I am certain that most if not all air quality rules and regulations put out by the EPA are in fact written by consultants. I know one such rule writer very, very well.
The EPA air quality operation is located in the research Triangle at Raleigh/Durham NC
I’ll have to issue a caution here. I can’t remember which precedes the other......... a rule or a regulation
Perhaps the problem is creating an actual full-time organization to do something. Once that something is done, what are they going to do next? Declare victory and quit? Doubtful. Maybe the answer is for Congress to establish a committee and then disband the committee once done. Air quality met the goal. Everybody has a party and goes home.
The Rural Electrification Board still exists with an ever-increasing budget. Same with the Department of Energy. If I cared, I could probably name a few more. Billions spent every year while adding NOTHING to the GDP.
In the current mode, “Rules” (interim or final) contain the actual bureaucratic instructions called Regulations.
The ‘rule’ is published in the Federal Register; the Regulations add to the Code of Federal Regulations.
As we all know, the plain meaning and intent of Chevron was to declare a bureaucrat lord and master of the country. If a court must defer to the regulation, Mr. X from XYZ agency who nobody will meet overrides real experts, tangible evidence, demonstrated consequences, and/or anything else in reality. You’re right, bert, it doesn’t much matter who’s paying the leftist who gleefully writes rules over us.
Where it’s going to be interesting is that the State isn’t interested in ceding power. They will still overreach; in fact they’ll double down. They will write egregious abuses and dare anyone to stop them, and their minions will shop those cases to friendly judges. Those judges are no longer obligated to defer to the State but will happily do so.
They will continue to use lawfare to bury us in costs and struggles.
To stop this we will need to (continue to) elect MAGA people who will appoint originalist judges so that they lose and lose badly, and eventually the only long-term cure is to defund and remove the agencies as Millei is doing down there.