Bannon Admits Trump's Cabinet Nominees Selected to Destroy Their Agencies
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/2/23/1637009/-Bannon-Reveals-His-Intention-To-Deconstruct-The-Administrative-State-i-e-Destroy-The-CountryBy Dartagnan at dKos
At CPAC today Stephen Bannon, the Chief Advisor and intellectual heft behind the Twittering infant that sits in the Oval Office, provided a little glimpse of the future he has planned for all of us.
In the clearest explanation for why nearly all of Trump’s cabinet choices are known mostly for despising and attacking the very Federal agencies they’ve been designated to lead, Bannon explained—in very clear language--that they weren't appointed to lead these agencies, but to destroy them:
Atop Trump’s agenda, Bannon said, was the “deconstruction of the administrative state” — meaning a system of taxes, regulations and trade pacts that the president and his advisers believe stymie economic growth and infringe upon one’s sovereignty.
“If you look at these Cabinet nominees, they were selected for a reason, and that is deconstruction,” Bannon said. He posited that Trump’s announcement withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership was “one of the most pivotal moments in modern American history.”
The wholesale elimination of Federal agencies that ensure we receive such things as clean air, clean water, fair labor laws, fair housing standards, anti-discrimination laws, financial regulations, food and drug safety, national education standards and the like, has been a goal of far right “thinkers" for decades. The rationale, propagated by corporate and industry-funded think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation, has always been that that the existence of these “unelected" agencies represents a mortal threat to American “sovereignty and self-government." This is exactly the line Bannon was peddling at CPAC today. It is delusional, right-wing garbage.
The reality is that these extensions of the Executive Branch—the Department of Labor, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Education, for example-- exist to serve the interests of all the American people, performing the painstaking and complex task of regulating the very things that make all Americans’ lives worth living. They perform this function because history has clearly shown that neither the Congress nor the states are remotely up to the task of doing it. They have neither the time, the expertise, the manpower, or the ability to handle such mammoth responsibilities in a country of 330 million people.
SNIP> more at link
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if "interstate commerce" is involved (i.e., the broad term for anything that "crosses state or U.S. international borders"
then it is generally handled by the feds (Executive Branch agencies that are created (by law) and funded (via appropriations) by Congress and managed by the President).
So (generically) if someone manufactures something that is only sold in that state, then the state regulates it.
However there are certain exceptions (e.g., if parts for the previously-mentioned manufactured product came across the state line despite the finished product only manufactured and sold in that state) and practices that may impact many states simultaneously, then in those cases, Congress often makes a decision (law) to "federalize" these cases. You saw that with the speed limit and drinking age and things like "public accommodations". The law will then designate which agencies have jurisdiction (in some cases, it may be multiple ones).
The existence and "power" of the Federal government is described and promulgated right there in the Constitution and if GrimReaper™ continues on his path of stupidity, his decisions will be taken to the Supreme Court to argue what the federal government is SUPPOSED do based on the Constitution, NOT based on some fantasy of recreating a new type of U.S. government that is anti-Constitutional or extra-Constitutional.
At present, they are trying to strip some of the regulations (the "how to go about doing the agency's job" instructions - i.e., the steps that are required to carry out a law that Congress passed and the President signed), but then this is often done by people who have no sense or desire to look up the history behind a regulation. In most cases, the regulation was put there after some catastrophic event or after a multitude of smaller but impactful events that needed federal intervention to resolve.
This is just the beginning. The republicans will do more damage to America than Isis or Boko Harem ever could dream of. 
