“FDA” on The Daily Caller

1.) Obama writes editorial against regulatory excess, can name only one excessive regulation — Overly schoolmarmish regulations have to go, Pres. Obama writes in an op-ed in the morning’s Wall Street Journal. In it, Obama pays lip service to America’s semi-free market system as the source of “dazzling ideas and path-breaking products” and “the greatest force for prosperity the world has ever known.” The op-ed is a curtain-raiser for this afternoon, when Obama will sign an executive order that “requires that federal agencies ensure that regulations protect our safety, health and environment while promoting economic growth,” as well as “a government-wide review of the rules already on the books to remove outdated regulations that stifle job creation and make our economy less competitive.” But do not get your hopes too high: Apparently, the only regulatory excessiveness that Obama could think of was artificial sweetener: “The FDA has long considered saccharin, the artificial sweetener, safe for people to consume. Yet for years, the EPA made companies treat saccharin like other dangerous chemicals. Well, if it goes in your coffee, it is not hazardous waste. The EPA wisely eliminated this rule last month.” Meanwhile, a spox for Rep. Eric Cantor wishes Obama had released this executive order in 2009, when House Republicans proposed it first. (more)

President Obama moved Tuesday to undercut criticism by conservatives that he will unilaterally impose his agenda through regulation, announcing an executive order making economic growth a required criteria for federal rule-making. (more)

Here’s a word of advice to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulators deciding this week whether or not to ban menthol cigarettes: Cool it. If the FDA sows this wind, I fear we will reap the whirlwind. (more)

Despite efforts by Senate Democrats to severely restrict the use of the filibuster, it seems as though they will use any tactic, including the filibuster, to see that the effort to repeal Obamacare never makes it to this president’s desk. It’s clear that House Republicans’ repeal efforts are just the first step in a long process. Republicans and conservatives understand and accept this, which is why a strategic plan is needed. (more)

1.) House Republicans have not announced what they would cut from budget if they had power to cut budget — “House Republican leaders are so far not specifying which programs would bear the brunt of budget cutting, only what would escape it: spending for the military, domestic security and veterans,” reports the New York Times. “The reductions that would be required in the remaining federal programs, including education and transportation, would be so deep — roughly 20 percent on average — that Senate Republicans have not joined the $100 billion pledge that House Republicans, led by the incoming speaker, Representative John A. Boehner, made to voters before November’s midterm elections.” Even with security/defense/old people/catfood cuts off the table, there are still a few agencies that could stand to lose some weight: FCC, both DoE’s, FDA, IRS, NASA, &c. We could go on, but why bother? “Even if adopted by the House, the Republicans’ budget is unlikely to be enacted in anything like the scale they envision, since Democrats retain a majority in the Senate and President Obama could veto annual appropriations bills making the reductions.” (more)

As we begin a new year, the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) would first like to try and slay the demons and hobgoblins of the past year. We do this each New Year’s Eve by making a list of the top unfounded health scares of the outgoing year. These bouts of hysteria are prompted by many different things. But what they have in common is that there’s no scientific evidence to back up the alarms being sounded. (more)

This New Years Eve, while you’re chugging Four Loko and lobbing Happy Meal toys at one another, poised to inaugurate a new Congress and partying like it’s 2012, beware of that hog in the corner. He’s a big-government bureaucrat and he’s come to crash the bash. The newly elected Republican majority’s campaign promises of smaller government and less intrusion into Americans’ lives are reasons to celebrate, but the Obama administration’s unilateral, over-regulating agenda is barreling uninvited into the party. (more)

Calling Obamacare a government takeover of health care is the “lie of the year,” according to the self-proclaimed oracle of all things true and untrue in the political debate. That outrageous proclamation from PolitiFact shows that its editors need a Truth-O-Meter of their own. (more)

Four and a half years ago, my mom was diagnosed with Stage II breast cancer. (more)

This Sunday, December 5, many people will raise their glasses and celebrate Repeal Day — the anniversary of the end of Prohibition, a day when Americans regained a measure of individual freedom. However, some recent actions by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) suggest that aspects of Prohibition linger on nearly 80 years after the passage of the 21st Amendment. As a result, consumers are witnessing a dwindling variety of products and entrepreneurs are seeing their dreams and businesses washed down the drain. (more)

Bureaucrats have thankless jobs, always under attack for some horrible decision or another they’re making or choice to the public they’re limiting, and justifiably so. This is not a defense of bureaucrats, they’re deserving of almost every criticism that comes their way. This is to point out yet another way in which bureaucrats could limit options for you and your family through their ever-growing control over our health care. (more)

Concerned parents across the country are no doubt still celebrating the demise of Four Loko, the infamous alcoholic energy drink marketed directly to college students — who are somewhat less thrilled to see it go, if Facebook’s News Feed is any indication. Still, hostility to such products, which recently prompted the Federal Drug Administration to ban them, is entirely misplaced. Instead of worrying about whether college kids are going to ingest risky substances (short answer: they will, no matter what the government does), people should take issue with the baseless hysteria that prompted unelected bureaucrats to force dozens of products off the market. (more)

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration told the manufacturers of seven caffeinated alcoholic beverages Wednesday that their drinks are a “public health concern” and can’t stay on the market in their current form. (more)

Democrats on Tuesday received the worst drubbing, nationally and locally, suffered by either political party in more than half a century. This battering of epic proportions, primarily a repudiation of the economic policies and high-handedness of Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, was also an implicit condemnation of a left-wing regulatory philosophy that unnecessarily burdens those who create jobs and wealth. (more)

Here are the top three ways Washington will be different after this week’s midterm elections: (more)

According to the latest Gallup 2010 Confidence in Institutions poll, the U.S. Congress ranks dead last out of the 16 institutions rated. Only 11% of Americans have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in those who populate the institution, down from 17% in 2009 and a percentage point lower than the previous low (2008). (more)

After nearly a dozen party-going students were hospitalized in Washington state and authorities put some of the blame on a drink that mixes alcohol with caffeine, a popular version of the beverage called Four Loko has taken a lot of heat. But they are not the only drink that’s under scrutiny. (more)

The impact of the president’s health care reform plan is becoming evident but not in the way its supporters envisioned. (more)

With the election barely two weeks away, the nation is focused on what will happen if (when?) control of Congress swings rightward. While some far-reaching elements of Barack Obama’s agenda will face great — perhaps impassible — hurdles on Capitol Hill, that won’t stop the administration from implementing them via regulation, the ultimate end-run around Congress. (more)

Breast cancer patients from across the nation are up in arms over a proposed FDA decision that would literally rip the drug Avastin from their doctor’s hands.  The life-extending drug has been credited, in part, with helping patients live longer.  But the pleas from patients are not enough for the ideologues at Newsweek who are pressing for price rationing of drugs. (more)