Accountability
Like many of you, I greatly enjoyed watching the 2016 Summer Olympics, which recently concluded with Team USA having won a total of 121 medals. While I cheered on various sports, it likely comes as no surprise that swimming was my favorite sport to watch.
Unfortunately, an incident involving swimmer Ryan Lochte seems to have upstaged or even detracted some from the remarkable achievements of our country’s many talented athletes. Though investigations continue into what transpired (whether American swimmers vandalized a gas station, whether a false report was filed, whether local law officials used their weapons in self-defense, etc.), Lochte has since taken “full responsibility” and admitted to having “over-exaggerated” his story. Several of his sponsors appear to have found his behavior unacceptable, and announced they are parting ways with the swimmer.
Oh, if only Washington officials were held accountable for intentional untruths.
Russian Bear, Again on the Prowl
According to a recent Wall Street Journal report, ““Russia is bolstering its military presence on its western border, sending tens of thousands of soldiers to newly built installations within easy striking distance of Ukraine. The moves, which come as Moscow ratchets up confrontation over the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, are a centerpiece of a new military strategy the Kremlin says is meant to counter perceived threats from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Military analysts say the deployments appear to be an effort to build a more permanent and robust military posture around Ukraine, where Russia has carried out covert military interventions aimed at maintaining influence in its West-leaning neighbor.”
Crimea, which has been important militarily for hundreds of years, is the region of Ukraine seized by Russian forces in 2014. And now it appears that the Russian Bear is moving, once again.
Will President Obama this time take bold action? Will the Administration allow Russia to take more from Eastern Ukraine, a nation the United States had pledged to support if it were attacked? Or will the Administration sit idly by without a firm, rational response designed to back the Russians down without military intervention?
Alabaster Towers
As summarized by The Hill, a report released earlier this month by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) found that the EPA “has not properly analyzed the environmental effects of its ethanol mandate.” The Hill story explains that “The 2005 law creating the renewable fuel standard requires the EPA to write reports on the environmental impacts of the requirement to blend ethanol and other biofuels with gasoline, and to determine whether measures are needed to blunt the effects. But the [OIG] found the agency’s compliance with those provisions lacking.”
For many of us, the results of this OIG report are unsurprising.
For many of its major rules, EPA does not assess the ripple effects of its rules across the economy and often underestimates the potential job losses from its regulations.
For example, while EPA acknowledged potential lost “job years” of up to 26,000 in 2025 and up to 34,000 in 2030 for the electricity, coal and natural gas sectors due to the Clean Power Plan, EPA did not consider the full economy-wide impacts of the rule. The Energy Information Administration recently projected that the Clean Power Plan would reduce coal production in all major U.S. supply regions, while if the Clean Power Plan is not implemented, “U.S. coal production remains close to 2015 levels through 2040.” Based on the EIA’s analysis, the National Mining Association recently projected that the actual job losses in the coal sector alone due to the Clean Power Plan could be 100,000 or more.
Similarly, the EPA proposed regulations on boilers in 2010, which the regulated community concluded would have put at risk nearly 230,000 jobs across the U.S. economy, including over 20,000 jobs in the forest products sector alone. All the while, EPA continued to suggest there would no or minimal job losses from the proposed rule.
EPA bureaucrats in their alabaster towers in Washington don’t seem to understand how the economy in the real world works. They have essentially accused industry of crying wolf. But that “wolf” has consumed our jobs, and our people are paying the price.
If you have questions, concerns, or comments, feel free to contact my office. You can call my Abingdon office at 276-525-1405 or my Christiansburg office at 540-381-5671. To reach my office via email, please visit my website at www.morgangriffith.house.gov. Also on my website is the latest material from my office, including information on votes recently taken on the floor of the House of Representatives.
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