Out of commission:
Baruch, Jeremiah
Washington report OUT OF COMMISSION MR. WATT IS NOT ALONE "WE have EVERY kind of mix you can have," he said, "... a black. .. a woman, two Jews, and a cripple. And we have talent." Yes, Interior...
...House Speaker O'Neill, Senate Majority Leader Baker, and President Reagan each named five members to the panel...
...Baker concluded, "I feel that it is an important new approach that is gaining prominence . . . and may offer great promise for trying to diffuse some of the terribly sensitive political issues that sometimes virtually immobilize government from a decision-making standpoint...
...A question may arise in your mind for Mr...
...He goes on for quite a while but fails to mention the handicapped...
...The Coal Leasing Commission hopes to report as early as this December, certainly not enough time for original studies...
...The Coal Leasing Commission was mandated by Congress, which contended that Mr...
...political pressures have been building for commissions to be established on Medicare and on the deficit...
...Watt was leasing millions of acres of western federal lands for coal mining much too quickly for much too low a price...
...Given the increasing calls for a bi-partisan vehicle to handle these and many other issues, what kind of sensitive political issues will be left for our representatives elected through the normal process of party contests...
...Reagan skillfully drew together a commission representing a cross-section of the national security establishment that has dominated this country's arms policy during the Nixon, Ford, and Carter administrations...
...What the Commission contributes is that the issue is seen to be dealt with...
...Baker: is there a limit to the number of sensitive issues that are seen to be immobilizing government decisions...
...of something that may be terribly important politically in this country...
...Privacy Protection Study Commission...
...On the day the members of the Commission on Central America were announced labor leader, minority representatives, businessman, and all a colloquy unfolded on the Senate floor between Minority Leader Robert Byrd and Majority Leader Howard Baker...
...The groundwork for the necessary legislative majorities had been laid by the time the commission's recommendations were submitted to the president on April 8.The Reagan administration shows no embarrassment in complimenting itself by imitation one of the more obvious examples being the creation of the National Bipartisan Commission on Central America...
...Mr...
...This is an upfront bipartisan appeal that had been led by Democrat Henry Jackson of Washington (whose stature and integrity will be sorely missed in the nation's capital) and Republican Charles Mathias of Maryland in the Senate, and by Democrat Michael Barnes of Maryland a leading critic of the administration's policy and Republican Jack Kemp of New York in the House...
...four former secretaries of defense, two former secretaries of state, and three former directors of the CIA...
...Linowes also has authored a study of his experience from 1975to 1977 as Chairman of the U.S...
...Aware of polls showing a decline in voter confidence in its Central American policy, the administration has struck upon the coalition-building potential of a prominent commission as its best recourse...
...He most recently served as Chairman of the Commission on Fiscal Accountability of the Nation's Energy Resources, which reported its findings in January 1982...
...Senator Byrd stated that he was "becoming a little disturbed by the trend toward what I shall call government by commission...
...It is something that we have to follow as it evolves and develops.'' After raising such pointed questions about the role of an extra-governmental group and its relationship to our constitutional structures and leaving them unanswered Mr...
...Forming a common front, and facing the precipice of the system's bankruptcy, the president and the leadership of both houses set in place the Commission's delicately balanced plank of recommendations which Congress, with the reluctance of some and the gratitude of most, crossed over...
...The chairman of the Coal Leasing Commission, David F. Linowes so gracefully designated by Mr...
...Strange as it seems, and not unlike the situation for other policy areas, the Interior Department is no longer perceived to be dedicated to the common interest...
...The recent commissions on Social Security and on the MX provide textbook examples of how commissions can be used to build a national consensus...
...One of its observations is acutely relevant to Mr...
...He expressed his concern that commission reports were being presented in such a way that the Senate was being locked into decisions made by the commissions...
...The legitimizing role of commissions is coming to take precedence over their fact-finding role...
...Popper notes further that "this iron law of presidential appointment exemplifies . . . [how] representatives of major sectors of American society participate, collectively, in arriving at consensus on policy...
...Their recommendations, not surprisingly, won the endorsement of three former presidents...
...The Interior Secretary would be required to follow any commission recommendations for changes in the coal leasing programs that were approved by Congress...
...Baker replied that he did not share Mr...
...Ironically, Prof...
...Watt as a representative of the Jewish faith also happens to be a University of Illinois Professor of Political Economy and personifies the high-powered and versatile academician frequently called upon to participate in governmental commissions...
...The Commission members and staff must rely on existing research...
...This study is one of several interesting essays in the May/June issue of the American Behavioral Scientist (yes, Virginia, that journal can have interesting issues) which is devoted to a better understanding of governmental commissions their use of research and their role in policy-making...
...This formidable policy consensus linked a limited MX deployment with new arms-control initiatives and was crafted through continuous negotiations and bargaining with Democratic congressional defense specialists, such as Representatives Les Aspin of Wisconsin and Albert Gore, Jr...
...Watt, and to the entire Reagan administration: namely, that commissions have come to be increasingly more important for how policy is decided than for what is decided...
...The appointment of Henry Kissinger as chairman was frankly characterized by a White House official as a "high visibility" move...
...industrial competitiveness...
...The National Commission on Social Security Reform was created with the participation of the major actors necessary to build a working consensus...
...A commission has just been formed on U.S...
...Yes, Interior Secretary James Watt's endearing words for his newly appointed Commission on Federal Coal Leasing have come to be familiar to all "liberals and Americans" (another current Wattage...
...Jeremiah baruch (Jeremiah Baruch is the pseudonym of a Washington writer with a position in government...
...of Tennessee and Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia...
...The Commission on Strategic Forces, chaired by former National Security Council Chief, General Brent Scowcroft, was established by President Reagan when his unrelenting MX advocacy had seriously eroded the traditional national consensus on defense strategy...
...The conspicuous addition of "bipartisan" already indicates a little straining...
...Policies formulated in its recesses are held suspect of special-interest domination (currently to the coal and oil companies, and previously to the environmentalists...
...Part of that visibility lies in conveying a sense of full participation of interests as well as commitment to the common interest...
...Byrd's concern about commissions: "As a matter of fact, I think we are seeing a genesis...
...Again and again we are told if we do not accept this little strand or that little strand of a commission . . . the whole thing might become unraveled...
...Hence, in his Twentieth Century Fund study of presidential commissions, Frank Popper hauntingly echoes James Watt in suggesting that every person appointed represents a constituency: "A commission generally includes at least one businessman, labor leader, lawyer, educator, editor,„ farmer, woman, Negro, Protestant, Catholic, Jew...
...To be effective today, a governmental commission must provide adequate visibility for the policy area under study...
Vol. 110 • October 1983 • No. 18
