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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
60 new regulations, from salamanders to beans from Jordan.
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Senate Abolishes Filibuster, With Potentially Profound Implications for the Rule of Law
Yesterday, the Senate voted 52-48 to effectively abolish the filibuster for nominations to federal offices, such as federal appeals courts and trial courts, and cabinet departments. It used a tactic Senate…
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CEI Podcast for November 22, 2013: Daniel Hannan on Inventing Freedom
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I, iPad – Sir Jonathan Ive and Leonard Read Sing the Same Tune
Apple recently released an ad for the new iPad Air that — whether intentionally or not — mimics CEI’s I, Pencil short film.
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Taxpayer-Funded Propaganda to Show the “Evils” of Private Alcohol Sales
As if there wasn’t enough money in politics, now government agencies are using taxpayer dollars—our dollars—in an attempt to influence state policy. The National Institutes…
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Can the Government Regulate Bitcoins?
Bitcoins themselves cannot be regulated under current law, at least not directly. But certain activities involving…
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Government “Study” on Internet Tax Hides Harmful Small Business Effects
Under presidents of both parties, the Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy has produced quality independent studies on the harmful tax and regulatory burden on…
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Unions’ Taxpayer Subsidized Activity
Taxpayers expect their government to spend tax dollars only on activities that benefit the public. But in Kentucky, the City of Louisville and Jefferson County…
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Urban Active Fitness class action settlement
The class in Gascho v. Global Fitness Holdings LLC, Case No. 2:11-cv-436 (S.D. Ohio), consists of the 606,246 individuals who signed a gym membership or…
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Obamacare Fallout Continues: Obamacare “Winner” Turns Out to Be a Loser Instead
"You screwed me over," says a woman cited by President Obama as an Obamacare success story. Jessica Sanford was used as a prop in the president's "…
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Dumbest Reason to Be Skeptical of Autonomous Vehicles: They Might Cost Auto Mechanics Their Jobs
Today, the House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee held a hearing on “How Autonomous Vehicles Will Shape the Future…
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Cataloging Washington’s Hidden Costs, Part 2: The Unmeasured Impacts of Economic Intervention
Back in Part 1 of Cataloging Washington's Hidden Costs, the topic was the incalculable cost of the loss of liberty in…
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A More Unequal America
Inequality grows hand-in-hand with the growth of the regulatory state. The proliferation of regulations increases economic inequality, since powerful people and politically connected companies know how to shape and manipulate…
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Watch the Live Stream of The New York Meeting @ 6pm
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Two More Strikes against the Export-Import Bank
Two common points made in defense of the Export-Import bank are its recent profitability and the number of jobs it supports. During the recent reauthorization debate,…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
66 new regulations, from corporate mergers to dried bacteria.
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We Didn’t Regulate Credit Cards, We Regulated People
That was the upshot of a panel I spoke at yesterday in New York at the Atlas Liberty Forum. It looked at the impact of…
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Is the FTC Already Capable of Regulating Patent Demand Letters?
The answer is no, except under special circumstances. The question itself arises from comments by Julie P. Samuels of the Electronic…
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The Federal Register Is about to Top 70,000 Pages — And it’s Not Even December
This morning, the Federal Register stood at 68,980 pages. It’s the daily depository of all federal regulations proposed and final. It is our unfortunate Principia Regulatica.
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Illegal Change to Obamacare Is Designed to Scapegoat Insurers, Not Restore Canceled Insurance Policies
If aliens from outer space read today's newspapers, they would assume that America is a dictatorship, not a republic, and that President Obama has the authority…
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Obama Allows Illegal Health Policies, Quickly Pivots to Economy
The furor over the Healthcare.gov website that is merely supposed to automate the process of determining if one is eligible or…
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NLRB Considers Proposing Ambush Election Rule…Again
Finally, after a decade, the National Labor Relations Board is fully staffed with five Senate-confirmed members.
