Lord Keynes, Frustrated

For John, BLUF:  Environmental laws tie the hands of Federal and State Governments trying to stimulate the economy through big construction projects.

I was thinking, the other day, about how environmental and other laws, Federal and Local, were frustrating development of "shovel-ready" projects that would allow the execution of stimulus actions a la the Keynesian view of economics.—roughly, cut taxes and spend government money.

Here is an example of such a frustration, in this case relating to the California High Speed Rail Project.  Here is the key paragraph:

President Obama’s stimulus allocated $8 billion for high-speed rail projects, including, eventually, up to $3.5 billion for California’s project.  However, according to the stimulus law, California must begin construction on the project before December 31, 2012 or they will not be eligible for any more high speed rail stimulus dollars.  Obama’s Transportation Department reaffirmed this time limit last year when they admitted they had “no administrative authority to change this deadline.”

Granted, it was The Washington Examiner, but the principle seems right.

Regards  —  Cliff