This has happened sooner than I thought it would. Brand-new candidate Rick Perry has begun the task of demonstrating to the voting public the nature of the very clear choice available to them in the 2012 elections:
We're calling today on the President of the United States to put a moratorium on regulations across this country. Because his regulations, his EPA [rules], [they're] killing jobs all across America.
(The brackets are my best guess where I couldn't understand exactly what he was saying, despite watching the brief clip about six times. And googling the quote didn't get me any results.)
This is a great opportunity for the White House to respond in a way that continues the work of clarifying the electoral choice.
Given the noises the President has made in the past about how there are some good regulations and there are some bad regulations, I'm not overly optimistic that he will in fact highlight that choice. However, he does seem to be in the process of executing yet another "pivot," toward a more aggressive stance against "Congress" (which I continue to hope will eventually become an aggressive stance against the Republicans in Congress). So maybe he will take advantage of the opportunity to educate Americans about the value of regulations.
I wish someone would make the point that every time there is a mine disaster, or an oil spill, or a refinery explosion, the response of the corporate overlords is always "But we weren't doing anything illegal, so you can't blame us." The only boundary these soulless behemoths recognize on their actions (and they recognize it only sporadically and when they can't get away with ignoring it) is the boundary imposed by the law.
Given the fact that we already have thousands of "job-killing" regulations, and that hasn't stopped them from behaving in monstrous ways, just imagine what their behavior would be like if we freed them from the tyranny of all those regulations.
Please, Mr. President, please: Let's have this national conversation.