ne place Bush?

[tapirul]

Bush’s Most Radical Plan Yet

With a vote of hand-picked lobbyists, the president could terminate any federal agency he dislikes

By Osha Gray Davidson

If you’ve got something to hide in Washington, the best place to bury it is in the federal budget. The spending plan that President Bush submitted to Congress this year contains 2,000 pages that outline funding to safeguard the environment, protect workers from injury and death, crack down on securities fraud and ensure the safety of prescription drugs. But almost unnoticed in the budget, tucked away in a single paragraph, is a provision that could make every one of those protections a thing of the past.

The proposal, spelled out in three short sentences, would give the president the power to appoint an eight-member panel called the “Sunset Commission,” which would systematically review federal programs every ten years and decide whether they should be eliminated. Any programs that are not “producing results,” in the eyes of the commission, would “automatically terminate unless the Congress took action to continue them.”

           The administration portrays the commission as a well-intentioned effort to make sure that federal agencies are actually doing their job. “We just think it makes sense,” says Clay Johnson, deputy director for management at the Office of Management and Budget, which crafted the provision. “The goal isn’t to get rid of a program — it’s to make it work better.”

           In practice, however, the commission would enable the Bush administration to achieve what Ronald Reagan only dreamed of: the end of government regulation as we know it. With a simple vote of five commissioners — many of them likely to be lobbyists and executives from major corporations currently subject to federal oversight — the president could terminate any program or agency he dislikes. No more Environmental Protection Agency. No more Food and Drug Administration. No more Securities and Exchange Commission.

           “Ronald Reagan once observed, ‘The closest thing to immortality on this earth is a federal government program,’ “ says Rep. Kevin Brady, a Republican from Texas who has been working for the past nine years to establish a sunset commission. “We need it to clear out the deadwood.”

           Without many of those programs, however, American consumers, workers and investors would be left to the mercy of business. “This is potentially devastating,” says Wesley Warren, who served as a senior OMB official in the Clinton administration. “In short order, this could knock out protections that have been built up over a generation.”

           Others note that the provision goes beyond anything attempted by conservatives in the past. “When you look at this,” says Marchant Wentworth, a lobbyist for the Union of Concerned Scientists, “it’s almost like the Reagan administration was a trial run.”

           The man behind the sunset commission is Clay Johnson, the most influential member of Bush’s inner circle whom you’ve never heard of. The two Texans have been close friends since 1961, when they met as fifteen-year-olds at Andover prep school and later roomed together for four years at Yale. When Bush was elected governor of Texas in 1994, he put the buddy he calls “Big Man” — Johnson is six feet four — in charge of all state appointments. Johnson, a former executive at Neiman Marcus and Frito-Lay, refers to Americans as “customers” and is partial to Chamber of Commerce bromides such as “We’re in the results business.” He is also partial to giving corporate lobbyists a direct role in gutting regulatory protections. One of his first acts in Texas was to remove all three members of the state environmental-protection commission and replace them with a former Monsanto executive, an official with the Texas Beef Council and a lawyer for the oil industry. Overnight, a commission widely respected for its impartiality became a “revolving door between the industry lobby and government,” says Jim Marston, the senior attorney in Texas for the nonprofit organization Environmental Defense.

           Johnson continued his anti-regulatory efforts in the early days of the Bush presidency, when he helped place industry champions in positions throughout the government. As director of OMB, an obscure but powerful arm of the White House, he has implemented a “Program Assessment Rating Tool” to evaluate federal programs and cut funding to those that are “not getting results.” In reality, though, Johnson uses PART to slash government efforts that don’t fit the administration’s political agenda. This year’s budget eliminates twenty percent of the programs that were rated most effective, including efforts to improve the environment and education, and increases funding for programs that received the lowest possible rating — including an attempt to reduce the number of poor people claiming a low-income tax credit.

