COMPETITIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE

VOL. 29, NO. 2 | SPRING 2016

FEATURED ARTICLES

The Environmentalist Campaign

to Punish Free Speech
4 BY SAM KAZMAN AND KENT LASSMAN
FRED L. SMITH, JR.

W
Three Decades On, CEIs Fight for ith seven state attorneys general and
Economic Freedom Continues Al Gore sharing a New York City
stage, there was no doubt about it: It was
show time for a whodunit. The crime being
investigated? Dissent.
The March 29 news conference
unveiled, according to New York Attorney

6 General Eric T. Schneiderman, an

unprecedented coalition to fight not only
climate change but also allegedly deceptive
ANGELA LOGOMASINI speech about climate change. The group,
which dubbed itself AGs United for Clean
Outdated Science and Alarmism
Power, promised to use all the tools at our
Drives Flame Retardant Debate disposal to battle for progress on the most
consequential issue of our time.
Schneiderman was blunt about his goal
of shutting down debate: You have to tell
the truth. You cant make misrepresentations

11 of the kinds weve seen here.

This isnt a law-and-order drama.
Its politics clothed in messianic garb,
IAIN MURRAY and its primary tools are censorship and
intimidation.
Lets Stop Making Air
Travel Security Worse The AGs are following a familiar script
here: target an unpopular, deep-pocketed
business, harass that business potential
allies with overly broad investigations,
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE
run roughshod over the targets First
Amendment protections, and settle once
Dodd-Frank Is Hurting Those Who Had the politically weakened company tires of
Nothing to Do With the Financial Crisis, fighting the endless resources of the state.
by John Berlau. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 ExxonMobil was singled out by name
Banning Cars from Urban Centers: at the news conference, but the coalition
Costly Policy with Few Benefits appears to be following the script perfectly.
by Marc Scribner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Now its on to the fishing-expedition stage.
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. . . . . . 14 On April 7, the Competitive Enterprise
Institute was subpoenaed by coalition
Media Mentions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
member and U.S. Virgin Islands Attorney
End Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
General Claude Walker for all CEI material
on climate change and energy policy,
as well as information on our supporters,
over 10 years beginning in 1997. The
subpoenas purported focus is on our
contacts with ExxonMobil, a former CEI
donor that publicly ended its support for
us after 2005. Nonetheless, the subpoena
calls for practically all of our material on
climate change and energy policy, as well
as information on any donors who directly
or indirectly supported that work.
Thats one hell of a burden to slap
on a nonprofit. The coalitions purported
justification is that the risks of global
warming are so important and the scientific
basis for them so settled that disputing them
(continued on page 3)
 Leading CEI into a New Era
by Kent Lassman
S ince its humble beginnings 32 years ago, the
Competitive Enterprise Institute has grown into a
leading pro-market voice in debates about economic
policy and regulations that shape peoples lives
and livelihoods. For that reason, I am honored to
be entrusted with its leadership. As it has since its
founding, CEI will continue to promote the cause
FROM THE PRESIDENT
of liberty and fight against government barriers to
economic freedom.
One of the greatest threats to that freedom in
America is the overreaching administrative state,
which has grown unabated, regardless of which
party has controlled the White House. We will
continue to expose how government overregulation
impedes and displaces personal enterprise and
economic growth, and show how private alternatives
do more to provide individual choices and better
results for all.
We see the runaway power of the executive
branch in President Obamas signing of the Paris
climate treaty, which threatens to make energy
more expensive for all Americans. We also see it in
federal labor regulators unilaterally imposing new
overtime and joint employer mandates on American
businesses large and small. These examples merely
hint at the scope of the problem.
CEI has put forward a series of reforms to restore
and strengthen some crucial checks and balances,
working with policy makers to implement realistic
solutions. Just this year, the chairman of the House
Budget Committee included a proposal for a
regulatory budget, which CEI has long advocated,
in his budget plan. Thats a big deal. And we, along
Publisher
Kent Lassman
Editor
Marc Scribner
Editorial Director
Ph (202) 331-1010
Ivan G. Osorio
Fax (202) 331-0640
info@cei.org Contributing Editor
Keara Vickers
ISSN#: 1086-3036
2 CEI.ORG
with our allies, are doing what we can to keep that
as part of the final budget that passes Congress.
Also, as you may have heard, CEI was recently
presented with a subpoena from the U.S. Virgin
Islands attorney general for information regarding
our work on climate policy, as part of a fishing
expedition to stifle ideas at odds with the official
consensus. As with any such challenges, we
hold that the best defense is a good offense. We
have launched a counteroffensive, challenging
the subpoena in court, and we are confident we
will ultimately prevail. The state attorneys general
who are waging this political attack are targeting
an unpopular, deep-pocketed business, harassing
potential allies with overly broad investigations,
running roughshod over First Amendment
protections, and hoping the company caves and
pays the ransom. That sort of government-led assault
cannot be allowed to succeed. Already, prominent
opinion leaders have spoken out against this attack,
including George Will and the editorial boards of
The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times.
Its an honor to be entrusted with the leadership
of a vital organization like CEI. Under the leadership
of Fred L. Smith, Jr. and then Lawson Bader, CEI has
gone a long way toward a more reasonable policy
debate, in Washington and beyond. Yet, for its many
victories, there are more challenges ahead. We have
our work cut out for us. I am eager to take on that
challenge.
The CEI Planet is produced by the Competitive Enterprise
Institute, a pro-market public interest group dedicated to
free enterprise and limited government.
CEI is a non-partisan, non-profit organization incorporated in the
District of Columbia and is classified by the IRS as a 501 (c)(3)
charity. CEI relies upon contributions from foundations, corporations
and individuals for its support. Articles may be reprinted provided
they are attributed to CEI.
COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
 AGs, continued
constitutes fraud. But the AGs rhetoric is blissfully oblivious to the First
Amendment.
Court rulings make it clear that broad subpoenas aimed at restricting
speech, especially in the context of policy debates, are invalid. Time and
again, the Supreme Court has held that the remedy for unwanted speech
is more speech in response. The chief law-enforcement officers of several
states should know better, but their reaction to a dissenting policy position is
punitive, coercive, and unconstitutional.
As for breaching donor confidentiality, the obvious aims here are
intimidation and to limit future use of the constitutionally protected right of
anonymous donation. In 1958, in NAACP v. Patterson, the Supreme Court

