Clearly, the impact of President Obama’s proposal to consolidate parts of six trade agencies is tiny in comparison to the government’s $3.5 trillion in spending or its trillion-dollar-plus deficits. But if—and that is a big if, depending upon not-yet-available details—it represents a genuine step toward smaller, less costly, and more effective government, it would be a welcome small change from the direction of the past three years. The proposal would reportedly combine some of the functions of the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, the Small Business Administration, the Export-Import …
Earlier this week Commerce Secretary Gary Locke descended on Louisiana to announce a $30.7 million grant for a coastal restoration project near Port Fourchon. He called the funding a sign of the “administration’s commitment to help the Gulf Coast’s economy and environment recover in the wake of the BP oil spill.” There was just one problem — funding for the project was approved months before the oil spill. And according to the state agency in charge of coastal restoration, there was no action even necessary by the Department of Commerce …
Left-leaning groups want to include millions of pretend people in the real-life 2010 Census. It almost happened in 2000. This time, they might get their way. The administration claims it has “no plans” to use statistical sampling to augment the actual headcount next year by adding millions of fictitious people. Statistical sampling creates profiles of make-believe people, assigning them an address, a gender, race, age, income, and other characteristics. And it counts them, just as though they were counted by a census worker. The Left argues that minorities and illegal …