           The evaluations “are based on the whims of White House budget bean counters,” says Gary Bass, executive director of the nonpartisan OMB Watch. “These are meaningless numbers that do nothing but back up preordained political conclusions.”

           The Sunset Commission would go even further. The panel — which will likely be composed of “experts in management issues,” according to one senior OMB official — will enable the administration to terminate entire government programs that protect citizens against injury and death. Consider what America might look like if Reagan had wielded such an anti-regulatory ax twenty years ago. Abolishing the EPA would have increased air pollution, causing tens of thousands of children to develop chronic respiratory diseases. Terminating the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration would have eliminated many protections we now take for granted — including air bags, child safety seats and automatic seat belts. And getting rid of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration would have forestalled workplace regulations that have prevented illnesses among millions of farmworkers.

           Even if such regulations remain on the books, eliminating entire agencies would leave no one to enforce them. “And if there’s no cop on the beat, who’s going to follow the law?” says J. Robert Shull, senior policy analyst at OMB Watch.

           The first hint of Bush’s plan to create a commission surfaced only weeks after he won re-election last November. At an economic conference convened by Treasury Secretary John Snow, one panel member made the case for inserting a sunset provision into existing regulations. Such a move would “shift the burden of proof onto the regulations and require us to demonstrate that they’re still needed,” said Susan Dudley, director of regulatory studies at the Mercatus Center, a free-market think tank based in Washington, D.C.

           It’s fitting that the first public mention of Bush’s plan came from Mercatus. The center’s “regulatory studies program” was founded by Wendy Gramm, the wife of former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm and the woman Reagan called “my favorite economist.” As a senior official at OMB under the Gipper, Gramm fought hard to eliminate federal regulations. Her most notorious victory came in 1992 when, as chair of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, she pushed through a measure exempting companies that trade in energy derivatives from regulation, following an intense lobbying campaign by Enron. Gramm resigned from the commission and accepted a seat on the Enron board of directors, where she was paid $1.85 million and received donations from the company to support Mercatus. Enron, meanwhile, used its exemption from federal oversight to engage in its infamous accounting fraud that destroyed the company and bankrupted investors.

           But such dangers of eliminating regulations have done nothing to slow Bush’s drive for a sunset commission. Given its political gains last November, the administration is optimistic about winning approval in Congress. “The stars and the planets are aligned,” Johnson recently declared, citing the solid Republican majority in Congress and the need to curb the soaring federal deficit.

           But there may be a stumbling block. The commission not only threatens the environment and public health — it would also violate the constitutional separation of power between Congress and the executive branch, enabling the president to dismantle programs created by lawmakers. “Under the administration’s proposal, Congress would relinquish its constitutional power to legislate,” says Rep. Henry Waxman, a Democrat from California who has been the commission’s most vocal opponent. “Power would be consolidated in the executive branch, and the legislative role would be emasculated.”

           Republicans already have a plan to counter such concerns. Under a bill expected to be introduced soon, the power to appoint the commission would be given to Congress rather than to the president — simply transferring the authority from Bush to his GOP allies on the Hill. And if the commission is challenged in court, the administration is likely to drag out the fight until it has firmly established a conservative majority on the Supreme Court.

           Either way, opponents consider the commission a serious threat. “The end result,” says Waxman, “would be a field day for corporate lobbyists.

[A CERB]

nu, nu ne place bush. e un liberal plangacios.