R.M.
held that such attempts were illegal under the First Amendments right of
association.
You might think that if the law is that clear, we have nothing to worry
about. But fighting a subpoena is incredibly costly and time-consuming,
especially when the attorneys general behind them have promised to use all
FREEDMAN
the tools at their disposal, courtesy of their states taxpayers.
Regardless of where you stand on global warming policy, the notion of a
SOCI ET Y
multi-state campaign to end the debate ought to make you worry. After all,
there are many science-driven policy debates out there, on topics ranging
from genetically modified food to population control. It is not as if the Help the Competitive
government has a sterling reputation when it comes to science. From Galileo
to todays food plate, we know government politicizes science. It ought not
Enterprise Institute
to punish dissent, too. carry on its work for
generations by joining the
Kent Lassman (kent.lassman@cei.org) is President and CEO and Sam Kazman
R.M. Freedman society.
(sam.kazman@cei.org) is General Counsel of CEI. A version of this article origi-
nally appeared in The Washington Post. In 2013, CEI established the R.M. Freedman
Society in honor of Robert M. Freedman,
a business owner from West Bloomfield,
Michigan, who placed CEI in his estate

Stand with CEI

and, in 2009, sadly passed on and gave
CEI its first legacy gift. We named the
society in appreciation of his generosity.

for Free Speech Many of CEIs extended family choose to

include CEI in their estate plans through:
Bequests,
Twenty state attorneys general have formed a coalition
called AGs United for Clean Power. Their real purpose is Charitable Remainder Trusts,
to silence debate on the issue of climate change by using Charitable Lead Trusts, or as a
their prosecutorial power to criminalize dissent.
Life insurance beneficiary.
The Competitive Enterprise Institute recently received a subpoena
to that effect, demanding a decades worth of documents,
including private communications containing donor information. If you make the decision to include CEI in
your estate plans, please reach out and let
us know.
We will not let this stand. We will fight back.
We need your help to succeed. While these sorts of decisions should be
undertaken with the help of an estate
To learn more and help us defend free speech, please planner, Lauren Avey and Al Canata of
contact Coley Jackson at coley.jackson@cei.org. CEI can be a resource to you. You can
reach them anytime at 202-331-1010.

COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE C E I . O R G 3

 Three Decades On, CEIs Fight for
Economic Freedom Continues
BY FRED L. SMITH, JR.
T he growth in government has
many causes, but a key factor
has been the Traison de Clerics
the phenomenon of an intellectual
class realizing its power potential
and exercising it to take control of
the state and expand its reach. In
America, this took the shape of the
Progressive movement. When our best
and brightest abandoned Americas
constitutional and cultural restraints
on centralization, they began on the
path to socialism on the left and crony
corporatism on the right.
I launched the Competitive
Enterprise Institute 32 years ago to
address this challenge, seeing promise
in an activist approach to policy
reform. Our goal was a vertically
integrated approach to policy reform,
to move beyond the traditional think
tank model and aggressively market
our ideas to the media, policy makers,
and the general public; build alliances
to gain support; and make our case
in the appropriate arena, whether in
Congress, the agencies, or the courts.
And when appropriate, we add humor
to make that case. Weve implemented
that plan well.
That required moving from the
academic work of policy analysis to a
more practical understanding of why,
so often, bad policies have such strong
support. On environmental issues, we
took on Superfund, a major green
pork barrel boondoggle, making the
case that contracts are a more efficient
and cost-effective means to satisfy
concerns about waste sites. In the labor
policy area, we took on comparable
worth legislation, distributing thou-
sands of My Worth is Incomparable!
buttons at protest rallies.
4 CEI.ORG
We brought public attention to the
perverse moral hazard associated with
federal banking policy. My Daddy
used to say that banks would loan you
money if you could prove you didnt
need it. We noted that Fannie and
Freddie would grant you a mortgage
if you couldnt repay it. We reframed
the debate over federal auto fuel
efficiency standards, showing that
forcing smaller cars on the driving
public led to more traffic deathsin
effect, death by regulation.
In brief, CEI became the
go-to group for regulatory reform
from antitrust to FDA regulation.
Wayne Crews has brought public
attention to the scale and costs of
the regulatory administrative state
through his publication, Ten Thousand
Commandments, an annual survey of
the federal regulatory state.
In effect, weve functioned as a
Battered Business Bureau, reaching out
to entrepreneurs suffering under unwise
rules. For years, the left has been
very effective at forming rent-seeking
alliances that enhance their ability to
advance interventionist policies, while
their economic partners gain political
privileges. Our business outreach
sought to meet that challenge head-on.
I became a student of business in
the political sphere, recognizing that
many factors that led business leaders
to seek to appease their critics. The
challenge was clear: capitalism was
unlikely to survive if capitalists werent
enlisted in its defense. How might the
competitive business sector be enlisted
in the liberty struggle? In my 1989 CEI
dinner talk, I made points that are now
at the heart of the efforts of the Center
for Advancing Capitalism, which I now
lead.
Businesss message may be good
but it remains a suspect messenger.
Business needs credible, independent
alliesand the free market movement
needs the economic and informational
support that only business can
provide, I noted. Convincing
business that supporting our groups is
in its long term interest remains a key
tasks for CEI.
CEI has grown greatly over the last
three decades, fighting new battles as
the scope and scale of government
intervention in the economy has
continued to increase. Much of the
time, CEI plays a blocking role,
which is valuable in itself. Yet, while
government still grew steadily, we
have remained hopeful, recalling the
late Herbert Steins famous comment:
If something cannot go on forever, it
will stop.
Our current administrative state
cannot go on forever. We can find
our way back to a government limited
in scope and scale. That was the
dream of our Founders. It undergirds
our Constitution, the great document
that checked Leviathan for our first
century. Twentieth century Progressives
dismantled many of those constraints,
in the hopes of achieving heaven
on earth. Their utopian vision has
become dystopic, but it still exercises
great power in politics. CEI works
continuously to restore legitimacy to
limited government again. Its a long
and difficult struggle, but one that still
motivates me and CEIs staff.
Fred L. Smith, Jr. (fred.smith@cei.org) is
Founder of CEI and Director of CEIs
Center for Advancing Capitalism. A
version of this article originally appeared
in Forbes.
COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
 Dodd-Frank Is Hurting Those Who Had
Nothing to Do With the Financial Crisis
BY JOHN BERLAU
T he Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform
and Consumer Protection Act
has done too little to address the
real causes of the financial crisis
and too much to add red tape that
hamstrings consumers, investors, and
entrepreneurs who had nothing to do
with it.
Indeed, some provisions of the law
have virtually nothing to do with ensur-
ing financial stability. Take Section
1502, the conflict minerals provi-
sion. This requires public companies
to disclose in their annual reports any
use of five mineralsincluding gold,
tin, and tungstenthat may have
been sourced from the conflict zones
of the Democratic Republic of Congo
and adjoining countries. Although this
provision concerns a serious moral and
geopolitical issue, no one can plausi-
bly claim it would help avert the next
financial crisis.
Moreover, shoehorning the conflict
minerals provision into a bank bill and
placing enforcement into the hands of
a governmental entitythe Securities
and Exchange Commissionthat lacks
foreign policy expertise has hurt the
very people it was intended to help.
As journalist David Aronson wrote in
The New York Times, since manufactur-
ers often cant be sure of the sources
of their materials, many now avoid
the Congo region altogether.
According to Aronson, this
created a de facto embargo
on the minerals mined in the
region that impoverished
poor villagers and made war-
lords more powerful.
Meanwhile, left untouched
by Dodd-Frank are the gov-
ernment-sponsored enterprises
Fannie Mae and Freddie
Mac. While there is debate on
whether these entitieswhich
have implicit taxpayer back-
ing and purchase mortgages dramatically.
from bankswere a principal
cause of the financial crisis,
there is widespread agreement
that they at least played a significant
role. The 2010 majority report of the
Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission
called Fannie and Freddie the kings
of leverage in the years leading up to
the crisis.
Yet Dodd-Frank does nothing to
shore up Fannie and Freddies capital
requirements and contains a host of
exemptions for them in its new mort-
gage rules. And Fannie and Freddie
backed roughly 60 percent of new
mortgages from 2008 to 2013, leaving
taxpayers holding the bag.
Almost six years on since Dodd-
Franks passage, big banks continue
to dominate, while community banks
loss of market share has accelerated
dramatically.
Almost six years on
since Dodd-Franks
passage, big banks
continue to dominate,
while community
banks loss of market
share has accelerated
Though Dodd-Frank may not be
solely to blame for this decline, com-
munity banks and credit unions have
become increasingly vocal about the
costs of compliance, which are much
more easily absorbed by large banks
that can hire armies of attorneys,
accountants, and information technol-
ogy specialists.
Dodd-Frank should be changed
so it does more to prevent the next
financial crisis and less to harm
innocent investors, entrepreneurs, and
consumers.
John Berlau (john.berlau@cei.org) is a
Senior Fellow at CEI. A version of this
article appeared at The New York Times
Room for Debate.

