Politics
Cass Sunstein Confirmed by Senate
To the dismay of some environmentalists, the Senate confirmed Cass Sunstein as “regulatory czar” today. An undeniably brilliant scholar, Sunstein is a long-time advocate of cost-benefit analysis as a check on overly zealous risk regulation. (Unfortunately, his views of regulation figured much less in the public debate than a frenzied campaign to mobilize hunters, gun …
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CONTINUE READING…in which I turn into a left-wing subversive
Glenn Beck has acquired his first (although surely not-to-be-last) scalp from the Obama Administration” CEQ Green jobs Coordinator Van Jones (whose appointment LegalPlanet noted in March) resigned his position Saturday night. I went to law school with Van, and while I am not a fan, I thought that letting him go would be an unwarranted capitulation …
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CONTINUE READINGMisinformed Attacks on the Law of the Sea
Objections to the Law of the Sea Treaty are based on specious arguments about sovereignty.
CONTINUE READINGThe Kennedy seat
It may be gauche to admit to worrying about this so soon after Ted Kennedy’s death, but the conversations have already begun: How much harder will it be to get to 60 votes on healthcare reform and, more relevant here, climate change legislation without his seat filled? Massachusetts procedures for finding a new senator, and …
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CONTINUE READINGMore on the Chamber of Commerce’s extraordinary demand for a “Scopes trial” on climate change
UPDATE: regarding the standard of judicial review of any on-the-record hearing (discussed below), see the comments: commenter Steve Taber disagrees with my initial analysis, and he may be right (though I don’t have time to look into it further today). ORIGINAL POST: Holly has written a thoughtful post discussing the meritlessness and cynicism of the …
CONTINUE READINGRep. Waxman, Sen. Pavley, and Mary Nichols talk climate change
For those of you interested in the relationship between federal climate legislation and California’s landmark global warming laws, tune in tomorrow 10am-noon PDT for a public forum at UCLA. It will be live webcast here, and yes, we are apparently even twittering it. Rep. Henry Waxman will talk about his work in passing the American Clean Energy and …
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CONTINUE READINGShow Me The Money!
Guess what? The oil industry is about to launch a populist campaign against climate change legislation. (Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.) Why would they do such a thing? The latest statistics on executive pay may tell us something about that. It turns out, according to Reuters, that the top bracket of employee …
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CONTINUE READINGAnd You Wonder Why People Don’t Respect Lobbyists?
A cap-and-trade bill was defeated in Australia yesterday. As the New Republic points out (here), it’s not clear that this is anything more than a temporary setback. An interesting sidelight, however, concerns the sources of the opposition — some of which are U.S.-based: Incidentally, one of the largest, most influential opponents of the Australian bill …
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CONTINUE READINGCalifornia’s Integrated Waste Management Board: Goodbye and Good Riddance
Shortly after taking office as California’s Governor, following a tumultuous recall election in 2003, Arnold Schwarzenegger famously promised to “blow up the boxes” of state government in favor of a more streamlined governance structure. That commitment has since largely been sacrificed on the alter of ever-contentious California politics. But this summer’s belated and painfully-negotiated California …
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CONTINUE READINGNudging Smart Growth
There are lots of problems with Sunstein and Thaler’s book Nudge, but its central premise has potentially powerful applications to a host of problems. Sunstein and Thaler posit that in many policy areas, “choice architects” can help people make better choices without impairing their actual ability to make that choice — a philosophy that they call …
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