by Kerry Thomas
September 10, 2009
On September 9, while the American media focused their
spotlights on the continuing debate over nationalizing America’s health
insurance industry, the U.S. Senate quietly and with little notice considered
the confirmation of Harvard Law School professor Cass Sunstein as
President Barack Hussein Obama’s Administrator
of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the Office of Management and Budget.
Sunstein is a former colleague and friend of Barack Hussein Obama from
the University of Chicago.
Unlike most of the
President’s “advisors” (commonly referred to as czars), Cass Sunstein actually
was confirmed by the Senate on September 10 by a vote of 57-40 (roll
call vote 274). Both of Wisconsin’s
Democrat Senators voted to confirm Sunstein.
In his capacity as regulatory
czar, Sunstein will be responsible for reviewing draft regulations throughout government agencies and
overseeing the implementation of government-wide policies, according to the
Washington Post.
The Wall Street
Journal says the obscure job “wields outsize power. It oversees regulations throughout the
government, from the Environmental Protection Agency to the Occupational Safety
and Health Administration.” Sunstein will be instrumental in administration efforts to
regulate financial services, control greenhouse gases, and implement universal
health care, among other things.
Why should you care?
Like so many people
in this administration, Cass Sunstein is politically left of the Left. Some of his moe interesting positions:
Sunstein has long advocated establishing legal “rights” for
livestock, wildlife, and pets. In an
August 2002 paper titled “The Rights of
Animals” Sunstein wrote, “Almost everyone believes in animal rights…there
should be extensive regulation of the use of animals in entertainment,
scientific experiments, and agriculture…there is a strong argument…for bans on many
current uses of animals.”
Sunstein expounded these views in a 2004 book called Animal
Rights: Current Debates and New Directions, which he
co-edited with then-girlfriend Martha Nussbaum. In the book, Sunstein set out his ambitious plans to give animals
the legal “right” to file lawsuits.
“Animals should be permitted to bring suit, with human
beings as their representatives, to prevent violations of current law … any
animals that are entitled to bring suit would be represented by (human)
counsel, who would owe guardian like obligations and make decisions, subject to
those obligations, on their clients’ behalf.”
In 2007 Sunstein
delivered the keynote speech at Harvard University’s “Facing
Animals” conference. (Sunstein’s
remarks begin about 39 minutes into the video.)
“We ought to ban hunting, I suggest, if there isn’t a
purpose other than sport and fun. That
should be against the law. It’s time now.”
Sunstein also argued in favor of “eliminating current practices such as
greyhound racing, cosmetic testing, and meat eating.”
Sunstein concluded
his Harvard remarks by expressing his “more ambitious animating concern”
that the current treatment of livestock and other animals should be considered
“a form of unconscionable barbarity not the same as, but in many ways morally
akin to, slavery and mass extermination of human beings.”
“Extensive
regulation of the use of animals.” In
other words, using government regulations to get everything the animal rights
group PETA can't get through simple persuasion.
Do you suppose Sunstein just might consider imposing new
more restrictive regulations on America’s ranchers, restaurateurs, hunters, and
biomedical researchers, to say nothing of regulating the dietary options
available to American consumers?
As the new “regulatory czar” he’ll have the power to do just
that.
Click here
to read 12 more pages of Cass Sunstein’s quotes on animal rights, hunting, the
2nd Amendment, free speech, civil liberties, taxes, the judiciary, government
regulations, and a second Bill of Rights.
With
respect to a second Bill of Rights, Sunstein writes, “My major aim…is to
uncover an important but neglected part of America’s heritage: the idea of a
second bill of rights. In brief, the
second bill attempts to protect both opportunity and security, by creating
rights to employment, adequate food and clothing, decent shelter, education,
recreation, and medical care.” (Cass R.
Sunstein, The Second Bill of Rights: FDR’s Unfinished Revolution and Why We
Need it More Than Ever, Basic Books, New York, 2004, p. 1)
Regarding
the 2nd Amendment: “Consider
the view that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to own guns. The view is respectable, but it may be
wrong.” (Cass R. Sunstein, A
Constitution of Many Minds, Princeton University Press, 2009, p. 172-173)
““Almost
all gun control legislation is constitutionally fine. And if the Court is
right, then fundamentalism does not justify the view that the Second Amendment
protects an individual right to bear arms. ”
(Cass Sunstein, writing in his book, “Radicals in Robes”)
Cass Sunstein has an interesting view of
taxes: “In what sense is the money
in our pockets and bank accounts fully ‘ours’? Did we earn it by our own
autonomous efforts? Could we have inherited it without the assistance of probate
courts? Do we save it without the support of bank regulators? Could we spend it
if there were no public officials to coordinate the efforts and pool the
resources of the community in which we live?...Without taxes there would be no
liberty. Without taxes there would be no property. Without taxes, few of us
would have any assets worth defending.” (Cass R. Sunstein, “Why We Should
Celebrate Paying Taxes,” The Chicago Tribune, April 14, 1999)
And finally, here’s
how Cass Sunstein sees his new job at the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA ): “OIRA should see, as one of its
central assignments, the task of overcoming governmental myopia and tunnel
vision, by ensuring aggregate risks are reduced and that agency focus on
particular risks does not mean that ancillary risks are ignored or increased.” (Cass R. Sunstein, Free Markets &
Social Justice, Oxford University Press, 1997, p. 315)
Recall the federal government’s environmental regulations
regarding logging and the spotted owl; the use of water for irrigation verses
the snail darter; or even the prohibition on the mining of clean coal by
placing the land into a federal wilderness area. All done by federal agency regulation, not by Congressional
legislation.
Cass Sunstein is now in a position to implement political policies
through regulation that the Obama administration cannot achieve through
legislation.
With such radical
views, and now with the power to implement regulations in support of his
radical views, it’s little wonder that Cass Sunstein has been called the most
dangerous man in America.