Political Appointees to Supervise Regulations

President Bush issued a new rule mandating the presence of a political appointee to supervise the regulatory decisionmaking in federal agencies:

Within 60 days of the date of this Executive order, each agency head
shall designate one of the agency’s Presidential Appointees to be its
Regulatory Policy Officer, advise OMB of such designation, and annually
update OMB on the status of this designation.’

It additionally requires agencies to make an annual aggregate cost/benefit analysis of all new regulations, rather than only evaluating each regulation separately.

The Times story suggests that the White House is in particular aiming at EPA and OSHA, but the effects will presumably be felt elsewhere.