January 30, 2007
Executive (dis)order ::
politics — tagged admin law, executive orders, legal and politics
12:15 pm
I haven’t read the Bush Administration’s executive order that the New York Times reported on this morning (note, it seems not to have been posted yet over at the FR website here it is), but I have to say I’m kind of intrigued by the idea, but for different reasons than the liberal political blogs are dwelling on. Sure, there are many who are saying that it’s another step in politicizing what should be an area of pure regulation that functions well only when it’s based on the best evidence and best practices and not on ideology. And I would agree if I thought there was any possibility of the program working. But look—how many federal regulatory agencies are there out there? (I really have no idea, so it’s not just a rhetorical question.) And how many of them are going to report to the White House? And with all the problems the Bush administration is currently facing, is there any way that any group of humans could handle this new bit of chaos? It just seems too overwhelming a project to manage in any coherent way.
So it makes me wonder if maybe it’s something of a back door strategy on the part of the Bush administration. While everyone is screaming that this is just another attempt to coddle regulated industries, in reality what is happening is the Bush administration is taking down regulations by simply performing an impossible task incompetently.
Incidentally, this is a perfect example of micromanagers are really not effective leaders. They just can’t do the amount of work that is required to in order to exercise the amount of control their pathologies demand.