I, Whiskey: The Movie

Coming Soon from CEI

COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE C E I . O R G 5

 Outdated Science and Alarmism Drive
Flame Retardant Debate
BY ANGELA LOGOMASINI
L earning from history should keep
us from repeating our mistakes.
Yet when it comes to environmental
politics, the opposite seems to be true.
History and improved scientific under-
standing fail to inform, while alarmism
and irrational fears drive policy.
The current debate related to
flame retardant chemicals is a prime
example. Environmental activist
groups have petitioned the Consumer
Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to
ban an entire class of flame retardant
chemicals called organohalogens,
with a decision expected this year.
Yet, the scientific justification for such
bans has long been invalidated.
The debate about flame retardants
began back in the early 1970s, with
the emergence of the environmental
movement and newfound fears that
synthetic chemicals posed significant
cancer risks. Even the now world-
renowned scientist Bruce Ameswho
later proved these fears unfounded
once expressed concerns that trace
synthetic chemicals were a significant
cause of cancer.
I didnt want to put my kids in
these pajamas [which were treated
with chemical flame retardants], so we
bought their pajamas in Europe when
we were there, he recalls in a 2014
interview. In 1977, Ames and Arlene
Blum published an article in Science
that advocated banning of tris(2,3-
dibromopropyl)phosphate, commonly
known as tris, for use in pajamas. At
the time, tris was applied to sleepwear
in order to meet federal flammability
standards set by CPSC.
That same year, CPSC banned
the use of tris in sleepwear, even as
6 CEI.ORG
it admitted in the Federal
Register that it had no
conclusive data that
establish TRIS has caused
cancer in humans. CPSC
banned the chemical
solely because it caused
tumors in rodents exposed
to very high levels. At the
time, scientists believed
that was enough to
demonstrate cancer risk in
humans. After all, CPSC
noted, all known human
carcinogens have been
shown to be carcinogenic in labora-
tory animals.
However, Ames did not continue
to advocate bans. Instead, he and his
Even the now world-
colleague Lois Swirsky Gold decided
to critically evaluate the prevailing
renowned scientist
wisdom about rodent tests. Ironically,
within a decade, Amess research
Bruce Ameswho
thoroughly debunked claims that such
trace chemicals pose a significant
later proved these
cancer risk, which invalidated his
own fears about tris.
fears unfounded
Ames and Gold found that it
wasnt the chemicals themselves that
once expressed
caused cancer in rodents, but the
high doses. High doses can cause
concerns that trace
chronic wounding of tissues, cell
death, and consequent chronic cell
synthetic chemicals
division of neighboring cells, which
is a risk factor for cancer, Ames and
were a significant
Gold explained in a 1997 research
article.
cause of cancer.
In fact, Ames and Gold found that
these tests caused tumors in rodents Yet the facts dont seem to matter
even when the chemical tested were much in this debate. Even today, faulty
naturally occurring chemicals found in rodent tests are being used as the basis
many healthy foods, such as apples, for banning flame retardant chemicals.
carrots, and other fruits and veggies. Consider the evolution of policy
They concluded: There is no convinc- regarding three Polybrominated
ing evidence that synthetic chemical Diphenyl Ethers (PBDEs) flame
pollutants are important as a cause of retardants: penta-BDE (used for foam
human cancer.
COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
 furniture) and octa-BDE (used in
plastics for business equipment),
and deca-BDE (used in electron-
ics such as television sets). These
chemicals are not dangerous
when used in consumer products.
Activists are targeting them for the
same faulty reason they targeted
tristhey are rodent carcinogens.
But again, so are chemicals that
are naturally found in carrots,
apples, and plums.
Green activists have been able
to generate enough scary head-
lines to press manufacturers to vol-
untarily phase out these chemicals.
The Chemtura Corporation (then called
Great Lakes Chemical Corporation)
was among the first, deciding in 2004
to phase out penta-BDE and octa-BDE.
The EPA took this opportunity to
essentially ban these chemicals with-
out any scientific justification. As the
only U.S. manufacturer of these two
chemicals, Chemtura eliminated the
only legal domestic uses. The agency
then quickly issued a rule that bars
any new significant uses without first
gaining EPA approval under the Toxic
Substances Control Act (TSCA).
The EPA admits it had no health risk
justification for its action. EPA has not
concluded that PBDEs pose an unrea-
sonable risk to human health or the
environment, the agency explained
Learn more at RealClearRadio.org.
COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
Old and faulty
science coupled
with activist-
generated fear is
driving this debate.
on its website. However, due to
growing concerns, EPA believes that
the phase out and the regulatory
action taken in this announcement are
useful steps to minimize and ultimately
help prevent further exposure to these
chemicals. As a result, these chemi-
cals are now effectively banned.
In 2009, the EPA pressured
two U.S. producers (Chemtura and
Albemarle) and one importer (Israels
ICL Industrial Products) of deca-BDE
to voluntarily phase it out as well,
ending production and importation
by 2013.
Now activistsincluding Arlene
Blum, who unlike her 1977 co-author
Bruce Ames continues to believe that
if its carcinogenic in rats it should
be banned in humanswant to ban
potential replacement products for the
C E I . O R G 7
Molecular structure of
flame retardant TRIS
PBDEs, petitioning CPSC to ban all
organohalogen flame retardants with-
out any real scientific justification.
And there you have it: Old and
faulty science coupled with activist-
generated fear is driving this debate.
Banning flame retardants simply
because they may kill rats in labs is
absurd, given the fact that fires actu-
ally kill people in their homes. If we
continue to eliminate flame retardants,
we can expect that fires will burn
hotter and move faster, and more
people will die as a result.
Angela Logomasini (angela.logomasini@
cei.org) is a senior fellow at CEI. A ver-
sion of this article originally appeared in
Science 2.0
Realclear Radio offers listeners a
fresh perspective on political and
social issues of the day through
informative interviews and dis-
cussions. Brought to you by the
Competitive Enterprise Institute
and RealClearPolitics, and hosted
by CEI Fellow Bill Frezza.
 A Night in Casablanca
C E I S A N N UA L D I N N E R A N D R E C E P T I O N
THUR SDAY, JUNE 2, 2016 JW MARRIOTT WASHINGTON, D.C.
1331 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE, NW
Register online at CEI.org/CEIDinner
KEYNOTE
ADDRESS
STEVE FORBES
CHAIRMAN AND
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF OF
FORBES MEDIA
Steve Forbes is Chairman
and Editor-in-Chief of Forbes
Media. Forbes Magazine is the nations leading busi-
ness magazine with a circulation of more than
900,000. Combined with Forbes Asia, Forbes Europe,
and the companys licensee editions, Forbes Magazine
reaches a worldwide audience of more than 5 million
readers. Forbes.com is one of the worlds most influ-
ential websites, with more than 60 million unique
visitors each month.
In 1996 and 2000, Forbes campaigned for the Repub-
lican presidential nomination. A flat tax, medical
savings accounts, a new Social Security system for
working Americans, parental choice of schools for
their children, term limits, and a strong national
defense were key to Forbess platform, and he contin-
ues to promote this agenda.
The author of several books, Forbes co-authored
Reviving America: How Repealing Obamacare, Replac-
ing the Tax Code and Reforming the Fed will Restore
Hope and Prosperity with Elizabeth Ames (McGraw-
Hill Professional), which was published in December
2015. He is the only writer to win the prestigious Crys-
tal Owl Award four times.
In 1985, President Reagan named Forbes Chairman of
the bipartisan Board for International Broadcasting
(BIB). He was reappointed to this post by President
George H. W. Bush and served until 1993.
 JULIAN
L. SIMON
MEMORIAL
AWARD
WINNER
DR. BRUCE YANDLE
DEAN EMERITUS, CLEMSON UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND BEHAVIORAL
SCIENCE
Bruce Yandle is Dean Emeritus of Clemson Univer-
sitys College of Business and Behavioral Science, a
Distinguished Adjunct Professor at the Mercatus
Center at George Mason University, and a Senior
Fellow Emeritus at the Property and Environment
Research Center. During his distinguished career, he
served as a senior White House economist during the
Ford Administration, Executive Director of the Fed-
eral Trade Commission during the Reagan Adminis-
tration, and as member and chairman of the South
Carolina State Board of Economic Advisors.
Yandle is best known for his Bootleggers and Bap-
tists theory of interest group lobbying. The theory,
which illuminates how strange-bedfellow alliances
promote shared political aims, is now standard in
political science and economic curricula.
Several of Yandles 17 books, and much of his schol-
arly research, examine how secure property rights
and enforced common law principles lead to better
environmental and natural resource protection than
regulatory restrictions. This work makes him an ideal
recipient of the Julian Simon Memorial Award.
Yandle received his AB degree from Mercer University,
and his MBA and PhD degrees from Georgia State
University. Prior to his academic career, he worked in
the industrial machinery business for 15 years.
MASTER OF
CEREMONIES
MARY KATHARINE
HAM
CNN POLITICAL
COMMENTATOR,
SENIOR EDITOR AT THE
FEDERALIST