[lucisandor]

mie mi se pare o chestie de circumstanta
problema cu articolul asta e ca presupune ca Bush nu e de incredere, in vreme ce parlamentul ar putea fi (parlamentarii fiind bine ferecati impotriva contactului cu lobishtii astia)....
eu nu am incredere mai mare in parlamentul licuriciului decit in Bush... desigur, delict de gindire (poate chiar de inteligentza): as putea fi pedepsit prin replici taioase "dar ce cauti acolo?" (de parca oamenii s-au dus pe everest de dragul climei) sau prin deja discutatele excursii in cuba
dar, tu, om cu stele si dungi la geam, luneta, si buda, om naiv care crede ca tom dilei ala e doar un accident si ca restul sint imaclati.. de ce nu ai crede ca si presedintele e imaculat?
ai crede ca founding grandfathers aveau ei asa o chestie cu checks and balances, dar as baga mina in foc ca ei nu se gindeau la SEC si EPA ca la niste chestii fundamentale, asa, cam ca dreptul la libera vorbire (ca si aia erau destepti si credeau ca libera vorbire o sa depolueze planeta)

daca nu era Bush presedintele, increderea in presedinte ar fi fost cel putin egala cu cea in parlament si i-ar fi fost permis, de ex, sa conduca tzara... dar asa, Bush? condus tzara? nu se poate! lobi! lobi!

[victor]

bush ca legiutor :) Poate o sa apara un moment cand interpretarea legii va fi mai presus de lege :)

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/04/30/america/web.0430bush.php

President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.

[...]

Ce parere aveti de Iran? saptamana asta se lanseaza iran oil bourse cu vanzari de petrol in euro... 2 saptamani pana incepe?

[tapirul]

un articol interesant despre dolar, euro, si petrol in EnergyBulletin

[victor]

fain articolul - alte articole similare am gasit aici http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php si http://www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net/ -

sa vedem - mi se pare ca propaganda si pregatirile anti Iran merg cu viteza maxima deja

[tapirul]

in EnergyBulletin mi se pare foarte interesanta (si plauzibila) teoria cu dusul americanilor in Iraq

The man that actually did demand Euro for his oil was Saddam Hussein in 2000. At first, his demand was met with ridicule, later with neglect, but as it became clearer that he meant business, political pressure was exerted to change his mind. When other countries, like Iran, wanted payment in other currencies, most notably Euro and Yen, the danger to the dollar was clear and present, and a punitive action was in order. Bush’s Shock-and-Awe in Iraq was not about Saddam’s nuclear capabilities, about defending human rights, about spreading democracy, or even about seizing oil fields; it was about defending the dollar, ergo the American Empire. It was about setting an example that anyone who demanded payment in currencies other than U.S. Dollars would be likewise punished.
Many have criticized Bush for staging the war in Iraq in order to seize Iraqi oil fields. However, those critics can’t explain why Bush would want to seize those fields—he could simply print dollars for nothing and use them to get all the oil in the world that he needs. He must have had some other reason to invade Iraq.

History teaches that an empire should go to war for one of two reasons: (1) to defend itself or (2) benefit from war; if not, as Paul Kennedy illustrates in his magisterial The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, a military overstretch will drain its economic resources and precipitate its collapse. Economically speaking, in order for an empire to initiate and conduct a war, its benefits must outweigh its military and social costs. Benefits from Iraqi oil fields are hardly worth the long-term, multi-year military cost. Instead, Bush must have went into Iraq to defend his Empire. Indeed, this is the case: two months after the United States invaded Iraq, the Oil for Food Program was terminated, the Iraqi Euro accounts were switched back to dollars, and oil was sold once again only for U.S. dollars. No longer could the world buy oil from Iraq with Euro. Global dollar supremacy was once again restored. Bush descended victoriously from a fighter jet and declared the mission accomplished—he had successfully defended the U.S. dollar, and thus the American Empire.

mda.. Cerbu, mea culpa. Americanii nu s-au dus in Irak sa le ia petrolu'...

[tapirul]

victor, articolul propune si metodele

ˇ Sabotaging the Exchange—this could be a computer virus, network, communications, or server attack, various server security breaches, or a 9-11-type attack on main and backup facilities.

ˇ Coup d’état—this is by far the best long-term strategy available to the Americans.

ˇ Negotiating Acceptable Terms & Limitations—this is another excellent solution to the Americans. Of course, a government coup is clearly the preferred strategy, for it will ensure that the exchange does not operate at all and does not threaten American interests. However, if an attempted sabotage or coup d’etat fails, then negotiation is clearly the second-best available option.

