CEI Senior Fellow Greg Conko looks at the major provisions of the food safety bill that the Senate is voting on today. The bill would set in stone ever-evolving best practices. Changes to plant inspection and food recall policies are a mix of ineffectiveness and perverse incentives that could raise food prices. Overall, the FDA is too blunt an instrument to be effective on this sensitive issue.
January 2012
[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1rDwuvi4Xw 285 234]
Well, you can forget the airports-only naked body scanners — they’re now coming to a neighborhood near you. Forbes reports that “American Science & Engineering. . .has sold U.S. and foreign government agencies more than 500 backscatter X-ray scanners mounted in vans that can be driven past neighboring vehicles to see their contents.”
My take: This whole War on Terror is getting out of hand. What happened to the Fourth Amendment (i.e., no unreasonable searches and seizures without probable cause)?
The Department of Homeland Security’s mission statement says that their ”overriding and urgent mission is to lead the unified national effort to secure the country and preserve our freedoms. . . . The citizens of the United States must have the utmost confidence that the Department can execute both of these missions ['both' refers to terrorism and natural disaster response].”
“Preserve our freedoms”? How does having federal agents put their hands down my pants or take naked photos of me preserve my freedom?
“Citizens of the United States must have the utmost confidence”? What does “must” mean? Quite frankly, I don’t think the government could run a lemonade stand efficiently.
As my colleague Hans Bader astutely pointed out in a recent blog post, the government failed to stop the Christmas bomber last year and that the “TSA often fails to detect explosive ingredients and fake bombs in performance tests. A study found that the TSA is more than twice as likely to fail to detect a bomb as the private security firms it replaced.” Ask the people of New Orleans how satisfied they are with DHS’s FEMA response to Hurricane Katrina.
It’s about time to have a chat about national security and freedom. Unfortunately, we have to recognize that there’s a trade-off involved that is all too easily ignored. If freedom is our end, we have to recognize that the means to “preserve” it might undo the whole thing.
Partisans are strange creatures. They can support a policy for years when their guys are in charge, then oppose it in the blink of an eye when the other team takes power. Ross Douthat takes a thoughtful look inside the partisan mind in yesterday’s New York Times:
[M]illions of liberals can live with indefinite detention for accused terrorists and intimate body scans for everyone else, so long as a Democrat is overseeing them. And millions of conservatives find wartime security measures vastly more frightening when they’re pushed by Janet “Big Sis” Napolitano (as the Drudge Report calls her) rather than a Republican like Tom Ridge.
He also identifies a bright side to partisanship that I hadn’t thought of:
But for the country as a whole, partisanship does have one modest virtue. It guarantees that even when there’s an elite consensus behind whatever the ruling party wants to do (whether it’s invading Iraq or passing Obamacare), there will always be a reasonably passionate opposition as well. Given how much authority is concentrated in Washington, especially in the executive branch, even a hypocritical and inconsistent opposition is better than no opposition at all.
Good point.
Image credit: turtlemom4bacon’s flickr photostream.
1. Literary Review was going to give the 2010 Bad Sex in Fiction Award to Alastair Campbell–Tony Blair’s former Director of Communications–but they had to disqualify Campbell for “wanting to win.”
2. The head of the Washington State Potato Commission has ended his 60-day all-potato diet. The diet was a protest of new government limits on potatoes in federal meal programs.
3. As the U.S. debate over DADT continues, Britain’s Ministry of Defense maintains that women are the real threat to “group cohesion” on the front lines.
4. Jimmy Kimmel and David Sedaris don’t think TSA scanners are a big deal, but Sedaris brings up an interesting point: people with padded or fake body parts are liable to be especially embarrassed by the scanners.
5. A Spanish woman is claiming that she is the registered owner of the sun and we all owe her money for using sunlight. All righty then.
