Legalectric

Here it is, Michigan v. EPA:

Michigan v. EPA   U.S. Supreme Court File No. 14-46

Given this decision, it’s going to be hard for any agency to argue that it shouldn’t do a solid cost benefit analysis, and one that includes verification and analysis of benefits!  That’s a good thing given the outrageous benefits claims I’ve seen in transmission proceedings.  Check this part of the Order early on (I’m just going over it now):

In accordance with Executive Order, the Agency issued a “Regulatory Impact Analysis” alongside its regulation.This analysis estimated that the regulation would force power plants to bear costs of $9.6 billion per year. Id., at 9306. The Agency could not fully quantify the benefits of reducing power plants’ emissions of hazardous air pollutants; to the extent it could, it estimated that these benefits were worth $4 to $6 million per year. Ibid. The costs to power plants were thus between 1,600 and 2,400 times as great as the quantifiable benefits from reduced emissions of hazardous air pollutants. The Agency continued that its regulations would have ancillary benefits—including cutting power plants’ emissions of particulate matter and sulfur dioxide, substances that are not covered by the hazardous-air-pollutants program. Although the Agency’s appropriate-and-necessary finding did not rest on these ancillary effects, id., at 9320, the regulatory impact analysis took them into account, increasing the Agency’s estimate of the quantifiable benefits of its regulation to $37 to $90 billion per year, id., at 9306. EPA concedes that the regulatory impact analysis “played no role” in its appropriate-and-necessary finding. Brief for Federal Respondents 14.

Michigan v. EPA, p. 4.  The regulatory impact analysis included the information, it was in the record, but EPA says that it “played no role” in that decision.  So can’t they just reissue it, state they took that into account and used it as a basis for its decision and everyone can go home?  AAAARGH!

And here’s a highlight where I actually agree (!) with a sentence in Thomas’ Concurrence:

Statutory ambiguity thus becomes an implicit delegation of rule-making authority, and that authority is used not to find the best meaning of the text, but to formulate legally binding rules to fill in gaps based on policy judgments made by the agency rather than Congress.

Dissents, p. 3 (pdf p. 20 of 47).

As Ed Berger said, “Tryin’ is lyin’ cuz if you were tryin’ you’d be doin’ it!” So now, it’s time to try, once more with feeling!

True, I’ll never be able to replace my Selmer VI.  Of all the things stolen while I was on my last trip before law school, which was pretty much everything I owned, the loss of my horn hurt the most of all.  That was the worst of the high price I paid to go to law school and that last run to try to make some dough… sigh… that sure didn’t work.  But Friday, driving around town, we stopped at a garage sale, and it was 50% off day.  I found a workable cheap horn, workable and utilitarian, certainly nothing like my Mark VI.  It has a leak somewhere in the low end but it’s an improvement on the others I’d found, ones that were way old, cool wall hangings but without that feel, not real playable, very old and creaky and leaky.  Wishful thinking, I’d scored a preowned Beechler S5S without deep tooth marks a while back, and I’m set up with a box of weak LaVozs.  I think this will be enough to let me know if my cracked teeth can handle this.

Whew, serious woodshed time!  Neighbors will probably shoot me!

Ma’am, come down off the pole!

Come down off the pole! Ma’am, Ma’am, come down off the pole!

Time for it to come down. Even Walmart gets that…

Here are the actual Opinions (and the Dissents are … stunning… hilarious… OH… MY… DOG!):

14-114_6-25-15_King v. Burwell

13-1371_6-25-15_Texas Dept. of Housing and Community Affairs v. Inclusive Communities Project, Inc.

14-556_3204_6-26-15 – Obergefell v. Hodges

Turns out our own Rep. Frank Hornstein has a tie to this — very cool:

I feel a personal connection to history today. Around a year after my Mom’s death in 1998, my father sold the Cincinnati home I grew up in to James Obergefell and John Arthur. A few years later I visited that home with my father, brother and sister and James and John gave us a tour, proudly showing off the renovations and improvements they made to the place. Scott Dibble’s text to me a few minutes ago says it all: LOVE WINS. Thank you James Obergefell for your courage and activism and may John Arthur’s name forever be a blessing

After a day in the bowels of FERC’s docket system as RM15-22-000, FERC rejected the BLOCK Plains & Eastern Clean Line Petition for Rulemaking.  It’s a binary thing, has to be either one or the other, so now it’s in the DOE’s hands.

FERC REJECTION_RM15-22-000  20150625-3025(30664807)

So, DOE, what cha gonna do?  You’ve been thinking about it, but it’s been 10 years since Section 1222 was passed.

DOE_PetitionRulemaking_Attachments_FINAL

And the grand finale of the Administrative Procedure Act, Section 553:

(e) Each agency shall give an interested person the right to petition for the issuance, amendment, or repeal of a rule.