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Wikileaks’ Latest — Draft IP Chapter in Major Trade Agreement
Wikileaks has made another big splash yesterday -- not about spying, but about a multinational trade agreement currently being negotiated. Wikileaks published a draft…
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New Committee to Investigate Michigan Teachers Union Right to Work Violations
Although Michigan's right-to-work legislation took effect in March of this year, teachers have raised concerns that unions are using strong-arm tactics that prohibit them from…
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Antitrust as Corporate Welfare: Imposed Concessions and Conditions on Mergers Are a Fundamental Error
As is now commonplace, American Airlines needed to relent to conditions imposed on the merger with US Airways to secure Department of Justice approval, primarily…
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CEI Podcast for November 12, 2013: CEI’s I, Pencil Film Wins Award
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Under Obamacare, People Pay More for Inferior Health Plans, Lose Health Insurance They Liked
A Colorado woman who championed Obamacare lost her insurance plan. As a CBS TV station in Denver noted, "Millions of people are getting cancellation…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
78 new regulations, from toy guns to tires.
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FDA Trans-Fat Ban Sets Stage to Target Sugar, Salt, and More
On November 7, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced plans to change its classification of trans-fatty acids and remove the designation "Generally Recognized…
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Why Obama’s Pivot from Obamacare to Infrastructure Makes No Sense
President Obama is in New Orleans today to pivot attention to what he’ll call leveraging investment in infrastructure. From the ones and zeros of the…
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Enflaming, Not Enlightening: George Monbiot on Investment Treaties
George Monbiot in The Guardian, in his usual hyperbolic and specious way, describes the proposed U.S.-EU trade agreement’s purpose as to attack national sovereignty…
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Obama Administration Rule Exempts Big Labor from Obamacare Tax
In September, the Obama administration rejected union demands for subsidies offered under Obamacare, which are reserved for the uninsured and low-income workers.
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Twitter, the JOBS Act, and the Return to IPO Normalcy
The headline read that the company's initial public offering price is "high," and "so is its valuation." The accompanying story explained that the latest tech…
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CEI Podcast for November 7, 2013: A Prohibitive Excise Tax
A new CEI study finds that the most expensive ingredient in beer isn’t grain, hops, or equipment: it’s taxes. Study co-author and Fellow in Consumer…
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Labor Ballot Measure Roundup
Voters around the country faced numerous ballot measures yesterday, of which many involved labor policy.
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Memo to Road Socialists: There Is Nothing Unlibertarian about Road Pricing
Virginia just elected Democrat Terry McAuliffe as governor, as had been predicted by every poll conducted during the past few months -- although at a…
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Senate Poised to Pass Employment Non-Discrimination Act
Yesterday, the Senate voted 61-to-30 to invoke cloture on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which would ban workplace bias based on sexual orientation or…
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House Passes Bill to Delay DOL Overreach
Last week, 30 Democrats in the U.S. House of Representative joined Republicans to approve the Retail Investor Protection Act, which delays the Department of Labor's…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
92 new regulations, from student loan paperwork to government employee travel allowances.
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November 4 Press Release
US SUPREME COURT DENIES FACEBOOK USERS CY PRES SETTLEMENT CHALLENGE OPPORTUNITY OPENS DOOR FOR FUTURE CHALLENGES WASHINGTON, D.C. – The US Supreme…
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Cataloging Washington’s Hidden Costs: Part 1: The Loss of Liberty
Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so. —Quote frequently attributed to Galileo that he probably never said. Washington is teeing up…
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CEI Study Supports Tax Cuts for Beer
If you’ve read Lauren French’s Politico article on the two beer tax reduction bills currently under consideration in Congress, you might think that the Competitive…
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Mel Watt Fails Taxpayer, Privacy, and Transparency Tests
Former Rep. Mel Watt, D-N.C., failed his procedural confirmation vote today to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which oversees the government housing entities Fannie…
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Towards a More Transparent Fed
Iain Murray and I have a piece in today's American Spectator breaking down the new paper we co-wrote with John Berlau.
