The Sore Losers' Approach to Government

By Jonathan Tomczak

If you can't beat them, keep them from showing up.

The act of paralyzing a regulatory department is part of a broader strategy by some members of Congress to render government departments all but useless. Because they lost the battle to prevent these agencies from being created in the first place, they choose to cut funding, restrict enforcement mechanisms and make the agencies jump through impossible hoops in order to provide oversight. It's a sore losers' approach to governing, and it's more pervasive than many of us realize.

A fertilizer plant in West, Texas exploded on April 17. Twelve people died in the blast. The investigation is ongoing and the cause is still unknown, but the most shocking information discovered so far is that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has not inspected the plant since 1985.

This is hardly a surprise, and not an accident. There are only 2,200 OSHA inspectors for roughly 8 million workplaces in the United States. According to the Washington Post, the agency only investigates when a complaint has been filed, and even then their enforcement abilities are limited. 

OSHA found serious deficiencies with the plant in 1985, yet the maximum fine allowed was $7,000. The Environmental Protection Agency later found the same plant was two years late filing a risk-management plan. It almost doesn't matter if the explosion was a result of deficient standards. What can anyone do about it if it was?

 Not only Commerce regulators are being attacked. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms has not had a director since 2006, when a bill was passed making the position subject to Senate confirmation. 

The new Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, established to protect consumers from predatory tactics of big banks, has been constantly attacked in Republican-proposed bills, and only has a director because President Barack Obama made a recess appointment. The same process was needed to fill positions for the National Labor Relations Board last year.

Last week, Republicans in the Senate blocked the confirmation of the new EPA director by simply not showing up.

There is such a thing as too much regulation. Businesses need breathing room, much like athletes need some leeway to play the game competitively. Nobody likes it when the referees flag penalties left and right. It's only fair that government agencies are as accountable for their actions as businesses. Some might even say that government agencies being overburdened by oversight rules is a sweet, poetic justice.

It's not, though. There are reasons these agencies exist. In 1969, the Cuyahoga River was so polluted that it caught on fire. Most banks care about profits more than they do people. Court cases remain backlogged, depriving people of the justice they deserve. The agencies and personnel overseeing these government functions do so because there was a time when no one did, and it created an awful living environment around the country. 

The members of Congress doing this, mind you, are the same ones who will turn around and complain that the agencies are overly expensive. Of course they are! 

All the barriers put up in front of them necessitate higher administrative costs to get around the red tape. The tactics being employed are not a path to a smarter government, a more efficient government or even a cheaper government. They're a path to a 19th century government.

Anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist once said that his hope is to make government so small you could "drown it in a bathtub." Until the agencies are actually eliminated - and whether they should be is a discussion for another time - the asphyxiation must stop. The agencies of government are not perfect, but they are capable of doing extremely good work.

All they need is to be given the chance.

Jonathan Tomczak is a political science and history double major and editor of the Opinion section.