By Tribune-Review

Published: Tuesday, November 20, 2012, 8:56 p.m.
Updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2013

With his re-election behind him, perhaps now President Obama will finally release his regulatory agenda, which was due in April and again in October under the Regulatory Flexibility Act.

The law requires the release of all new rules that pose a “significant economic impact.” The administration's last regulatory agenda, released in the fall of 2011, included 2,676 rules.

What the administration has stashed away portends to be “a regulatory tsunami,” according to a Heritage Foundation analysis.

Topping the list are more restrictive requirements for controlling ozone emissions — as proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency — at a projected cost of $90 billion or more annually. Add to that the designation of coal ash as a “hazardous substance,” which would cost that industry up to $110 billion and thousands of jobs in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and Missouri, writes Diane Katz for Heritage.

Then there are various delayed diktats from other federal agencies, such as proposed energy-conservation standards for walk-in coolers and a new rule requiring rear-view cameras and video displays for all new cars and trucks (estimated cost, $2.7 billion).

How many of these proposals will be implemented at an enormous cost to businesses and consumers? If Obama's past regulatory agenda is a prologue, enough for every American to feel pressed by government's increasingly fat thumb.

1. The other Islamist threat: Looting history
2. Iran’s president-elect is an odd ‘moderate’
3. Pittsburgh Tuesday takes
4. Greensburg Tuesday takes
5. Alle-Kiski Tuesday takes
6. The Veterans Affairs/Legionella mess: It grows & grows ...
7. Anonymous Connellsville donors: Money & more
8. Saturday essay: Garden of change
9. The Box
10. Municipal leadership lacking: ‘Town fathers’ indeed
11. Fisher v. Texas: End racial preferences

There are currently no comments for this story.
Subscribe today! Click here for our subscription offers.