Photo Credit: Hilary Perkins
Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I came across this article in Urban Land magazine, “Housing Gen Y: The Next Challenge for Cities,” by John McIlwain. In it, McIlwain describes the current status of Generation Y — young people in their late teens to early thirties:
Today, an unprecedented number of gen-Yers are responding to this housing challenge by living with parents, with roommates, or in university dorms. Indeed, U.S. household formation has dropped to some 400,000 a year, a mere quarter of the pre-recession norm of 1.6 million. (The drop in immigration has caused some, but by no means all, of this remarkable shift.)
Why is gen-Y, now at the prime age for forming new households, staying at home, with roommates, or at school? For one, over 30 percent of this cohort, by some estimates, is unemployed. No job means no money for an apartment or home of one’s own. And while more members of this group have graduated from high school and college than those of previous generations, they are also carrying more school debt—an average of $23,000 per person. Nor is this group saving, but instead is carrying large credit-card debts.
All true. Today’s young people face unique challenges that their parents never experienced, and the job market will likely be slow to recover. I am, however, ultimately optimistic of Generation Y’s long-term prospects. McIlwain is not so optimistic, and believes long-run development planning should shift to accommodate the current and medium-run economic statuses, consumption patterns, and investment decisions of middle-class young adults.
Generation Y is the most mobile generation ever; its members can look for jobs anywhere in the country and the world by simply clicking on the internet. While the jobs come first, this generation is also looking for a good quality of life, which means to them, among other things, housing that is affordable, attractive, and located in walkable neighborhoods near jobs, services, and amenities. Gen-Yers are not looking to move to the now-cheap housing in the foreclosure-devastated exurban culs-de-sac even though that is where housing is most affordable now.
Any city or metropolitan region that cannot provide affordable, walkable, and attractive neighborhoods in which gen-Yers can afford to live will simply lose the best of them to those regions that have such neighborhoods. If they have to “drive ’til they qualify,” as the workforce before them has had to do, gen-Yers are more likely to simply fly off to another city or region.
Simply put, generation Y represents the future of every region’s economy. Attracting and keeping this group requires careful planning and a commitment to develop new mixed-income housing in mixed-use neighborhoods close to the central city and to the surrounding suburban town centers. The time to do this is now, while gen-Yers are still living at home, because when jobs for them do come back, the pent-up demand they represent will move quickly to those regions that are ready for them.
There is no indication that the long-run American residential trend toward urban peripheries and small towns is diminishing, let alone reversing. Yet McIlwain, smart-growth proponents, and urbanists all wish to shift development planning toward a more interventionist position in order to achieve their denser, transit-oriented, more “livable” cities. Now, in principle, I have no problem with greater density and choose to live in central Washington, D.C. But typical planning solutions involving more land-use regulations to achieve these ends are incredibly misguided. Low-density land-use patterns are in part a result of zoning laws that either restrict building form (e.g., height restrictions) or require a separation of land uses (e.g., residential, commercial, light-industry, heavy-industry). Abolish zoning regulations and you will likely see an increase in mixed-use development and, in many places, density.
But taking a hatchet to the government red tape that caused the “problems” in the first place is rarely an option; rather, urbanists generally call for more government regulation. This is Einstein’s definition of insanity (as tired and clichéd as that line is, so is the behavior of planners). For example, Greater Greater Washington’s David Alpert complains that property owners benefited too much from a neighborhood upzoning (liberalization) in Washington, D.C. Alpert, who was earlier this year the subject of perhaps the most obnoxious Washington CityPaper profile ever, also complains that the increased real estate prices that resulted from upzoning are incentivizing developers to build 10 floor area ratio (FAR) structures — in this case, 10-story buildings that occupy full parcels — that won’t allow for park space. In some places, you could build a 10 FAR building as 20 stories on half the lot and use the other half for gardens, a publicly accessible park, etc., but D.C. has a cap on building height. Some developers would likely be more creative with landscaping/publicly accessible space if there were fewer restrictions on development. Alpert mentions this briefly, but then turns back to his central planning instincts and concludes:
And in the future, all cities and towns should avoid making the same mistake. Libertarian-leaning urbanists like Market Urbanism have recommended fewer development restrictions and greater reliance on the free market. In many cases that makes a lot of sense, but the NoMA experience shows a need for at least some mechanism to reserve for public goods some of the value an upzoning generates. Is there a more free market way to handle this?
