EDITOR’S CHOICE: It's a sure sign that a government agency has become over-powerful when it vastly increases its budget, grabs power unconstitutionally and treats Congress with contempt. All of this applies to the Environmental Protection Agency. Few have noticed as the administration has quietly arranged to use the EPA to apply environmental standards to most every decision under the sun -- as a backdoor maneuver to seize power for the central government. Unless Congress acts quickly to curb the EPA, it will become a huge drag on the economy and an additional threat to already declining civil liberties. New tactics to ram through cap-and-trade.

POWER GRAB: Iain Murray, vice president for strategy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute wrote the following in the Washington Times about the EPA power grab. Few bodies are more deserving of cutbacks now. This year, EPA's budget (which had hovered at $7 billion to $8 billion since 1997) increased by 34 percent, to more than $10 billion for the first time ever.

The budget increase does not translate into an upsurge in staffing level -- which remains lower than its apex of more than 18,000 workers in 1999 -- but instead represents much more patronage in the form of grants to states. The increased patronage comes at a time when the EPA is accruing much more power. It’s finding under the Clean Air Act that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare goes way beyond the powers of the act. The agency has decided it has the power to:

● License California and other states to adopt non-federal fuel-economy standards within their borders.

● Act as co-equal (or even senior partner) with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in setting fuel-economy standards for the auto industry.

● Establish climate and energy policy for the entire nation.

● "Tailor," that is, amend, the Clean Air Act to avoid an administrative debacle of its own making.

As my colleague Marlo Lewis has pointed out, in each of these cases, the EPA is ignoring the plain language of the statutes and, in some cases, the constitutional requirements of the Supremacy Clause and separation of powers.

STANDARDS: The details of each of these actions are complicated, but the basic thrust of this four-step power grab is as follows. By granting California the power to ignore federal fuel-economy standards, the EPA created a regulatory patchwork that imposes significant burdens on the auto industry.

This led to the White House brokering a deal whereby the EPA muscles in on the NHTSA's statutory authority to regulate fuel-economy standards, something for which the EPA has no statutory authority The EPA claims this then compels it to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from stationary sources, thereby making it the effective arbiter of national climate policy -- even as Congress debates what to do about the issue.

Even the EPA seems to recognize the absurdity of the resulting regulations under the language of the Clean Air Act -- which would lead to the EPA having to issue permits for fast-food franchises and large apartment buildings to emit greenhouse gases -- so the agency took upon itself the power to tailor statutory language, thereby playing lawmaker, to avoid the regulatory debacle which it itself had put in motion.

Fortunately, some lawmakers have caught on to what the EPA is up to. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Alaska Republican, was so concerned that she wrote to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, asking 13 simple questions about the proposed course of action. The reply she received was so evasive that it answered only two -- and partially at that.

ROGUE AGENCY: Congress may soon get its first real opportunity to rein in this rogue agency. Sometime between now and May 25, the Senate is expected to vote on Mrs. Murkowski's Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution of disapproval. This measure would veto the legal force and effect of EPA's endangerment finding.

The EPA's nongovernmental allies are so worried about this resolution that they have engaged in a smear campaign, accusing Mrs. Murkowski and others of seeking to impose a "Dirty Air Act." She has not been intimidated, though, and her proposal is likely to come to a vote.

A rogue regulatory agency is like an oil tanker with sails. Once in motion, it takes a lot to stop it. Congress can take the wind out of the EPA's sails through the Murkowski resolution of disapproval and a significant reduction in the agency's budget. On the other hand, if the EPA gets away with this power grab, we can expect further abuses of its authority in relation to the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Protection Act. If it gets its way, the agency's $10 billion budget will look like chicken feed.

CLIMATE BILL: Meanwhile the administration remains hell-bent on passing a climate bill that will effectively nationalize energy policy. Liberal House Democrats are shifting their political tactics after failing to secure a public option in the new healthcare reform law. The move comes in the wake of liberals having to walk back threats that they would vote against a health care bill without a government-run program.

