In a Forbes column, ATR staff member Chris Prandoni writes about the possibility of the most expensive regulation in history that could be coming to the White House:
Look out! Last week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) just sent what could be the most expensive regulation ever to the Office of Management and Budget for final review. We don’t know what the ozone rule will look like, but an EPA advisory board is pushing for standards that would, under EPA’s own estimates, cost about $100 billion to comply with every year. Another study by the National Association of Manufacturers estimates the rule could cost $270 billion per year and would put millions of jobs at risk.
Also pointing towards a huge price tag, EPA was ready to issue the ozone rule in 2011 but President Obama delayed the rule fearing the regulation’s cost would hamper his reelection chances. No longer encumbered by the electorate, the ozone rule will likely come at a huge cost. With the EPA already promulgating 9 of the 10 most expensive regulations in history, this sort of activity has become par for the course.
Tim Cavanaugh wrote in a National Review Online article on Mark Warner’s desire to raise taxes:
The equation of “new taxes” with “compromise” — which the paper should really be embarrassed to make after the stunning non-apocalypses of the budget sequester and the partial shutdown of some non-essential government services last year — also elides a point the two campaigns have been arguing over. Though Warner claims Gillespie signed the tax pledge created by Americans For Tax Reform’s Grover Norquist, and his campaign even flooded the press room with literature to that effect at Monday’s debate, Grover himself has shot that story down. As Post Virginia reporters Jenna Portnoy and Laura Vozzella point out, “Norquist tweeted late Monday that Gillespie did not sign the pledge: “Gillespie told me he would not sign pledges. He didn’t. He told the people of Virginia he wouldn’t raise their taxes. He won’t. Warner did.’”