Editorial: Removing scientific oversight

Saturday, Feb. 3, 2007 | 7:12 a.m.

President Bush has signed an order that allows the White House to have more control over shaping the federal rules and policies that guide protection of the public's health, safety, environment, civil rights and privacy.

According to a story by The New York Times on Tuesday, the executive order that Bush issued last week requires every federal agency to have a regulatory policy office that is run by a political appointee. This appointee will oversee the development of rules and regulatory guidance documents - duties that previously were performed by scientific experts and civil servants.

This essentially gives Bush the power to dictate how policies on protecting the public's health, safety and environment should be crafted, regardless of what scientists say. Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, told the Times that the president's order "is great news for special interests."

Indeed. The president's directive seems as though it was crafted specifically to benefit special interests.

Business groups immediately applauded the order as a way of streamlining what they consider to be an overbearing federal regulatory system. But critics rightly fear that regulations by government agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, will fall prey to Bush's loyalty to private business interests, which have lavished the president and other Republicans with generous contributions.

Bush's order opens a back door through which he can exert more control over federal regulations. Federal agencies will have to run their rule changes past a Bush political appointee and also must provide details on why a problem - such as factories releasing dangerous chemicals into the air - warrants government intervention.

So the order doesn't streamline federal regulation. It actually adds a layer of bureaucracy and review to the regulatory process.

And it is precisely the kind of behind-the-scenes meddling that Bush uses to manipulate the laws and government regulations to his liking, regardless of what the facts show to be the most responsible and scientific course of action.