Tag Archives: regulation

Continuing Veterans Administration Failure

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Kyndra Rotunda, ex-Army JAG and currently Professor of Military & International Law and Executive Director of the Military and Veterans Law Institute at Chapman University, had some comments in her Wall Street Journal op-ed [emphasis in original].

When Congress enacted the Veterans Access, Choice and Accountability Act of 2014 in the wake of revelations about bureaucratic dysfunction at the Veterans Affairs Department, the plan was to reduce wait times at VA hospitals, give veterans access to outside health care and allow the VA to quickly terminate problem employees.

How is the VA doing? For starters, government statistics show that hospital wait times are 50% longer than two years ago.

And

The law allows the firing of top-level VA officials with less notice and fewer appellate rights than government employees enjoy. The fired VA worker must appeal within seven days of the discipline; administrative judges must hear and decide the case within 21 days, or the department’s discipline stands; judges cannot mitigate penalties; and decisions are final.
…
Over the past month alone, judges at the Merit Systems Protection Board, which hears appeals by federal employees, sided with three VA officials who challenged their disciplining. The MSPB reinstated all three.

Time to get out the axe.

But then Rotunda strayed.

[W]hat’s the harm in allowing judges to mitigate penalties?

In response to which, I ask, “What’s the harm in requiring these administrative judges simply to uphold or set aside the penalty?”  Either the person did the deed, or he did not.  The penalty is not for a third party to decide; the employer—even this wholly mendacious VA of an employer—is the one to determine whether the person’s services are needed any further.

Full stop.

Veteranos Administratio delende est.

This Bears Close Watching

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Especially in light of this administration’s—and its hoped-for Progressive successor’s—penchant for surrendering apologetically our sovereignty to extra-national entities like the United Nations.

The United Nations has launched a far-reaching initiative that could give UN-sponsored authorities sway over the biological resources of the high seas—all the waters that lie outside national territories and economic zones.

The potential shift in power involves multi-trillion-dollar issues, such as whether large areas—conceivably, as much as 30%—of the world’s international waters should be designated as no-go areas to protect biological diversity….

Because national sovereignty is so 19th century.  And the UN does such a wonderful job managing its existing tasks.

Good for the Senate

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And too bad for Senator Chuck Schumer (D, NY), who wanted to expand Government yet further and have it dictate business and free market decisions to businesses and customers.

Schumer tried to attach an amendment to a bill renewing a number of the FAA’s programs

would have blocked airlines from further reducing the “size, width, padding, and pitch” of seats, passengers’ legroom and the width of aisles.

Having more room on an airplane is certainly a nice idea, especially on long flights.  However, as with so many things in our lives and our economies, this is a matter for us to determine in a free market, not for Government to dictate in an increasingly government-controlled economy.

Fortunately, the Senate voted down the amendment.  Unfortunately, it was defeated by an essentially party-line vote: this sort of expansion of intrusive Government it all too typical of the Democratic Party.

Elections have consequences.

Do Your Own Work

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Currently, per a 1996 law passed by Congress, the CDC is barred from using funds to “advocate or promote gun control.”  Now, some 100 or more medical organizations want Congress to lift this ban, so they can research “gun violence.”  The letter they’ve written to four Congressional committees making this request can be seen here, and it’s signed by the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, among those 100+.

These groups admit that the ban on using CDC funding to conduct this research does not ban the research, but they claim that the lack of government funding amounts to such a ban.

No.  This is just cynicism: if these guys actually thought the research they propose had any value, they’d go ahead and do it.  They’re just demanding OPM so they don’t have to make the hard choices of priority setting.

Elections have consequences.

Fallout

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Pfizer Inc and Allergan PLC terminated their planned $150 billion merger after the Obama administration took aim at the deal that would have moved the biggest drug company in the US to Ireland to lower its taxes.

Yup.  Because the Progressive administration Knows Better than business leaders how those businesses should be managed.

The decision to walk away is the latest setback in Pfizer’s long-running efforts to overcome what Chief Executive Ian Read has said was the company’s competitive disadvantage with foreign rivals that faced significantly lower tax bills.

Of course, Jack Lew, the Treasury Secretary whose tax rules the center of the administration’s aim, knew this would be part of the result.

In addition, the failed deal also hurts Pfizer’s plans to break itself up. Company executives have considered splitting the company for years….

Of course, Lew knew this, too.  This pattern of abuse makes me wonder how closely Lew is coordinating his actions with Richard Cordray, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau MFWIC.