Government Regulation

The Obama administration this week will propose the most significant new regulation of the financial industry since the Great Depression, including a new watchdog agency to look out for consumers' interests. Under the plan, expected to be released Wednesday, the government would have new powers to seize key companies -- such as insurance giant American International Group Inc. -- whose failure jeopardizes the financial system.

Targeting one of the biggest sources of air pollution, federal and state regulators moved forward Wednesday with plans to slash emissions from big diesel-powered ships entering U.S. coastal areas. Under rules that took effect Wednesday, the roughly 2,000 ocean-going vessels that enter California ports each year must switch to fuel with lower sulfur content before coming within 24 nautical miles of the state's coast.

During hard economic times, American businesses often implore government to ease up on regulations to help them survive. In China, officials are more than happy to oblige. Need an environmental impact review for your project? No sweat. Compliant regulators are delivering them in as little as three days. And for Chinese law enforcement cracking down on company bosses, the message from higher-ups is clear: Lighten up.

California Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner plans to unveil proposed regulations today to combat the health insurance industry practice of dropping members with costly illnesses. Poizner's draft regulations would require insurers to write applications for coverage in plain English and allow applicants a "not sure" answer to questions about their preexisting medical conditions.

Revealing the recession's rising toll on financial firms, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. disclosed Friday that it had ordered six more California banks to clean up their acts in February after the agency examined their books and operations.

Farming and ranching representatives appeared before a congressional panel Thursday to express concern that a major bill pending in the House could unnecessarily complicate the marketplace without improving food safety. Amid recent health scares involving cookie dough and pistachios, the Obama administration has pledged to modernize the food safety system. Lawmakers are considering the Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009, aimed at broadening the Food and Drug Administration's powers.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission has given preliminary approval to changes in new lead-testing rules after complaints that the measures could have forced thrift stores and sellers of handmade toys to dispose of merchandise or even go out of business. If formally adopted, the changes approved on a first vote Tuesday would grant exemptions to last year's Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, which seeks to ensure that products for children do not contain dangerous amounts of lead.

A federal thrift regulator bungled its oversight of Downey Savings & Loan, allowing the Newport Beach thrift to pile on billions of dollars in high-risk mortgages and eventually collapse, according to a government report. The regulators from the beleaguered Office of Thrift Supervision also botched their oversight of Pomona-based PFF Bank & Trust, which collapsed along with Downey last fall, according to reports issued this week by the U.S. Treasury Department's inspector general.

In a historic shift in public health policy, Congress is poised to give the federal government sweeping new authority to regulate the manufacturing of cigarettes and other tobacco products. The legislation, long resisted by the tobacco industry, could allow consumers to see for the first time what chemicals and other additives tobacco companies put in their products.

Eddie "Iceberg" Chastain, a 385-pound wrestler with a shaved head and a red goatee, calls himself the Being of Inconceivable Horror. In the ring, he wields a fork -- just like his mentor, Abdullah the Butcher. He pummels his opponents with cross-face forearms, levels them with clotheslines and crushes them with avalanche splashes. But outside the ring he has begun to show a softer side. "You know, it's not actually my intent to hurt my opponent," he said in a telephone interview last week.