Ted Cruz vs. The Sierra Club

Ted Cruz vs. The Sierra Club

Tuesday, Senator Cruz chaired a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Oversight, Agency Action, Federal Rights and Federal Courts titled “Opportunity Denied: How Overregulation Harms Minorities” that investigated the harmful effects of government overregulation on people and businesses who lack the resources and political connections to deal effectively with mountains of red tape.

According to his office, Cruz invited Harry Alford, president and CEO, National Black Chamber of Commerce; Michael Barrera, national economic prosperity manager, The LIBRE Institute; Sabina Loving, owner and operator, Loving Tax Services, Inc.; and Timothy Sandefur, principal attorney, Pacific Legal Foundation. Their testimony focused on the harmful effects of government overregulation on the African-American and Hispanic communities and on the experience of small businesses within these communities.

Democrat witnesses included Aaron Mair, president of the Sierra Club; Amit Narang, regulation policy advocate at Public Citizen; and William Scott, CEO of Tristatz, LLC.

“Fifty-five years ago, there were 13 regulatory federal government agencies. Today, there are over 70,” said Senator Cruz.

This is where Cruz shines his brightest.

Questioning Sierra Club President Aaron Mair, Senator Cruz challenged Mair to name one instance harmful government regulation:

“Sir, the test is in the pudding,” said Mair. “I’m asking about the pudding today though, not the future pudding,” responded Senator Cruz.

Needless to say, not one testifying party could come up with one.single.example. Plenty of Washington speak, but no proof that overregulation is detrimental. Which is pretty impressive given the EPA’s trail of job destruction and energy cost increases.

Cruz explained:

“The regulation epidemic in this country certainly hasn’t translated into more jobs for minorities. Especially since President Obama has taken office. The median household income for African-Americans and Hispanics, for instance, has remained virtually unchanged since President Obama was elected. Meaning that there has been no recovery since the 2008 crash. And poverty rates for African-Americans has gone up. African-American unemployment remains almost double that of non-minorities, as it has for over 50 years.

And there are together roughly a million fewer [prime] working-age African-American and Hispanics employed today than [December 2007 when the recession began]. Let me repeat that statistic: there are together roughly 1 million fewer [prime] working-age African-Americans and Hispanics employed today than [December 2007 when the recession began]. That’s roughly 1 million lives impacted, plus their children, plus their families. People who want to work, want to provide for their families, and yet are being denied that opportunity.

It’s estimated that for every additional $1 million that the government spends enforcing its regulations, the economy loses 420 private sector jobs.

Of course, it doesn’t have to be this way. Curbing excessive government regulation shouldn’t be a partisan issue.

According to William Scott, CEO of Tristatz (we don’t know what that is either) and Democratic witness in the hearing, we should be thankful for government regulation which has, after all, saved us from… contaminated wood?

RedState’s Leon Wolf covered Scott’s interesting claims:

Ho-lee crap. Let’s just pause for a second here and understand the liberal mindset. Let’s look at the three things this guy says that we would not have, if it weren’t for government regulation.

First, he says that without regulation, seeds that are planted in the ground would not grow plants that provide nourishment. I’m being charitable with his rambling, nonsensical answer, and that’s the best possible interpretation of what this guy – who was brought out to be someone with something of value to Democrats to say – said about seeds. Get it? This guy thinks that if you buy some asparagus seeds, and plant them in the ground, the asparagus does not grow up to contain Vitamins A, C, E and K (or folic acid or fiber) unless there’s a government regulation that says that it must. Unless the FDA commands farmers to grow asparagus with these nutrients, it apparently just grows up all worthless and nutrient free and our bodies would all shrivel and die.

Second, he said… he said the wood in the Senate office buildings might be “contaminated” without government regulations. The wood, he said. Might be contaminated. If not for the government regulating – I guess, trees? – we might all just be surrounded by poisonous wood. Poisonous wood everywhere, and every time we touched it, we might all die. I want to emphasize that this guy, this William C. Scott, said this under oath in front of Congress, cognizant of the fact that there were cameras there recording the things that came out of his mouth. And he found it to be an eminently reasonable thing to say, that without government regulation, the wood in the Senate office buildings might (apparently) kill us all. From being “contaminated.”

Of course, no diatribe about the benefits of government regulation for minorities would be complete without reference to the Great Cheap Carpet Menace. I mean, without regulation, the carpet in the freaking United States Senate Chambers might be cheap. Definitely the Federal Government could not afford, anywhere in their trillion-plus dollar budget, to actually just buy good carpet from carpet salesmen with good reputations for a building that stands as one of the very symbols of our nation’s prosperity and good will. And definitely if the carpet just came up as soon as it was installed, there’s no way the government could sue the people who installed it for their shoddy workmanship or use their purchasing power to force them to come back in and re-install it. No way. What’s needed is government regulation here. To make sure, apparently, that even if you buy cheap carpet, it’s not cheap.

Shorter liberal sentiment: There exists not one single, solitary, instance of harmful government regulation, but if it weren’t for government, we’d have no plants.

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