Please welcome Michael Mohr-Ramirez to the Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) team. Michael is originally from New Jersey and has worked for Rep. To

Please welcome Michael Mohr-Ramirez to the Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) team. Michael is originally from New Jersey and has worked for Rep. Tony Gonzales (TX-23), where he handled foster care, education, and budget issues, as well as working on appropriations. He also worked for Rep. Will Hurd (TX-23). He has already hit the ground running and we are very excited to have him at TPA.

A Health Lesson from the United Kingdom

Well, this is embarrassing (and fixable). A new independent report by the UK government has recommended doubling down on vaping as a way of driving down smoking rates. While the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) dithers and backslides on regulating products which it fully recognizes are far less harmful than smoking, across the pond they are talking of a “vaping revolution” with cross-party political support. The June 2022 report aims to “mak[e] smoking obsolete” and considers vaping products to be central to its plans to achieve the government’s goal of being smoke-free by 2030. Recommending that the government “must embrace the promotion of vaping as an effective tool to help people to quit smoking tobacco,” report author Javed Khan OBE has put forward progressive policy proposals on harm reduction which put the FDA’s precautionary principle approach to shame.

Khan suggests that health professionals should offer vapes to smokers in health settings as a substitute for smoking and that government should accelerate the pathway by offering vaping products to be prescribed on the National Health Service (NHS). Furthermore, he recommends that vaping products should be provided free of charge to smokers in deprived communities, advocates for the products to not be subjected to a retail sales tax, and demands that smoking cessation information campaigns routinely include vaping as a means of quitting smoking. In direct contrast to the misinformation campaigns by public health groups in the US, Khan also calls for skeptical health professionals to be properly educated about the less harmful nature of e-cigarettes, and calls for a national information campaign to “dismantle myths about smoking and vaping.”

While the FDA has been floundering, with only nine vaping products authorized amid millions of applications, the UK fully recognizes the benefits of harm reduction and is forging ahead in improving the public’s health in a manner which the FDA seems incapable of doing. At a conference in Europe last month, Benjamin Apelberg, Deputy Director at the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products (CTP) claimed that the FDA“envisions a world where cigarettes would no longer create or sustain addiction & where adults who still seek nicotine could get it from alternative and less harmful sources.” Yet the same agency has spent the last few years burdening the vaping market with a never-ending series of obstacles which has devastated small businesses, shrunk the market to a handful of authorized devices and created so much doubt around the products that only a pitiful 2.6 percent of the American public correctly believe that vaping is “much less harmful” than smoking cigarettes, according to the latest US
National Cancer Institute HINTS survey.

The new UK report shows that there is a far more grown-up conversation taking place across the Atlantic around vaping and other reduced risk nicotine products, while the FDA has been blundering and obsessing about youth vaping, leading adult smokers to continue smoking, and does not appear to want to have a sensible conversation at all, let alone afford adults the opportunity to even try reduced risk tobacco products. How can it be that a nation as proud as the US can be so badly served by the damaging bureaucratic mess ineptly concocted by the FDA towards potentially life-saving vaping products? The FDA should carefully study what is happening in the UK with vaping and tobacco harm reduction and learn some lessons in how to regulate reduced risk tobacco products for the benefit of its citizens rather than pander to the fanatics and heavily funded nicotine prohibitionists who currently guide the agency’s approach.

Klobuchar’s Wrong Formula for Antitrust

America is facing a host of issues right now. Inflation is showing no signs of slowing down and the country is still experiencing a host of supply chain issues stemming from the global effects of COVID-19 lockdowns from the last two years. This has culminated in a concerning shortage of baby formula in the United States, leaving many young families in dire straits. Lawmakers in Washington are scrambling for solutions for the baby formula problem. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) offered her solution to the baby formula crisis on Twitter last weekend, saying, “To prevent shortages like these from happening again, we need to get to the root of the problem. We have to modernize antitrust laws.” Klobuchar would follow up that take shortly thereafter with this, “Monopolies and duopolies are causing shortages. Multinational shipping conglomerates and Big Tech companies are making it harder for small businesses to compete.”

