Are entire agencies needless?

Minot (N.D.) Daily News: Included in President Barack Obama’s plan to lessen the cost of government regulations is a proposal by the U.S. Transportation Department that could save businesses and thus, consumers, about $1 billion over 20 years.

It is — and you might want to sit down for this — to enforce certain railroad safety rules “only where they are actually needed.”

We wonder, what exactly does that mean?

The White House announcement on the matter did not mention why the Transportation Department has been enforcing rules that are not “actually needed” for years and probably decades, at who knows what cost to the taxpayers.

We suspect that is a question bureaucrats in virtually every federal agency would have trouble addressing. It’s disturbing, to say the least, to know we have agencies spending millions of dollars enforcing regulations and guidelines that aren’t “actually needed” at a time when the federal government continues to run a massive deficit.

Amazingly, we suppose, in the context of the federal government, trashing rules that never had a purpose in the first place ... is progress. It will come as small comfort to Americans who now must wonder how much of our money has been thrown away needlessly.

Here’s an idea: Why not eliminate some entire agencies unless “they are actually needed”?