Conservative Leader Urges Public Access to CRS Reports
Paul M. Weyrich, the influential culture warrior who leads the arch-conservative Free Congress Foundation, has called upon Congress to grant public access to products of the Congressional Research Service.
“It seems to me that it is time to end the foolishness and just make the CRS website available to the general public,” Mr. Weyrich wrote in a new commentary.
Does Mr. Weyrich’s endorsement of public access to CRS reports imply that continued restrictions on such access might actually be desirable? Of course not.
Here are some recent acquisitions (all pdf).
“The Executive Office of the President: An Historical Overview,” updated November 28, 2006.
“Radioactive Tank Waste from the Past Production of Nuclear Weapons: Background and Issues for Congress,” updated January 3, 2007.
“United Nations Reform: U.S. Policy and International Perspectives,” January 22, 2007.
January saw us watching whether the government would fund science. February has been about how that funding will be distributed, regulated, and contested.
This rule gives agencies significantly more authority over certain career policy roles. Whether that authority improves accountability or creates new risks depends almost entirely on how agencies interrupt and apply it.
Our environmental system was built for 1970s-era pollution control, but today it needs stable, integrated, multi-level governance that can make tradeoffs, share and use evidence, and deliver infrastructure while demonstrating that improved trust and participation are essential to future progress.
Durable and legitimate climate action requires a government capable of clearly weighting, explaining, and managing cost tradeoffs to the widest away of audiences, which in turn requires strong technocratic competency.