Free Republic

@steelegordonFox News has reported that nearly three-dozen Republican congressmen have accused the EPA of “apparent bias” against conservative groups seeking information under the Freedom of Information Act. Government agencies charge fees for producing the requested documents and these fees can be very substantial, sometimes upwards of $100,000. But the fees can be waived if the agency thinks the information will serve a public purpose. According to Fox: The allegations were first made by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative Washington, D.C., think tank. It claimed the EPA was not being fair as it weighed whether to charge fees to groups...

Twelve years ago, the White House and Congress made an agreement with the pharmaceutical industry that seemed eminently reasonable at the time. The industry would supply substantial sums - reaching $200 million a year at latest count - to help the Food and Drug Administration hire more reviewers to speed the approval process for new drugs that might otherwise be held up solely by administrative logjams. The quid pro quo was that the government had to meet tight deadlines for reviewing drugs and had to keep steady its own financing for new-drug reviews, adjusted for inflation. That seemed a reasonable...