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September 29, 2006
DUDLEY FOR OMB? NOT IF CONSUMER GROUPS CAN STOP HER
According to a Washington Post report, health and safety advocacy groups are preparing to fight hard against the Bush Administration’s attempt to name Susan E. Dudley to head the Office of Management and Budget. OMB is the gatekeeper for much federal regulatory activity – a clearinghouse that some feel have been antagonistic to regulations favoring consumer health and safety that have drawn corporate opposition.
"We believe she is unfit," the Post article quoted Joan Claybrook , president of Public Citizen, as saying. It added that “…the Bush administration fired back at Public Citizen on Dudley's behalf,..‘When a fringe group like this one criticizes Susan Dudley, I think it's a good indication that she's actually squarely in the thoughtful mainstream along with most Americans,’ said Scott Milburn , press secretary at the OMB. ‘She's very well suited to . . . keep our regulatory process on track.’” (Public Citizen has created a web page that criticizes Dudley’s record and her views on leading safety issues: “She said that air bags shouldn’t be mandatory – because if we really wanted them, the market would have already provided them.”)
“To some degree,” the Post story said, “the dispute over the Dudley nomination reflects inherent tensions in the federal regulatory system. The OMB reviews major agency regulations and can send them back to agencies for more justification. Agencies say their rules flow from laws, do not need more justification and sometimes are backed up by federal courts. The hue and cry increases during Republican administrations, which public interest groups see as tilting policy in favor of big business.”
Prior to her nomination, it noted, Dudley directed the regulatory studies program for the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. The center has been active in submitting proposals to the OMB that call for modifying or eliminating regulations and has emerged as a policy player in the Bush administration and on Capitol Hill.
Posted by MVHAP at September 29, 2006 12:32 PM