Huh? He identified the correct problem (land-use regulations), but then blames a result he doesn’t like on a lack of development restrictions and market forces. Stephen Smith of Market Urbanism responds to Alpert here. Unfortunately, this sort of shoddy reasoning is all too typical of those currently “planning for Generation Y.”
Photo credit: Tacoma Urbanist’s flickr photostream.
The federal government has managed to create a new regulation that will put even more local governments in the red. Apparently, bureaucrats have determined that this is the perfect time to force all street signs across America to be revamped. It will no longer be legal to have all capital letters in the signs; instead, only the first letter of each word will be permitted to be in CAPS along with other requirements.
“In Milwaukee this will cost the cash-strapped city nearly $2 million — double the city’s entire annual for traffic control.” So during this recession, local governments will not only need to cut back on services, but they will need to pay for new street signs. Sadly, this is similar to actual Keynesian economic theory put into practice.
It is amazing that bureaucrats who create these laws couldn’t foresee why anyone who lives on a country road would object to paying an enormous amount of money on a new street sign that nobody needs. In fact, this is a perfect example where federalism works quite well to solve local concerns.
You can see the video of this report below:
CEI Weekly is a compilation of articles and blog posts from CEI’s fellows and associates sent out via e-mail every Friday. Also included in the weekly newsletter is a brief description of CEI’s weekly podcast and a feature on a major CEI breakthrough made during the week. To sign up for CEI Weekly, go to http://cei.org/newsletters.
CEI Weekly
November 26, 2010
>>Featured Story
As more genetically-modified products become available on the market, more and more natural foodists protest that genetically-modified foods are “tampering” with nature. CEI Senior Fellow Greg Conko appeared on Fox Business’ Stossel this week to defend the merits of so-called “Frankenfood.” Watch the interview here.
>>Shaping the Debate
It’s Time to End the Ethanol Boondoggle
Fred Smith and Brian McGraw’s op-ed in The Richmond Times-Dispatch
Never Ready for Prime Time
Chris Horner and William Yeatman’s op-ed in The McClatchy-Tribune News Service
The Ecological Monster Who Said . . . Peep
Ben Lieberman’s op-ed in The Washington Times
What’s Good for GM is Now Terrible for America
John Berlau’s op-ed in The American Spectator
GM Selling at a Loss Should Tell You Something
Iain Murray’s op-ed in The Daily Caller
FDA Criticized for Banning Alcoholic Energy Drinks
Greg Conko’s citation on MSNBC.org
>>Best of the Blogs
Anti-Terrorism: A Political Auto-Immune Disease?
By Fred Smith
Obama Includes Toyota, Hyundai and Kia in 75,000 Jobs “Created” by GM Bailout
By John Berlau
Taxpayers Pay Three Times for Special Interest Litigation
By Kathryn Ciano
Six Ways Congress Can Fix COICA Copyright Bill
By Ryan Radia
No Sense in Maryland’s “Dime-a-Drink” Tax Increase
By Michelle Minton
>>CEI Podcast
November 30, 2010: The Crusade Against Alcoholic Energy Drinks
Baylen Linnekin, author of the recent CEI On Point “Extreme Refreshment Crackdown: The FDA’s Misguided Campaign Against Alcohol Energy Drinks” and contributor to the food regulation blog Crispy on the Outside, looks at the recent push to ban alcoholic drinks that contain caffeine. Baylen believes that regulators are over-reacting. Alcohol energy drinks typically contain no more caffeine than a cup of coffee, and their appeal to underage drinkers is overstated.