Mary Katharine Ham is a CNN Political Commenta-
tor and a Senior Writer at The Federalist. During the
2016 presidential election cycle, she co-moderated a
GOP primary debate on ABC. Prior to joining CNN,
she was a weekly commentator on Fox News The
OReilly Factor. She is the co-author of End of Dis-
cussion: How the Lefts Outrage Industry Shuts Down
Debate, Manipulates Voters, and Makes America Less
Free (and Fun) and has written for HotAir, The Weekly
Standard, and The Daily Caller.
A fourth-generation journalist, she did a stint cov-
ering NASCAR, high school football, and her coun-
tys largest legumes before embracing new media
and heading to Washington, D.C. Her career goal
has been to discover the formula for talking about
politics without being a blowhard. She is a Twitter
enthusiast, and a mother of two who hiked Kiliman-
jaro on her honeymoon.
 Banning Cars from Urban Centers:
Costly Policy with Few Benefits
BY MARC SCRIBNER
T ake back our streets! is a common
refrain among urban activists. No,
theyre not talking about reducing
violent crime, as many of them reside
in affluent neighborhoods. What they
want to take city streets back from is
cars, which they see as a scourge that
lowers cities quality of life. But the
alternatives they propose are much
more costly and provide far fewer
benefits.
When mass transit use plummeted in
the 1970s, anti-car activists succeeded
in distorting government transportation
funding to greatly advantage transit
over highways. Today, even though
more than 90 percent of households
have cars, government spends 28
percent of total transportation funds on
transit, with most of that money coming
from state and federal fuel taxes, as
well as local property taxes.
Yet, despite this government gravy
train, transits market share is lower
than it was in 1980, at less than 2
percent of trips made nationwide. Even
when looking only at commuting trips,
where trains and buses do best, transit
accounts for less than 5 percent of the
market shareone-fifth of its share of
funding.
The myth that mass transit can serve
most people does more than just waste
taxpayer funds. Reducing access to
cars contributes to unemployment and
poverty. In the New York metropolitan
area, where 40 percent of all U.S.
transit trips occur and where one-third
of the residents take transit to work,
only 15 percent of jobs are accessible
by transit in less than an hour. In
contrast, New Yorkers with cars can
access more than five times as many
10 CEI.ORG
jobs in 60 minutes. New Yorkers
dependent on transit suffer from
the longest commutes in America
even longer than New York
drivers.
Closing some streets to auto
traffic can occasionally make
sense. New Yorks Times Square
pedestrian plaza is often touted
as a successful example. But
most cities are not New York and
the nations experiments with
converting streets to pedestrian
malls have mostly ended in failure.
When cities including Chicago,
Philadelphia, and Sacramento
tried this in the 1960s and 70s
in an attempt to revive their
downtowns, customers stopped
coming and businesses closed.
By the 2000s, nearly all these
cities had reopened their streets
to auto traffic. These cities attempted
to create small car-free zones, not the
car-free cities envisioned by activists.
Following their advice and closing off
most urban streets to auto traffic would
be a disaster.
Environmental activists claim
automobiles should be banned to curb
air pollution, but thats not quite right.
Yes, cars pollute, but they have become
far cleaner over the last few decades
and will be even cleaner still in the near
future as automakers achieve greater
fuel efficiency. And environmentalists
dont mention the polluting impact of
traffic congestion. Instead, they often
promote congestion and the resulting
driver misery as a way to deter driving.
Then there is the issue of traffic
safety. The traffic congestion and
low speeds in Americas downtowns
help keep serious car accidents rare
relative to the rest of the country. The
majority of road fatalities occur in rural
areas, where fewer than 20 percent of
The myth that mass
transit can serve
most people does
more than just waste
taxpayer funds.
Reducing access to
cars contributes to
unemployment and
poverty.
Americans live. The rest largely occur
in auto-oriented suburbs where most
Americans reside, not urban cores.
Attempting to seriously reduce auto
injuries and fatalities by banning cars in
the dense cities where crashes pose the
lowest risk is both an overreaction and
a misapprehension of the problem.
None of this means there arent
problems with cars in our major cities,
many arising from poor highway
planning in the 1950s and 60s.
Introducing congestion tolls and
market-rate parking are the places to
start. But 21st century problems will
not be solved by trying to return our
cities to the auto-free 19th century. We
should work to improve technology, not
outlaw it.
Marc Scribner (marc.scribner@cei.
org) is a Fellow at CEI. A version of this
article was syndicated by Tribune News
Service.
COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
 Lets Stop Making Air Travel Security Worse
BY IAIN MURRAY
E arlier this year, I planned a trip
to Berlin for mid-March. I initially
thought to tack on a couple of extra
days to conduct some business in
Brussels, but decided against it. Had
I not changed my mind, I probably
would have been checking into my
return flight when the airport bomb
went off. And the awful realization
of what could have happened to me
concentrated my thinking as a frequent
traveler on changes to airport security
since 9/11. In trying to secure planes,
we have made airports more of a
target, and in doing so have not made
travel safer.
Thats because the security aimed
at keeping terrorists off planes
concentrates large numbers of people
in security lines. As we learned in
Brussels, those lines are tempting
targets for terrorists seeking to inflict a
lot of casualties. This isnt the first time
airports have come under attack. In
2007, terrorists deliberately crashed a
jeep loaded with propane into the main
entrance of Glasgow International
Airport in Scotland, but it burst into
flames rather than explode. If your
aim is to kill large numbers of people,
a suicide attack on an international
departures hall is an easy way to do it.
As is well known, boarding a flight
is a lengthy business these days. Not
only are security lines long, lines to
COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
check baggage are often long as well.
The thing is, not every passenger poses
equal risk. In fact, the vast majority of
passengers pose no risk at all. Yet, as
we saw in Brussels, they are placed at
extra risk thanks to a one-size fits all
security mindset.
In fact, there is strong evidence
that extra wait times deter people
from flying at all and cause them to
choose to drive instead. Driving is much
more dangerous than flying, terrorist
atrocities notwithstanding. Nearly
1,600 people died the year after 9/11
because they chose to drive instead of
flying.
We might just regard this as a trade-
off of risks if we had firm knowledge
that the security procedures stopped
terrorist attacks. Yet, Americans
were outraged last year when an
internal investigation revealed that the
Transportation Security Administration
(TSA) failed 95 percent of tests
designed to see whether it would
stop weapons, explosives, or other
contraband getting through. Proposals
to move the screening area to the
terminal entrance merely move the
potential target, doing nothing to
increase security.
The TSAs reaction to its lapses was
predictable: tighten security by creating
longer lines, beginning the cycle all
over again. The agency would also
like to see more use of whole body
scanners, which evidence suggests
are ineffective, create longer lines as
people opt out, and cost taxpayers a
C E I . O R G 11
fortune. We learned recently that one
of its grand schemes to shorten lines
involved spending $1.4 million on
an iPad app that randomizes which
security line people should go toan
app so simple I could probably build it.
What America and the world
need is a genuine risk-based security
approach that focuses on finding
dangerous people rather than
dangerous objects. Most travelers
would go through security quickly. This
would include business travelers who
have pre-registered with a scheme like
TSA PreCheck (one of the good things
TSA has done), families with children
or elderly relatives who are also
very unlikely to pose a threat, tourist
groups, and other sets of people who
have clear mutual trust with low-risk
individuals.
People outside these categories
would have to suffer through a more
rigorous procedure like we have now
(or perhaps more so), but as their
numbers would be lessened, even
those lines would go faster.
The result of cutting lines in this way
would be happier travelers, less cost to
the public, and a less tempting target
to the worlds terrorists. As a frequent
flyer, all three of those things are
important to me and I hope to see them
implemented.
Iain Murray (iain.murray@cei.org) is Vice
President for Strategy at CEI. A version of
this article originally appeared on CapX.
 Center for Advancing Capitalism
Co-Hosts Conference with
University of Maryland
On March 10, CEIs Center for Advancing Capitalism (CAC)
partnered with the Ed Snider Center for Enterprise and Markets
at the University of Marylands Robert H. Smith School of
Business to host the New Intellectual Forum, a new initiative
aimed at creating an integrated alliance of business and
intellectual supporters to defend and promote capitalisms
contributions to economic and societal prosperity. CEI Founder
and CAC Director Fred Smith and CAC Program Manager
Richard Morrison participated in the panel. Joining them on
the panel were Andrew Sherman, Rajshree Agarwal, Rudolph
Lamone, and Christina Elson of the Ed Snider Center.

