Conservatives hate big government, right? And they distrust bureaucrats, right?
Below are the first few paragraphs from a story I first thought was a hoax: It’s about the Office of Management and Budget wanting final say on
….well, lots of things.
Read on:
By Andrew Schneider
Of the Post-Dispatch [copyright]2004, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
WASHINGTON - Under a new proposal, the White House would decide what and when the public would be told about an outbreak of mad cow disease, an anthrax release, a nuclear plant accident or any other crisis.
The White House Office of Management and Budget is trying to gain final
control over release of emergency declarations from the federal agencies
responsible for public health, safety and the environment.
The OMB also wants to manage scientific and technical evaluations - known
as peer reviews - of all major government rules, plans, proposed
regulations and pronouncements.
Currently, each federal agency controls its emergency notifications and
peer review of its projects.
But the OMB says peer review policies in various agencies vary
dramatically. And a senior OMB official says his office has been ordered by
Congress to take "a greater role in evaluating what the agencies do."
On Friday, a nonpartisan group of 20 former top agency officials sent a
letter to the OMB asking the White House watchdog agency to withdraw its
proposal, saying it "could damage the federal system for protecting public
health and the environment."
That’s enough, isn’t it? If this is conservatism, Joseph Stalin was a powerful one.