>>Support CEI
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Today marks a milestone — the 80th birthday of G. Gordon Liddy. While any biographical reference to Liddy invariably leads with his role in the Nixon administration’s Watergate scandal — and subsequent prison time — it’s important to say also that the man’s life has transcended that historical moment. It’s a life that has been rich and full and adventurous. I know him best in his reinvention as a top radio political talk show host, The G. Gordon Liddy Show on Radio America, where, since 1992, he has daily featured outstanding topics and guests and skewered the folly and misdeeds of the Left.
What many may not know about Liddy is that he’s appeared as an actor in movies and television — including Miami Vice, Airwolf, MacGyver, The Highwayman, and as himself (!) in Oliver Stone’s 1995 movie Nixon. Also, he’s a big fan of ABBA. (Yes, that 1970s disco band from Sweden.)
On a more serious note, Liddy had impressive, formidable accomplishments long before his Watergate downfall. He earned a law degree from Fordham Law School, graduating as an editor of The Fordham Law Review. And then he served two years as an Army artillery officer during the Korean War. And then, still in his 20s, served in the FBI as a Special Agent, earning multiple commendations from J. Edgar Hoover. By age 29, Liddy became the youngest Bureau Supervisor at FBI national headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Oh, and in his spare time, he was rated by the Treasury Department as a pistol expert and is an FAA-licensed pilot.
But perhaps the aspect of G. Gordon Liddy that I admire most is his self-described fierceness and fearlessness. “Defeat the fear of death and welcome the death of fear,” he once famously declared. It must be a truly liberating way to live.
Tech:
Christian group asks Apple to reconsider app suspension:
“A Christian organization that recently had its Apple iPhone app removed from Apple’s App Store has sent a letter to protest the removal, asking CEO Steve Jobs to reconsider the decision.”
Comcast Starts The Ball Rolling That Kills All-You-Can-Eat Internet Access:
“Get ready to pay more for all the video you’re watching on the Internet: The days of all-you-can-eat Internet access are growing scarce.”
Netflix Partner Says Comcast ‘Toll’ Threatens Online Video Delivery:
“Level 3 Communications, a central partner in the Netflix online movie service, accused Comcast on Monday of charging a new fee that puts Internet video companies at a competitive disadvantage.”
Web Delivery Firm Says Comcast Charging Unfair Fee for Data:
“Level 3 Communications Inc., an Internet backbone company that supports Netflix Inc.’s increasingly popular movie streaming service, complained Monday that cable giant Comcast Corp. is charging it an unfair fee for the right to send data to its subscribers.”
EU Google Antitrust Probe: European Union Investigating Search Abuse:
“European Union regulators will investigate whether Google Inc. has abused its dominant position in the online search market – the first major probe into the online giant’s business practices.”
Global Warming / Environment / Energy:
US escapes major hurricanes for 5th Straight year:
“The Atlantic hurricane season ends Tuesday, going down as one of the busiest on record but blissfully sparing the U.S. coastline a major hurricane for a fifth straight year.”
Insurance / Gambling:
BetClic chairman slams French gaming laws:
“Stéphane Courbit, chairman of the board of directors and 50% shareholder of BetClic Everest Group, has slammed French authorities for imposing the “worst online gambling laws in Europe” since the market opened in June this year, branded taxation levels “absurd” and suggested that French gaming law “encourages fraud”.”
Health / Safety:
Small farmer advocacy groups disagree over fallout of Food Safety Modernization Act:
“Small farmer advocacy groups disagree over what the Food Safety Modernization Act (SB 510), a measure that would substantially increase the power and reach of the Food and Drug Administration, will mean for small farmers if passed by the Senate Tuesday.”
