Obama's Regulatory Cliff Is The Bigger Problem

Rules: Even if President Obama and John Boehner work out a deal to avoid the "fiscal cliff," the U.S. is still careening toward a another cliff, thanks to Obama's massively expensive, if little noticed, regulatory agenda.

As IBD reported before the election, Obama's regulatory minions had temporarily put several costly new rules on ice to protect the president from charges that he was anti-business and to shield the economy from the effects of all these huge new regulatory burdens.

But almost as soon as voters decided to give Obama four more years, his regulators once again sprang into action.

Or as the AP put it, "Since the election, the Obama administration has quietly reopened the regulations pipeline."

The latest is a costly new rule that tightens allowable levels of so-called fine particulate matter. That will make it far harder for local governments to issue new manufacturing permits if they are to stay in compliance with the new standard.

Worse, the new rule isn't even needed, since the EPA's own data show levels of this pollutant — called PM 2.5 — steadily declining under the existing standard.

The National Association of Manufacturers called the EPA's decision a "staggering level of shortsightedness." That's putting it mildly.

The public also didn't learn until after the election that they will each have to pay a $63 fee, thanks to new ObamaCare regulations.

In essence, this is a surprise $25 billion tax hike — imposed on everyone, middle-class families included — to offset what the administration admits will be a massive disruption in the insurance market once ObamaCare's rules kick in.

In addition, the EPA has proposed water quality rules for ...

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