Posted on 12/14/2013 9:59:19 PM PST by Seizethecarp
The White House systematically delayed enacting a series of rules on the environment, worker safety and health care to prevent them from becoming points of contention before the 2012 election, according to documents and interviews with current and former administration officials.
Some agency officials were instructed to hold off submitting proposals to the White House for up to a year to ensure that they would not be issued before voters went to the polls, the current and former officials said.
The delays meant that rules were postponed or never issued. The stalled regulations included crucial elements of the Affordable Care Act, what bodies of water deserved federal protection, pollution controls for industrial boilers and limits on dangerous silica exposure in the workplace.
The Obama administration has repeatedly said that any delays until after the election were coincidental and that such decisions were made without regard to politics. But seven current and former administration officials told The Washington Post that the motives behind many of the delays were clearly political, as Obama’s top aides focused on avoiding controversy before his reelection.
The number and scope of delays under Obama went well beyond those of his predecessors, who helped shape rules but did not have the same formalized controls, said current and former officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.
Those findings are bolstered by a new report from the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS), an independent agency that advises the federal government on regulatory issues. The report is based on anonymous interviews with more than a dozen senior agency officials who worked with the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), which oversees the implementation of federal rules.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Top story in the electronic edition...
From the story here is the most damning revelation regarding Obamacare:
“The administration also was slow to handle rules pertaining to its health-care law. Several key regulations did not come out until after the 2012 election, including one defining what constitutes “essential health benefits” under a health plan and which Americans could qualify for federal subsidies if they opted to enroll in a state or a federal marketplace plan.”
The overly broad definition of “essential health benefits” was the big payoff to the medical industrial complex and was hidden prior to the election to conceal the huge increase in premiums that would be required to be paid/subsidized.
Well, the controversy merely arrived later.
More and more, I favor a six year Presidency and no consecutive second term.
This was Cass Sunstein’s handywork:
begin quote:
At the Environmental Protection Agency, for example, a former official said that only two managers had the authority to request a major rule in 2012: then-administrator Lisa P. Jackson and deputy administrator Bob Perciasepe. Perciasepe and OIRA’s director at the time, Cass Sunstein, would have “weekly and sometimes semi-weekly discussions” to discuss rules that affected the economy, one said, because they had political consequences, the person said.
“As we entered the run-up to the election, the word went out the White House was not anxious to review new rules,” the former official said.
Sunstein, who has returned to his post as a Harvard Law School professor, declined to comment.
end quote
Delayed new regulations?
Why bother?
Romney and the 2012 GOP leadership would never have noticed.
In fact, they probably helped write some of them!
Holy Captain Obvious!
Gee, do ya think? Obama is going to cram as much through the Senate as he can, in terms of nominations, treaties, etc. because he can see the end of a Democratic majority in the Senate right about November 4th, 2014. The pressure on Ruth Bader Ginsberg will be enormous - Obama would like to replace her with a clone who is 44 years old and healthy. Republicans need to figure out how to stretch the confirmation process as long as possible, by all means, to prevent Obama from doing further damage in an effort to avoid the consequences of Democracy. He is ruthless, and while I am pleased that the Washington Post woke up for long enough to write this, the rest of the media is like a turning aircraft carrier. It will take a very long time, and a lot of damage can be done before November.
Oh, how I hope to see the day when these people are tried in court. And I hope the first one is that little slimy Jay Carney. I guarantee he’d sing like a canary for a deal.
Thanks for posting this.
These are the kinds of political shenanigans that a watchdog press is supposed to expose. A free press that chooses to be subservient is pointless and impotent.
“These are the kinds of political shenanigans that a watchdog press is supposed to expose.”
In the article comments WaPo is getting slammed by conservatives for failing to report these excesses before now and Obots are saying “Bush did it too” but the article makes clear that Barry’s team has far exceeded all prior administrations in politicizing rule-making.
“limits on dangerous silica exposure in the workplace”
That will be interesting. There are very effective personal protective gear but you must enforce its use. Keeping the workplace free of silica can be prohibitively expensive which may be what the anti capitalists are really after. More regulatory government jobs and fewer private sector ones.
Thanks. I doubt this one will be brought up on the talk shows. /s
Think about that. Without the prospect of an election, you would give the President six years without having to worry about what the public wants or dislikes. If the media did it's job properly, this fraud would never have been elected, and certainly would not have been re-elected.
Yesterday it was the NY Times attacking Obamacare premiums for professionals in NY State.
This week Chris Matthews attacked the totally incompetent “White House” (Obama) management of the Obamacare rollout.
Even Lawrence O’Donnell was grilling Zeke Emanuel for “allowing” Barry to lie for so long to the American public.
I get the feeling that WaPo, NY Times and MSNBC are getting focus group and polling showing that their target demographic is livid with Barry’s dishonesty and incompetence and are throwing him under the bus to pave the way for Hilarious.
And once Obama is OUT of office, the NSA will be run by the next president! It will be HOPEFULLY Republicans turning the tables on Democrats! Or so I hope, for change LOL
PIng.
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