Big Government And The CPSC

When I used to think of the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) I generally thought of a government agency with a good charter - keeping manufacturers honest and providing common sense regulation and recall procedures over products which might be harmful to persons unaware.

However, over the last decade I've changed my thoughts considerably.

There's the CPSC instigating armed paramilitary raids of legitimate, legal, established business owners over the oxidizing chemicals they sell, even though they are in good standing with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) whose job is to keep track of these sorts of things:

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.06/chemistry.html

Latest is the CPSC's interpretation of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008:

http://www.cpsc.gov/cpsia.pdf

The CPSC leadership appears to be playing power games with congress over a new law intended to help keep children from getting lead poisoning. The fallout is the destruction of children's books which may or may not contain lead, creating distress to second-hand stores which sell used children's toys and putting small private toy making enterprises out of business.

The CPSC's game of chicken with congress is even preventing the sales of small motorcycles which are made of steel with trace amounts of lead in it:

http://www.startribune.com/local/39693797.html

This last inanity makes me particularly angry. When I was a boy I had a small Suzuki 50cc motorcycle which gave me hours of enjoyment. Not only did I learn how to ride I also learned how to work on small engines.

The CPSC's leadership claims that congress made the law too broad against CPSC's recommendations and thus must follow the law to the letter. The lawmakers responsible for the legislation say that the law gives the CPSC discretionary powers about how to go about enforcement - which seems to be the case. The CPSC even has the power to delegate enforcement to state agencies.

In my opinion the leadership and employees of the CPSC need to have their leashes shortened (instead of lengthened as this law has done) and a system of checks and balances must be put in place to hamstring their abuse of power. This is Big Government at its worst and is not good for Americans or the American way of life.