John Berlau at South by Southwest

On March 14, John Berlau addressed entrepreneurs attending
the South by Southwest technology and entertainment festival in
Austin, Texas. Berlau was interviewed by Richard Swart, scholar-
in-residence at the University of California-Berkeley and chief
strategy officer of NextGen Crowdfunding, which sponsored the
event. Berlau discussed how the Jumpstart Our Business Startups
Act has helped entrepreneurs by liberalizing some rules that held
back investment-based crowdfunding, but Congress still needs to
give much more freedom to investors and entrepreneurs. (Photo
by Sara Harris Photography)

William Yeatman Testifies in

Congress on EPA Regional Haze Rule
On March 23, CEIs William Yeatman testified before the
Environment Subcommittee, of the House Science, Space,
and Technology Committee, on the Environmental Protection
Agencys regional haze rule. As Yeatman noted, the Regional
Haze program is an aesthetic regulation that costs billions
but whose benefits are literally invisible. For example, it
would impose almost $375 million in compliance costs on
New Mexico utility ratepayers to achieve an imperceptible
visibility improvement. The program requires states to come
up with their own implementation plans. The EPA has imposed
Regional Haze implementation plans on states that have not
issued their own plans, including Oklahoma, New Mexico,
and North Dakota, over the staunch objections of state
officials. These plans imposed by the EPA will cost at least $5
billion more than the states plans.

12 CEI.ORG COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE

 Capitol Hill Briefing on Paris Climate
Agreement
On April 10, the Cooler Heads Coalition hosted a congressional staff
and media briefing on the Paris Climate Treaty and the Green Climate
Fund, featuring CEIs Chris Horner, Myron Ebell, and Marlo Lewis,
along with David Kreutzer of the Heritage Foundation. As the panelists
made clear, the recently concluded Paris Climate Agreement is clearly
a treaty, contrary to the Obama administrations claim. The agreement,
negotiated at the 21st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change in Paris, is self-renewing,
which means it could bind U.S. policy indefinitely. This is one reason
why, the panelists argue, it should be called a treaty and submitted to
the Senate for its review.

