News bites: Business groups take aim at EPA rules, Upton on Reagan and oil, and more

Of all the Obama administration’s regulatory efforts, business groups are most concerned with pending Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rules, a series of letters to House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) show.

“The Environmental Protection Agency, which enforces rules that affect the U.S. economy from factories to farms, is the No. 1 target of complaints from business groups collected by House Republican leaders,” The Wall Street Journal reports.

“EPA rules were cited more than those from any other agency in more than 100 letters sent by trade associations, businesses and some conservative groups to House oversight committee chairman Darrell Issa in response to his call for businesses to identify regulations they deemed burdensome, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.”

On what would have been former President Ronald Reagan’s 100th birthday, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) focused on “the Gipper’s energy lesson.”

“Lamenting that 'restrictive price controls have held U.S. oil production below its potential,’ Reagan said that eliminating them ‘is a positive first step towards a balanced energy program,’ ” Upton wrote in The Detroit News Sunday.

“Within a few years, domestic oil production went up — and prices went down. Affordable energy helped usher in a quarter century of phenomenal economic growth. Reagan understood that keeping the lights on for families with abundant, reliable energy was not a partisan issue, it was a moral issue, and the entire country would benefit.”

Former BP CEO Tony Hayward is looking for a new job.

“Tony Hayward, former chief executive of BP, is finalising plans to return to the corporate scene after leaving the UK oil group last autumn in the wake of the Gulf of Mexico spill,” The Financial Times reports.

“Mr Hayward, who recently scaled Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest mountain, is considering several proposals and is expected to whittle them down on his return to the UK.”

Meanwhile, the U.S. military is buying Gulf seafood.

“Sales of Gulf of Mexico seafood are getting a boost from the military after being hammered by last year's BP oil spill, which left consumers fearing that the water's bounty had been tainted,” The Washington Post says.

“Ten products, including fish, shrimp, oysters, crab cakes, and packaged Cajun dishes such as jambalaya and shrimp etouffee are being promoted at 72 base commissaries along the East Coast, said Milt Ackerman, president of Military Solutions Inc., which is supplying seafood to the businesses.”