Another federal commission on waste

President Obama announced a new effort Monday to eliminate government waste.

Mr. Obama signed an executive order that creates a new oversight board to work with federal departments and agencies to cut waste and improve performance. Vice President Joe Biden will somehow find time in his busy schedule to meet regularly with Cabinet secretaries to chart their progress.

“As we work to tackle the budget deficit, we need to step up our game,” the president said in a video announcing the Campaign to Cut Waste. “No amount of waste is acceptable — not when it’s your money, not at a time when so many Americans are already cutting back.”

As examples of “pointless waste” and “stupid spending,” Obama cited daily publication of the Federal Register, despite the fact that it’s available on the Internet and has been for years.

OK.

Of course some government funds are lost to inefficiencies, redundancies, even fraud. And yes, all of the above should be tracked down and minimized.

Presumably whoever prints the Federal Register can make some case for retaining an archived “hard copy” for legal reasons, But if some trees can be saved, along with some government funds, fine.

But how many such commissions is this, now?

The Private Sector Survey on Cost Control, commonly referred to as The Grace Commission, was an investigation requested in 1982 by President Ronald Reagan into … guess what? Federal government waste and inefficiency. Its chief, businessman J. Peter Grace, asked members of that commission to “be bold” and “work like tireless bloodhounds. Don’t leave any stone unturned in your search to root out inefficiency.”

The Grace Commission Report was presented to Congress in January 1984. Commission members estimated that with their proposed reforms the federal debt would rise to only $2.5 trillion by 2000, while without their suggested reforms, the national debt could rise to a barely believable $13 trillion by 2000.

Congress ignored the commission’s report. The debt reached $5.8 trillion in the year 2000 and $13 trillion in 2008.

If Vice President Biden’s new commission is really interested in eliminating waste and redundancy, the first thing they do should also be the last thing they do: Order new copies of the Grace Commission report printed up and handed out to the president and each member of Congress, and then set a good example by voting themselves out of existence.