Marc Scribner Highlights Harmful Drone Regulations

In April, CEI Fellow Marc Scribner appeared on two panels on current
and forthcoming consumer and commercial drone regulations. The first,
hosted by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, featured a
discussion before congressional staff by Mercatus scholar Eli Dourado and
Scribner on the dangers of the precautionary principle approach to risk
and the unnecessary regulatory burdens created by the Federal Aviation
Administration. The second, hosted by the Heritage Foundation, featured
Scribner, along with a Maryland attorney suing the FAA over its recent
requirement that all hobby drones over 0.55 pounds be registered with
the agency. Scribner highlighted the absurdity of maintaining a federal
toy registry, as well as a dangerous new drone manufacturer certification
requirement buried in the Senates FAA reauthorization bill.

Iain Murray Joins the Free Market Road Show

CEI Vice President for Strategy Iain Murray was a featured speaker in
three cities in this years Free Market Road ShowBrussels; Jerusalem;
and Larnaca, Cyprus. Every year, the Free Market Road Show takes
liberty on the road with speakers from around the world to discuss free
market concepts in cities across Europe, from Edinburgh to Athens,
from Madrid to Talinn. This year, the Road Show toured from March 7
to May 27 through 45 capitals in Europe and the Caucasus. Murray
spoke alongside such luminaries as Professor Ben Powell, head of the
Free Market Institute at Texas Tech; John Fund of National Review, Syed
Kamall MEP, head of the European Conservatives and Reformists group in
the European Parliament; and Dr. Barbara Kolm of the Hayek Institute in
Vienna, who founded the Road Show. Murrays lectures covered financial
privacy, the sharing economy, and entrepreneurship; they are available
on the CEI website. For more on the Road Show, see:
http://freemarket-rs.com.

COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE C E I . O R G 13

 THE THE THE
GOOD BAD UGLY

Supreme Court CEI Receives, Fights

CEI Files Two Legal Deadlocks on Illegal Bullying
Challenges to Aviation Friedrichs Labor Union Subpoena from Virgin
Regulations Case Islands

In late April and early May,
CEI filed two federal lawsuits
challenging new regulations on
electronic cigarette use on airplanes
and the Transportation Security
Administrations body scanners.
On e-cigarettes, CEI accuses the
Department of Transportation of
illegally stretching the language
of the anti-smoking law to cover
e-cigarettes, which do not produce
harmful smoke. On the TSAs
body scanners, CEI alleges that
the agency failed to consider the
costs of security measures in terms
of deterred flyers, some of whom
will be injured and die by instead
driving on much more dangerous
roads. CEI argues both of the rules
should be vacated as arbitrary and
capricious under the Administrative
Procedure Act.
On March 29, the U.S. Supreme
Court announced a deadlock, 4 to
4 decision, in a major case involving
forced labor union dues, Friedrichs v.
California Teachers Association. With
the court gridlocked, government
unions will continue to take dues from
non-members, whether they like it
or not, said Iain Murray, CEI Vice
President for Strategy. Four justices
have voted against the free speech
rights of workers to prop up labor
union power. CEI Policy Analyst Trey
Kovacs urged state legislators to use
the tools at their disposal to protect
government workers rights. State
legislatures can take action to help
teachers, librarians, bus drivers, and
a whole host of other state and local
public employees, said Kovacs.
Lawmakers can implement specific
reforms to increase worker choice or
allow non-union members to
stop paying dues to a union they
do not want.
On April 7, CEI denounced a
subpoena from Attorney General
Claude E. Walker of the U.S. Virgin
Islands that attempts to unearth a
decade of CEIs materials and work on
climate change policy. This is the latest
effort in an intimidation campaign to
criminalize speech and research on
the climate debate, led by New York
Attorney General Eric Schneiderman
and former Vice President Al Gore.
CEI will vigorously fight to quash
this subpoena. It is an affront to our
First Amendment rights of free speech
and association for Attorney General
Walker to bring such intimidating
demands against a nonprofit group,
said CEI General Counsel Sam
Kazman. CEI served Walker with its
official response on April 20, detailing
23 legal objections and vowing a
fight if the subpoena was not
withdrawn. Your demand on CEI
is offensive, it is un-American, it is
unlawful, and it will not stand, CEI
wrote in a letter to Walker.