ˇ Joint U.N. War Resolution—this will be, no doubt, hard to secure given the interests of all other member-states of the Security Council. Feverish rhetoric about Iranians developing nuclear weapons undoubtedly serves to prepare this course of action.

ˇ Unilateral Nuclear Strike—this is a terrible strategic choice for all the reasons associated with the next strategy, the Unilateral Total War. The Americans will likely use Israel to do their dirty nuclear job.

ˇ Unilateral Total War—this is obviously the worst strategic choice. First, the U.S. military resources have been already depleted with two wars. Secondly, the Americans will further alienate other powerful nations. Third, major dollar-holding countries may decide to quietly retaliate by dumping their own mountains of dollars, thus preventing the U.S. from further financing its militant ambitions. Finally, Iran has strategic alliances with other powerful nations that may trigger their involvement in war; Iran reputedly has such alliance with China, India, and Russia, known as the Shanghai Cooperative Group, a.k.a. Shanghai Coop and a separate pact with Syria.

tu pe care votezi?

[lucisandor]

coup d'etat este o naivitate... ma uit la bietzii turci cum se chinuie sa isi asigure democratia, dupa aproape un secol: cum le dai voie sa voteze, cum voteaza cu extremistii musulmani... dupa un stagiu irakian, or sa treca fie la sitautia din Egipt, fie la cea din Palestina.. turcii sint mai europenizati, de aia la ei mai tzin niste aparente
aia cu virushi e o bashina SeFe, Iranul nu prea are calc si cred ca depinde si azi de hirtie.. aha, ii ataca la becap, le-o trage cu mucegai probabile
eu cred ca o sa isi puna palma in fund, cum au facut si in Vietnam sau Cuba, e un razboi gata pierdut, mai ales ca de la wtc incoace de fapt sint cam cacarisiti pe ei de frica si in irak s-au dus numai dupa ce au stiut sigur ca saddam NU are arme de distrugere in masa

[tapirul]

mda, asta ar fi decizia matura, da' americanii nu prea sunt faimosi pentru maturitate.

[victor]

eu zic ca va fi "ceva" razboi in iran: cred ca o sa incerce mai multe, speculez, in ordine :lol:

1. as paria pe Israel sa iasa mai in fata ca atacant decat US, cel putin in prima faza; deja parca anuntau Israel’s Eros B satellite photographs Iran’s nukes (Russian lauched)

ˇ Unilateral Nuclear Strike—this is a terrible strategic choice for all the reasons associated with the next strategy, the Unilateral Total War. The Americans will likely use Israel to do their dirty nuclear job.

2. sabotage clar: daca o sa dea mini-targeted-nukes in iran, o sa zica ca au atacat clasic si ca de fapt iranienii au provocat singuri accidente nucleare sau nu era safe enrichemntul pe care-l faceau sau deja aveau bombe ... si ca nu tin la poporul lor si se joaca cu sorta lor... daca explodeaza bomba - va fi de fapt iraniana... evident

3. Coup d’état si civilian social/religious unrest etc - deja parca era "cel mai mare labor prostest" ieri in iran din lumea islamica; o sa incerce dar nu o sa iasa prea mare lucru; in exterior insa va fi prezentat drept dictatura/interventii in forta contra demonstrantilor pacifisti etc.

4. nu cred ca o sa negocieze, us si eu vor merge impreuna din pacate, nici euro nu e backed by UE with gold. Cred ca o sa isi imparta mai bine "atributiile" vs iraq. nu prea cred ca va fi un euro-dolar war. Cred ca iran o sa forteze scizunea intre UE si US cu bursa, dar nu stiu daca va apuca sa functioneze.