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Corporate Culture Makes a Difference — In Business and in Baseball
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Happy Halloween! FAA to Allow Portable Electronic Devices During All Flight Phases
A month ago, a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Aviation Rulemaking Committee (ARC) recommended that the agency drop its ban on portable electronic device (PED)…
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Congressional Scorecard Update–Richard Griffin Confirmation
Yesterday, the Senate voted 55-44 to confirm Richard Griffin as the National Labor Relations Board general counsel, with Senator Lisa Murkowski as the sole Republican…
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Jane Brody’s Uninformed Attack on Cars and Suburbia
While at a conference where participants discussed the wannabe social engineers cum urbanists' war on automobility and housing affordability, Jane Brody's broadside against Americans'…
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Fairy Tales and Astroturf
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CEI Podcast for October 30, 2013: Bringing Transparency to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
George Mason University law professor and Mercatus Center senior scholar Todd Zywicki discusses his paper, "The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: Savior or Menace?"…
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Don’t Let FTC Shut Down Legit Credit Repair Services
Next to the infamous Healthcare.gov, the website that featured the most bugs of the last month was FTC.gov, the site of the Federal Trade Commission. During…
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Questions for Janet Yellen
Even if it is nominally independent, the Federal Reserve is arguably the government’s most important agency. It has control over the price system, the most…
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Racial Preferences in Obamacare, and Discrimination, Too, Based on Weird Ideology
The Daily Caller has an interesting story about race-conscious provisions and racial preferences contained in Obamacare. It's a subject that has received remarkably little…
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An Alarmist Vocabulary: Chemical Is “Linked To,” “Study Suggests,” “Consistent With”
Headlines continue to appear to claiming that a recent study has shown that the chemical bisphenol A increases the risk of miscarriage, which I addressed…
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Racial Preferences and Red Tape Grow Under Federal Dodd-Frank Act
Last Friday on National Review's The Corner, Roger Clegg wrote about the 2010 law governing the financial sector, the Dodd-Frank Act, and the racial "diversity quotas"…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
78 new regulations, from energy-efficient urinals to interstate turtle requirements.
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Contradictory Financial Regulations Cause Problems
It’s a case of “When Regulations Collide.” As we’ve seen in the energy field, contradictory regulations cost jobs as employers struggle to comply with…
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Glitches and Errors Widespread on Obamacare Health Insurance Website
In addition to the Obamacare web site glitches that left people unable to purchase insurance despite hours or days of trying, the website dramatically…
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CEI Podcast for October 24, 2013: The Social Cost of Carbon
Like anything else, carbon emissions have both costs and benefits. Marlo Lewis, a Senior Fellow in CEI’s Center for Energy and Environment, discusses a new…
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Alcohol Crimes Decline in Washington After Liquor Sales Privatization
In the lead up to Washington State voters approving privatization of liquor sales in the state, opponents claimed—as they always do—that the increased availability and…
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The Implications of Kludgeocracy
Steven Teles tells us in the fall issue of National Affairs that over the next decades, the challenge of "kludgeocracy" will come to the forefront of…
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Scientific Literacy and a Storm in a Tea Party Cup
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Stop Watching Us: End Suspicionless NSA Mass Surveillance
By now, pretty much everybody has heard that the U.S. National Security Agency is indiscriminately collecting private information about all Americans who use a…
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More Bipartisan Opposition to Obama Administration’s Move to Block Airline Merger (Including Rahm Emanuel)
Another day, another round of public bipartisan opposition to the Obama Department of Justice’s lawsuit to block the pending American Airlines and US Airways merger.
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Is Katy Perry Causing Childhood Obesity?
No, of course not! However, a coalition of health advocates seems to be making that assertion when they sent her a letter this week…
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The NSA: Upgrading from Privacy Destruction to Job Destruction
At a recent Cato Institute event on NSA spying activities, the ACLU’s Chris Soghoian stated that NSA activities were not only a threat to…
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FTC Likely to Approve Office Depot, Office Max Merger
According to news sources, the Federal Trade Commission is likely to approve the merger of Office Depot and OfficeMax, the second- and third-largest office…
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Public Pensions Are Not Property
Across the nation, state and local governments in dire financial straits face great difficulty in their efforts to bring their budgets under control. Pensions are…
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Sugar Policy Drives Out Candy Companies
“Cheaper sugar sends candy makers abroad” says a headline in today’s Wall Street Journal (gated). The article noted that increasingly U.S. candy makers are…
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J.P. Morgan Settlement Rips Off Taxpayers and Investors, Punishes Some Alleged Victims
Recently, The Washington Post reported that J.P.Morgan will pay $13 billion to settle lawsuits against it by the federal government and two…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
Shutdown edition: 3 new regulations. Two Coast Guard safety zones and a catch limit for herring.
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Loosened Laws in New Jersey Result in Brewery Boom
Only a year after New Jersey Governor Chris Christie signed a bill into law that would allow breweries in the garden state to sell beer…
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Costly Anti-Bullying Programs Backfire
Countless tax dollars have been spent on anti-bullying programs, and 49 states have anti-bullying laws. After New Jersey passed a broad anti-bullying law, hundreds of schools…
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CEI Podcast for October 17, 2013: Supreme Court to Review EPA Carbon Emission Regulation Lawsuit
CEI is a co-petitioner in the case.