Report: A bit more vitamin D is good, not too much:
“Got milk? You may need a couple cups more than today’s food labels say to get enough vitamin D for strong bones. But don’t go overboard: Long-awaited new dietary guidelines say there’s no proof that megadoses prevent cancer or other ailments — sure to frustrate backers of the so-called sunshine vitamin.”
Scientists trick cells into switching identities:
“Scientists are reporting early success at transforming one kind of specialized cell into another, a feat of biological alchemy that doctors may someday perform inside a patient’s body to restore health.”
NC to stop selling pure grain alcohol in ABC liquor stores:
“North Carolina’s government-run Alcoholic Beverage Control liquor stores will soon stop selling pure grain alcohol, citing public health concerns of the 95 percent pure alcohol being abused by college age drinkers.”
Economics:
WikiLeaks plans to release a U.S. bank’s documents:
“Julian Assange declined in an interview with Forbes to identify the bank, but he said that he expected that the disclosures, which follow his group’s release of U.S. military and diplomatic documents, would lead to investigations.”
Tiny house movement thrives amid real estate bust:
“As Americans downsize in the aftermath of a colossal real estate bust, at least one tiny corner of the housing market appears to be thriving.”
Watchdog: TARP to cost taxpayers $25 billion:
“The U.S. Troubled Asset Relief Program, which risked up to $700 billion of government funds to bail out troubled banks and automakers, will cost taxpayers a mere $25 billion, according to an estimate released on Monday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.”
The Federal Pay Freeze, In Context:
“Earlier this morning, I noted that President Obama’s proposal to freeze the pay of federal employees (excluding the military) for two years wouldn’t have much impact on the debt. Now we have more specifics. In his press conference, Obama claimed that the move would save the government $28 billion over five years. Taking that number at face value, that would represent a sixth-tenths of one percent reduction in the projected $4.52 trillion deficit over that same period (2011 through 2015). It would be the equivalent of a person who expects to rack up $10,000 of of credit card debt over the next five years touting the fact that he’s found a way to reduce his expenses by $60 over that time period. In football terms, it would be like a kickoff return that gains about a half of a yard.”
Democratic Policy Group Would Cut Social Security for Top Earners in U.S.:
“A Democratic-led policy group is defying party history by proposing changes to Social Security to pave the way for recommendations this week by President Barack Obama’s deficit-cutting commission.”
Legal:
Eric Holder Focuses on Important Legal Challenge: The 2022 World Cup:
“Prosecuting terrorists (sorry, “man-caused disaster suspects”) and investigating the WikiLeaks fiasco will have to wait, because the chief of the US Justice Department has more immediate priorities:”
Supreme Court to hear Microsoft appeal of patent judgment:
“From the “It’s Not Over Until It’s Over” Department, Microsoft has successfully persuaded the U.S. Supreme Court to hear its appeal of a $290 million judgment won by a Canadian technology company which claimed that the software giant infringed on one of its patents.”
Supreme Court Takes Aim Yet Again At Campaign Finance Laws:
“The Supreme Court agreed to hear a free speech challenge to Arizona’s Clean Elections Law on Monday, a case that campaign finance reform advocates expect to be another blow in the court’s dismantling of the country’s elections system.”
Tobacco corruption in Virginia:
“The case also raises questions about a state entity that is supposed to use money obtained in a massive 1998 lawsuit settlement against four major tobacco companies for the public good.”
Labor:
Greek seamen end strike after government order:
“It was the second time since July the ruling Socialists had used emergency powers to end a strike as unions resist austerity measures prescribed by the European Union and IMF.”
Transportation/ Land Use:
READ THIS: Local Governments Told to Buy New Street Signs:
“It’s just one reason the Federal Highway Administration is ordering all local governments — from the tiniest towns to the largest cities — to go out and buy new street signs that federal bureaucrats say are easier to read.”
High-speed rail work to start in ’11:
“Construction will start next year on the $71.4 million railroad project that the feds authorized for Northwest Indiana in early 2010, state transportation officials said Monday.”
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