5. china daca va intra in razboi va fi demonificata ca e gripata si nu isi omoara pasarile ca sa dezvolte safe tyson caged chickens si nu cumpara rumsfeld tamiflu

6. rusia - multe arme va vinde... :lol:

tare curios sunt cum o sa mearga lucrurile...

[Tasha-meseriasha]

Nici mie nu-mi place bush. imi raman fire de par intre dinti...(ce scarbos!)

[subsonique]

Evolutionism sau forta superioara? Aceasta este problema scolilor din America, care s-ar putea sa fie nevoite, dupa interventia presedintelui Bush, sa predea elevilor despre latura religioasa a evolutiei...

In acest moment, elevii americani invata despre teoria lui Darwin asupra aparitiei vietii pe pamant si a evolutiei acesteia, si desi cativa sustinatori ai crestinitatii au incercat introducerea orelor de religie in programa scolilor, proiectul acestora nu a fost aprobat.
Totusi, acestia s-ar putea sa primeasca un ajutor din partea presedintelui George Bush, care a spus astazi ca teoria fortei superioare ar trebui predata in scoli....
Referindu-se la aceasta problema, presedintele Americii a spus in interviul de astazi, realizat de catre un grup de jurnalisti din Texas la Casa Alba, urmatoarele: ”Sunt de parere ca ambele teorii trebuie predate, pentru ca elevii sa inteleaga subiectul disputei legate de evolutie."

Reactiile celor doua tabere nu au intarziat sa apara. Sustinatorii conservatori ai presedintelui au imbratisat ideea lui George Bush, comentand ca este normal sa fie predate doua teorii ale evolutiei, in timp ce oamenii de stiinta critica declaratiile acestuia afirmand ca desi teoria fortei superioare nu precizeaza originea acesteia, aceasta este de fapt „o acoperire” pentru Dumnezeu si pentru creatia divina a universului.

Potrivit Boston Sunday Globe, renumita universitate Harvard se va implica in rezolvarea misterelor legate de teoria evolutiei.
Cercetatorii spera ca descoperirile stiintifice recente, cum ar fi descoperirea apei pe Marte, ii vor ajuta sa afle mai multe despre originile vietii pe Pamant...
"Eu sper sa putem reduce evolutia la o succesiune de evenimente logice, ce puteau sa aiba loc fara nici o interventie divina," a spus David R. Liu, profesor de chimie si biologie la Harvard...

Totusi, premisa de la care pleaca cercetatorii este ca exista cateva mistere legate de originea vietii pe Pamant ce nu pot fi explicate.
Pe parcursul a cativa ani, cercetatorii vor primi anual fonduri ce totalizeaza un milion de dolari....
Aceasta initiativa vine la aproape doua saptamani dupa afirmatia presedintelui Bush ca elevii americani ar trebui sa invete alaturi de teoria lui Darwin si pe cea a fortei superioare...

articol preluat de pe www.solaris2012.org   (website antiamerican romanesc)

[manolo]

o singura remarca: teoria sustinuta de Biblie se numeste creationism si nu evolutionism, pentru ca se spune in Geneza ca Dumnezeu a creeat tot pe Pamant, inclusiv animale si pe om (cu soata sa).

chestia asta e mai veche, in unele state au incercat sa o aprobe pe plan statal, au avut probleme cu Supreme Court, pentru ca e vorba de amestecul bisericii in treburi statale, ce contravine statutului secular al US.

ce mi se pare ciudat este sa predai creationismul drept "stiinta", cand nu are nici unul din atributele unei stiinte.

nu stiu cum apare geneza in religii precum cea musulmana, budista, religii reprezentate in US (nu mai pomenesc de scientologie). asadar, cred ca daca s-ar hotari infiintarea unor ore de... religie, daca vreti, sa se ofere ore pentru toate confesiunile, in deplin spirit american si politically correct.

[stefan]

Băi spamăre, un site antiromănesc american ai?
Validitatea ştiinţifică a evoluţionismului darwinian merită o discuţie separată (ca you say "not falsifiable" ?).