponsoring lawmakers realized that it hurt even favored constituencies. But California is still a land mine for would-​be freelancers.

The Labor Department is trying to impose AB5-​style reclassification on the national level now that national lawmakers have failed to pass legislation to do it.

These days, the many dictators in our government often regard legislative means of passing legislation as an option only of first resort. If that fails, well, stick it to the people some other way.

So Kiley — and, hopefully, an effective congressional majority — must pass a law saying no, regulators, you may not pass this law in the guise of a regulation.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment Eighth Amendment rights general freedom

The Case of the Narrow Driveway

nanny state, regulations, government, bureaucrats

Sandy Martinez: mother of three, working hard to get by, whole life ahead of her — why would she sabotage it by failing to perfectly park her car in her narrow driveway such that two of the wheels edged onto the grass?

Think I’m making it up? 

No. It’s true. Some people get distracted and treat their grass as if it were gravel and let their car edge onto it.

Why’dja do it Sandy, huh? Why?

On the hand, it’s her property, so who cares? 

What difference does it make? 

Well, mucho … if you’re Lantana, Florida, which fined Sandy $101,750 for imperfect parking, $47,000 because of storm-​inflicted fence damage, $16,000 for cracks in her driveway.

The good news is that Institute for Justice is litigating on behalf of Sandy Martinez and other homeowners being hit with plainly unjust fines for trivial code violations.

IJ argues that the state and local governments at fault are violating the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against excessive fines. And the Institute and its clients are winning. The U.S. Supreme Court has just ruled, in Timbs v. Indiana, that this Eight Amendment ban applies to cities and states as well as to the federal government. 

Many locales, perhaps including Lantana, Florida, may still try to get away with the grift despite this definitive ruling. But sooner or later, some judge will throw out the blatantly excessive fines and point to the recent Supreme Court decision.

Help is on the way, Sandy.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Accountability crime and punishment education and schooling

Problem Student, Problem Admin

school problem, problem student, gun, violence, education

“School downplayed warnings about 6‑year-​old before teacher’s shooting, staffers say,” The Washington Post headlined its Saturday report.

Weeks ago, elementary school teacher Abigail Zwerner was shot by a first grader in their Newport News, Virginia, classroom. Authorities are not sure of the precise motive but have called the attack “intentional.”

Zwerner remains hospitalized in stable condition, while her child assailant is in emergency custody undergoing “court-​ordered mental health treatment.”*

School officials received a tip that the boy had brought a gun to school but did not find the weapon in their search.

More disturbing, The Post interviewed “educators claiming that Zwerner raised alarms … and sought assistance” but “that school administrators waved away grave concerns about the 6‑year-old’s conduct.” The lad reportedly “threw furniture and other items in class,” once “barricaded the doors to a classroom, preventing a teacher and students from leaving,” and “was known campuswide for disruptive and violent behavior.”

One educator revealed that “the boy wrote a note telling a teacher he hated her and wanted to light her on fire and watch her die.” When brought “to the attention of Richneck administrators,” however, the teacher “was told to drop the matter.

“Several teachers said they received no support when they faced violence in the classroom or attacks from students,” the article informed. “Some speakers claimed the district is more interested in keeping discipline statistics low than in taking meaningful action to address students’ problems.”

The Post’s story was hampered by numerous school personnel refusing to talk citing their fear of reprisals from school authorities. 

While mental health help must be addressed, there is no solution to problems if administrators act like crooked politicians, simply sweeping aside serious issues.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* In Virginia, a person must be seven years of age to be charged with a crime, so the first grader will not be prosecuted.

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free trade & free markets too much government

The Exceptions Disprove the Rules

freedom, prohibition, rules, regulations, red tape, bureaucracy,

“I’ve instructed my prosecutors not to charge certain low-​level nonviolent offenses to avoid people being held in jail unnecessarily,” Maryland’s Attorney General Marilyn Mosby informed the state’s Republican governor. She also urged the governor “to release all inmates in state prisons who are over 60,” explains The Washington Times, “approved for parole or scheduled to complete their sentences within the next year.”

This is all to avoid a prison pandemic. Meanwhile, the “Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced Monday that it would permit states to create laboratories for designing COVID-​19 tests,” Reason magazine tells us, adding that the FDA “has also decided to permit pharmacists to make their own alcohol-​based hand sanitizers.”

Reason’s Robby Soave asks the obvious question: “Why do the people who are working hardest to fight the coronavirus have to ask a slow federal bureaucracy for permission to save lives?”

The New York Times reports that Dr. Helen Y. Chu, an infectious disease expert in Seattle, tried mightily to perform tests on subjects, early in the epidemic, to track how the virus was spreading. She was stymied every which way.

By bureaucracies.

The kludge of bad regulations and laws merely adds cost and annoyance during normal times; during emergencies they present major stumbling blocks to public health.

So, when our leaders make special exceptions, they demonstrate that the regulations were always bad — now just worse.

Real leadership would nix these rules, permanently.