“Drawing the line in the sand too quickly was part of the lesson we learned on health care,” the co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), told The Hill. Grijalva voiced strong concerns about the direction of the climate and energy bill, which has moved toward the center as Democrats try to build a bipartisan consensus that can win 60 Senate votes. Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) are leading the effort in the upper chamber to pass a comprehensive bill.

CAP-AND-TRADE: A cap-and-trade program, which was included in the House bill that passed last year, is likely to be jettisoned, and President Barack Obama disappointed liberals last week by announcing his support for expanding offshore oil drilling. The president’s decision was seen as a move to garner the support of conservative Democrats and Republicans who would be open to voting for a comprehensive climate and energy measure. “It’s moving away from what was already a series of compromises in the House,” Grijalva said of the Senate legislation.

A group of 45 House Democrats, all members of the Sustainable Energy and Environment Coalition (SEEC), sent a letter late last month to congressional leaders, urging them to retain strong caps on carbon emissions. But the missive notably did not include any threat to oppose a stripped-down bill. The letter stated only that the coalition “feels that it is of the highest priority that any comprehensive energy legislation includes reductions in greenhouse gas emissions necessary to spur investment in clean energy technologies, and is consistent with reduction targets in the House-passed legislation.”

PUBLIC OPINION: That stands in contrast to the language used last August in the health care debate, when 60 House Democrats signed a letter stating plainly that they could not vote for a bill that lacked a public option. Eight months later, every House liberal backed the final legislation even though the public option had been discarded. The energy debate will be very different.

The co-chairman of SEEC, Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.), said in a statement that the coalition members were “very encouraged by the bipartisan work to get an energy bill in the Senate.” “With this letter,” Inslee said, “SEEC is stating that it is essential that a comprehensive energy bill includes greenhouse gas emissions targets and durable mechanisms to ensure those targets are achieved.”

ESSENTIAL: Other House lawmakers have also refrained from specific threats on climate change legislation, in a nod to the political reality of the Senate confirmed by the healthcare debate. “We learned that the Senate does not always — in fact doesn’t ever — take the work that the House has done,” said Rep. Rush Holt (D-N.J.), a vice chairman of SEEC. Holt added that while it was essential to put a price on carbon and invest heavily in new energy research, “you have to be willing to compromise.”

The House bill was crafted by the chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), and the chairman of the Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming, Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.).

Markey released an approving statement after Obama’s offshore drilling announcement, saying the decision “demonstrates his commitment to a comprehensive view of our energy policy.” Asked to comment on the direction of the Senate bill, a Markey spokesman, Eben Burnham-Snyder, said only that the chairman wanted the Senate to pass legislation “that can be merged with Waxman-Markey so the Congress can send a bill to the president this year.”

ADVOCACY: Environmental advocacy groups like the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council have kept up the push for a far-reaching climate bill that includes a cap on carbon emissions and strong reduction targets. The Sierra Club’s executive director, Mike Brune, told The Hill last month that the organization would actively oppose a bill that provided too many concessions to big industry groups.

The environmental groups have also taken pains to point out the political differences between healthcare and energy policy, where the geographical cleavages can be as important as the ideological differences. “Climate has always been a bipartisan issue,” Sierra spokesman Josh Dorner said.

OUTGUNNED: The willingness of liberal Democrats to fight for a strong climate bill could set up a clash with the party’s base, which was already disheartened by the loss of the public option battle and the perception that liberals were outgunned by the conservative Blue Dogs.

“Progressives drawing a line in the sand for the public option was not the problem. Being weak and not sticking by their line in the sand was the problem,” said Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.

“Their credibility will be less than the Blue Dogs’ in every future policy battle until progressives draw a line in the sand and refuse to cave. If the climate bill is co-opted by oil companies, coal companies and other polluters that may be a good place to start.”