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Controversial NLRB General Counsel Nomination Vote Approaching
Now that the partial government shutdown is over, its back to business as usual. As such, the Senate will tackle the controversial nomination of Richard…
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More than a Third of House Dems Oppose Obama’s American-US Airways Merger Lawsuit; What Real Pro-Competition Policy Looks Like
Bipartisan opposition to the Obama administration’s reckless assault on the pending merger of American Airlines and US Airways is growing. While the end of the…
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The Shutdown Is Over: What Now for Regulation?
The next day or two will also be slow ones for the Federal Register. But then there will be a flood of new rules as…
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Gmail’s Targeted Advertising Accused of Being Wiretapping: Part 2
As I stated in my previous article, a federal court is currently hearing a lawsuit challenging Google’s “targeted advertising” practices. The plaintiffs claim the…
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How Is the Shutdown Affecting Regulation?
Short answer: not much. Over at the Daily Caller, I go over some data from this shutdown, as well as the two Gingrich-Clinton showdowns.
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
Shutdown edition: 6 new regulations, from Basel III to bridge repair.
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Judge Rules Federal Government Cannot Close County Park in Shutdown
Earlier, I wrote about the federal government's use of the federal government shutdown as an excuse to close many private businesses. Those were businesses that lease…
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October 15
Tomorrow morning, the Supreme Court will announce orders relating to two cert petitions we filed (with substantial and critically necessary pro bono assistance) that it…
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Enviro Scare Tactics Undermine Breast Cancer Awareness Month
October is “breast cancer awareness month” thanks to a collaborative campaign arranged by public and private groups united in the mission to fight breast…
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“Ingratitude” at Tesla Motors?
Mother Jones’ profile of Elon Musk and Tesla Motors trots out a familiar story about industrial policy’s role in the success of infant…
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Don’t Believe the Hype: Your Food Is as Safe as Ever
Supporters of big government are taking advantage of a Salmonella outbreak linked to raw chicken to condemn Republican lawmakers and…
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Shut Down Fannie and Freddie Permanently
Cross-posted from Newsbusters.org “U.S. Government Shutdown Threatening Housing Recovery,” screams the Oct. 2 headline of a shutdown scare screed in Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Wade…
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Are California Droughts Natural or Man Made?
A ongoing battle in court and public opinion rages in California over the environmental status of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta (both rivers meet, and…
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CEI Podcast for October 10, 2013: CEI Files FOIA Requests Over Park Closures
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More Myths About the Government Shutdown
Young people often don't realize that government shutdowns used to be common, until the middle of the Clinton administration. The George W. Bush presidency was an exception…
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Gmail’s Targeted Advertising Accused of Being Wiretapping: Part 1
It has long been widely known that Google uses software that scans its users’ Gmail messages to generate targeted advertising. Recently,…
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Boston Bus Drivers Illegal Strike
On October 8, hundreds of Boston Public School union bus drivers went on a surprise strike, which left nearly 33,000 kids without a ride to…
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Obama Administration Memo: Keep Paying Union Bosses on Official Time
Over the weekend, the House unanimously passed the Federal Employee Retroactive Pay Fairness Act. If passed by the Senate, all furloughed federal employees will receive…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
113 new regulations, from drawbridge schedules to viticultural areas.
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Some Genuine Vindictiveness in Park Closings
The Washington Times story on the attempted forced shut down of the Pisgah Inn on the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina may provide some…
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Obama Administration Unnecessarily Shuts Down Many Private Businesses in Government “Shutdown”
PJ Media's Bryan Preston reported Wednesday that the "White House [is] ordering hundreds of privately run, private funded parks to close," using the government…
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Selfishness Underlies the Shutdown, At Home and Abroad
Americans aren’t the only ones talking about government shutdown this week. Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi almost collapsed Italy’s government on Wednesday by threatening…
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Twitter IPO a Vindication of Bipartisan JOBS Act
Almost two years ago, I wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed entitled, "Making It Legal to Tweet for Investors." In the op-ed, I described bipartisan bills…
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CEI Podcast for October 3, 2013: The Federal Shutdown
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Regulators and Justice
The federal government cajoled JP Morgan into acquiring Bear Stearns. Now they are punishing JP Morgan for crimes allegedly committed by Bear Stearns prior to…
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