At this point, one would be forced to ask what “Big Tech” could possibly have to do with a baby formula shortage. The short answer is: nothing at all. The longer answer is that Klobuchar is trying to gin up support in Washington for her antitrust proposal targeted against Big Tech. Her proposal, the American Innovation and Competition Online (AICO) Act, would prevent companies from utilizing their own services and bar them (in many cases) from keeping third party software off their devices. The legislation has raised a number of economic and cybersecurity concerns. In Washington, when all you have is a hammer, everything begins to look like a nail. Klobuchar is now trying to turn her antitrust crusade to the broader economy, somehow trying to link it to the baby formula shortage being experienced by many families across the country. While it may strike a chord for some and might do well to cynically garner attention for Klobuchar’s personal political agenda, it ought to be seen for what it
is – utter cynical nonsense. The immediate causes of the shortage come because of a recall due to safety concerns and the closure of one of America’s major formula factories. These realities would cause broader issues regardless of real or perceived consolidation in the formula market. Other factors include the fact that the market is limited to infants and birth rates in the U.S. are steadily declining.

If policymakers like Klobuchar are wondering why the shortage has not been able to be assuaged with any efficiency, they ought to look squarely in the mirror. Whatever consolidation exists in that market and the shortages the country is expected to face going forward are problems created by the United States federal government. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) correctly noted the root of the issue, “American babies are going hungry and the federal government is standing in the way. Current policies, tariffs, quotas, bans, and regulations are preventing mothers and fathers from being able to make the best choices to feed their babies.” In short, formula cannot come to market because of government regulations and intervention in the market. When shortages exist at home, those same regulations prevent formula from coming to U.S. shores. Despite all of this, the proposed solutions from lawmakers like Sen. Klobuchar are to create more government regulations and interventions in the formula market. It
would be comical if it weren’t so sad.

Whether it’s baby formula manufacturers, social media companies, or smart phone providers, regulations and the looming presence of government increase the costs of doing business. As those obstacles mount, the market reaches a point where only big, entrenched actors can afford to stay in business. The solution is not to go after the market harder, trying reckless solutions to break up big companies, which run the risk of price hikes and further shortages. Government-created problems cannot be solved with government solutions. Instead, the government – and those lawmakers that comprise it – should strongly consider stepping out of the way.


BLOGS:

Tuesday: Op-Ed: Federal Auditor Says Bureaucracy Is Harming Efforts To Close Digital Divide ([link removed])

Wednesday: TPA Announces New Government Affairs Manager ([link removed])

Thursday: Op-Ed: Klobuchar’s Wrong Formula for Antitrust ([link removed])

Friday: Op-Ed: As FDA flounders, the U.K. surges ahead with vaping ([link removed])


MEDIA:

June 16, 2022, 2022: WBFF Fox45 (Baltimore, Md.) interviewed me about oversight of money spent in Ukraine.

June 16, 2022: I appeared on WBOB 600 AM ([link removed]) (Jacksonville, Fla.) to talk about inflation.

June 20, 2022, 2022: WBFF Fox45 (Baltimore, Md.) interviewed me about inflation and a gas tax holiday in Maryland.

June 20, 2022, 2022: WBFF Fox45 ([link removed]) (Baltimore, Md.) quoted TPA in their story, “Nick Mosby reports zero campaign contributions over the past six months.”

June 21, 2022: The Livingston Parish News (Denham Springs, La.) ran TPA’s op-ed, “Potential government internet project in east Texas town courts costly controversy.” ([link removed])

June 22, 2022: Townhall.com ran TPA’s op-ed, “Klobuchar’s Wrong Formula for Antitrust ([link removed]) .”

June 22, 2022: I appeared on 55KRC Radio ([link removed]) (Cincinnati, Ohio) to talk about energy prices and drug reimportation.

June 22, 2022: Dan Savickas joined ‘The Barrett Brief’ to discuss current antitrust proposals and news of day.

June 22, 2022: Reason mentioned TPA in their story titled, “Mandating Low-Nicotine Cigarettes Could Make Smoking More Dangerous ([link removed]) .”

June 23, 2022: WBFF Fox45 (Baltimore, Md.) interviewed me about an initiative to cut property taxes.

June 23, 2022: I appeared on WBOB 600 AM (Jacksonville, Fla.) to talk about SEC overreach and gas taxes.
Have a great weekend!
Best,
David Williams
President
Taxpayers Protection Alliance
1101 14th Street, NW
Suite 1120
Washington, D.C. xxxxxx
www.protectingtaxpayers.org ([link removed])

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