And, for that matter, end the war on drugs — and prostitution and other victimless crimes.

One of the infractions Maryland’s AG decided to go lax on, however, is public urination. That crime has victims and ought to remain a public health violation.

Though perhaps not worth imprisonment.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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freedom, prohibition, rules, regulations, red tape, bureaucracy,

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Protector Protection

cfpb, watcher, eye, consumer, bureaucracy, power,

Government organizations are here to help. How do we know this? They have names that say so!

Take the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Great name. It is all about protecting consumers, right?

Created as part of the Dodd-​Frank legislation that was pushed through Congress following the 2008 financial implosion, the CFPB is tougher than the usual run-​of-​the-​mill government agency, however. In the words of Cato scholar Ilya Shapiro, it is “the most independent of independent agencies.” It has a single director, who is almost impossible to remove, and it is empowered to make, enforce, and adjudicate its rules.

And punish violators.

The CFPB doesn’t have to answer to anybody, not even to secure funding.

If this does not raise at least a teensy sense of alarm, let me offer two words of caution: power corrupts.

We all know the ease with which regulatory agencies may abuse their power over us — and few are as insulated from the rule of law as is the CFPB; its near-​immunity from oversight makes the ‘power-​corrupts’ problem much worse.

The law firm Seila Law LLC — which helps clients deal with debt problems — has sued to challenge the constitutionality of how CFPB is structured. Although lower courts have not been sympathetic with Seila’s argument, the case has now been accepted by the U.S. Supreme Court.

A satirist once famously asked, who will watch the watchers?

In the United States, we should ask, who will protect us from the protectors?

By the Constitution that would be the Supreme Court.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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cfpb, watcher, eye, consumer, bureaucracy, power,

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initiative, referendum, and recall insider corruption

Revolt of the Desk Jockeys

Our Constitution guarantees that each state of the union provide a republican form of government.

Does that mean that all that is prohibited is … monarchy?

No. 

One very common form of modern governance is deeply anti-​republican, requiring — at the very least — strict regulation to prevent it from usurping our form of government. And what is this dangerous variety? The kind an economist defined centuries ago: “We have an illness in France which bids fair to play havoc with us; this illness is called bureaumania.” He called it “government by desk,” or, “bureaucratie.”

Yes, bureaucracy.

You might think I’m about to launch into another attack upon the Deep State, perhaps in relation to the ongoing coup-​by-​desk of the Trump Presidency.

But no. Let us turn to the other Washington, the one with the capital named Olympia.

In that hotbed of politics-​as-​usual, the city government printed out and mailed — on the public dime — a pamphlet entreating voters to vote against I‑976, a state-​wide initiative that had been advanced onto the ballot by Tim Eyman* and hundreds of thousands of voter signatures.

Even if it had been a broadside for the initiative this would have been very, very bad.

In republics, those who inhabit public desks must not be allowed to hijack election campaigns from those who are, ultimately, in charge: the citizens.

And in Washington State by law: RCW 42.17A.555 broadly and strictly prohibits using public resources for campaigning.

Apparently, public servants in the Evergreen State (as elsewhere) do not see that they themselves can corrupt our form of government.

Which makes this government-​printed pamphlet a very serious breach of law indeed. 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* You may remember me talking about Eyman before — often. I have called him the most effective limited-​government activist in these United States. And it is from Eyman himself that I learned of this story.

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folly government transparency media and media people national politics & policies too much government U.S. Constitution

Peel Back the Onion

The Onion, satire, humor, CFPB, bureaucracy

Yesterday, an Onion title caught my attention: “Hooded Members of Congress Drown Another Love Child in the Potomac to Prevent Affair from Getting Out.” This is not funny because it is true, but because it is so close to the truth. Too close for comfort.

A similar story, the day before, sported a title so sublime that you do not really need to read further: “Al Franken Tearfully Announces Intention To Step Down From Role As Harasser Of Women.” The week before that, another satire gave us this extravaganza: “Paul Ryan Announces New Congress Sexual Harassment Training Will Create Safe Work Atmosphere, Plausible Deniability.”

But sex scandals are easy. If The Onion were seriously in the satire biz, the farcical-​on-​the-​surface nonsense of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau brouhaha that I wrote about on Tuesday would get incisive treatment as well.

My advice to Onion writers? Don’t go halfway into the problem, like David A. Graham does in The Atlantic: “The Fight Over the CFPB Reveals the Broken State of American Politics.” Sure, that’s true. But concluding that “neither party sees the political process as effective in resolving these basic issues is worrying” hardly goes far enough, and the next line — “the fact that they might both be right is worse still” — shies from the full extent of the predicament.

The Constitution was designed to avoid problems like the CFPB nonsense. Start there. Something like this comes close: “Politicians Shocked, Shocked to Discover That an Un-​Constitutional, Partisan Bureau Becomes Subject to Constitutional Dispute Along Partisan Lines.”

I have confidence that, if The Onion went there, it’d be funnier. 

Even without a sex angle.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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