14 CEI.ORG COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE

 MediaMENTIONS
Policy Analyst Trey Kovacs
discusses the Supreme Court
deadlock in the Friedrichs case:
With a divided court, thousands
of public servants around the nation
must still financially assist a government
union that they disagree with, said Trey
Kovacs, an analyst with the Competitive
Enterprise Institute, a libertarian group.
Now it is up to state legislatures to pro-
vide public employees with the freedom
to choose whether or not to pay for
union representation.
MARCH 29, The New York Times
Reuters speaks with CEI Vice
President for Strategy Iain
Murray about the impact of
Justice Scalias passing on a
labor union case:
The death of Justice Scalia has
proved a disaster for public sector
workers who have their paychecks
raided by unions, said Iain Murray,
vice president for strategy at the
Competitive Enterprise Institute, a con-
servative think tank in Washington.
MARCH 30, Reuters
General Counsel Sam Kazman
explains why CEI is challenging
an out-of-control federal agency:
The judge pointed out that
[Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Chairman Richard] Cordrays five-year
term ends in 2018, meaning the next
president will have to leave him in place
for more than a year, even if the two
disagree on policy.
That fact, combined with the CFPBs
independence from the congressional
appropriations process, creates a
complete lack of accountability, which
should be fatal to the agency, says
Sam Kazman, general counsel for the
advocacy group Competitive Enterprise
Institute. The institute filed a brief sup-
porting [mortgage lender] PHH and is
itself challenging the CFPBs legitimacy
in a separate lawsuit.
APRIL 21, Bloomberg
COMPETIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
The Financial Times editorial
board denounces the global
warming witch hunt against CEI
and others:
The targets of the investigations,
Exxon, the Competitive Enterprise
Institute, a think-tank, and DCI Group,
a PR and lobbying firm, are being
pursued under various different laws,
but the common theme is that they are
suspected of having knowingly made
false statements that played down the
risks of climate change.
The legal basis for these actions
seems flimsy: Exxon has no operations
in the Virgin Islands. Beyond that, the
implications of the investigations for
free speech on public policy issues are
alarming. Everyone ought to be able
to take part in policy debates without
worrying that their opponents will be
able to use the law to go on fishing
expeditions through their private com-
munications, looking for embarrassing
tit-bits that can be used against them.
APRIL 25, The Financial Times
Congressional Quarterly profiles
new CEI President Kent Lassman:
Most dinners benefiting Washington
think tanks feel staid compared with the
Competitive Enterprise Institutes annual
gala. The libertarian group might treat
its supporters to e-cigarettes, free rides
on Uber, or T-shirts that sport the mes-
sage, Rachel was wrong, deriding the
famed conservationist, Rachael Carson.
This is a place where people have
fun, says the groups new president,
Kent Lassman, who joined April 6 from
the public relations outfit DCI Group.
The institute, which has been around
for more than three decades and oper-
ates on a $7 million annual budget,
does a lot more than put on its annual
dinner, though the shindig has helped
CEI cultivate its brand as a hub for free-
market policy and advocacy. Steering it
is now Lassmans job.
APRIL 25, CQ Magazine
C E I . O R G 15
The Wall Street
Journals edito-
rial board blasts
state AGs war on
skeptics:
Sometimes we
wonder if were still
living in the land of
the free. Witness
the subpoena from
Claude Walker, attorney general of
the U.S. Virgin Islands, demanding
that the Competitive Enterprise Institute
cough up a decade of emails and
policy work, as well as a list of private
donors.
Mr. Walker is frustrated that the
free-market think tank wont join the
modern church of climatology, so he
has joined the rapidly expanding club
of Democratic politicians and pros-
ecutors harassing dissenters
APRIL 30, The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal high-
lights the 2016 edition of Wayne
Crewss annual survey of the
federal regulatory state:
Fridays jobs report from the Labor
Department brought the latest reminder
that the U.S. economy isnt creating
opportunities like it used to. A separate
report released this week goes a long
way toward explaining why.
On Wednesday Wayne Crews
of the Competitive Enterprise Institute
rolled out his annual report card on
federal regulation, Ten Thousand
Commandments. Beltway rules are
now imposing $1.9 trillion of annual
costs on the U.S. economy. Thats the
same level as last year, but when
combined with on-the-books federal
spending, which is $3.9 trillion, the
feds are taking a record-setting bite out
of private commerce and wealth.
MAY 9, The Wall Street Journal

...END NOTES
New York Senate Proposes Criminalizing Machete
Possession
The nannies in the New York State Senate have found
another target of their tut-tutting: machetes. Legislation
passed in April would criminalize the procession of machetes
with a penalty of up to a year in jail. The vote was 54-5
and now awaits companion legislation from the Assembly.
The bill adds machetes to the list of deadly weapons in the
state to include switchblades, gravity and ballistic knives,
daggers, metal or plastic knuckles, and billy clubs and
blackjacks. This oversight is surprising given the common
knowledge that machetes have often been used as weapons
and are actually defined as such in Websters dictionary
Machetea large heavy knife used for cutting sugarcane
and underbrush and as a weapon, said state Sen. Tony
Avella, a Queens Democrat leading the charge to outlaw
the home and garden tool.
Mayor Charged with Stealing 111 Road Signs
State police say an upstate New York mayor illegally
provided his village with 111 road signs belonging to the
state Department of Transportation (DOT). Frank Moracco
was charged in April with official misconduct and petit
larceny. Investigators say Moracco works as a sign shop
foreman for the New York DOT. Hes accused of stealing the
signs and giving them to the Herkimer County, New York,
village of Frankfort. Village clerk Karlee Tamburro told The
Observer-Dispatch of Utica that Moracco will continue to
serve as mayor and the Mohawk Valley village isnt com-
menting on the charges and Moracco did not comment on
the charges.
16 CEI.ORG
Nonprofit Org.
U.S. Postage
PAID
Permit 425
Southern MD
Film Censors Literally Watch Paint Dry for 10 Hours
British filmmaker Charlie Lyne is well-known to contro-
versy and recently decided to exact some revenge on the
countrys film censors. The British Board of Film Classification
rates and classifies movies. But unlike the U.S., it is actually
illegal to screen or sell an unrated film and the Board has
veto power over all movie content. Even worse, the Board
forces filmmakers to pay for their censorship, with fees for
feature films often running more than $1,000. Lyne decided
to use crowdsourcing website Kickstarter to fund the most
boring movie ever made. As the price is based on the films
runtime, the more money Lyne raised, the longer his pro-
test film could be. Over a month, 686 backers offered up
$8,666 and the film, Paint Drying, is 607 minutes long.
TSA Pays $47,400 for Randomizer App that Chooses
Left or Right
Frequent travelers are aware of the two screening paths
at U.S. airports: very invasive general screening with body
scanners or less invasive PreCheck screening. Those who
havent enrolled in PreCheck are sometimes surprised to be
randomly directed to the quicker lines by TSA personnel.
PreCheck enrollees are sometimes surprised, and angered,
to be directed to general screening. Thats where the
Randomizer app comes in. The app randomly directs travel-
ers to go left or right, so fliers will not be able to figure out
how to get random checks. However, the Randomizer comes
at an astonishing cost. According to government documents,
the TSA paid IBM more than $47,400 to develop the app.
Programmers know that random number generators are one
of the easiest applications to code and free coin flip pro-
grams are widely available on the Internet.
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