The inanity of page counts

When debating actual legislation, there's one sure-fire attack to levy at your opponents: "your legislation is longer than [insert complex sounding document]." A good recent example is the Facebook privacy policy, which was accused of being longer than the U.S. Constitution. This is a particularly inane comparison, because the trim 4,400 words in the U.S. Constitution make it the shortest of any country's.

The recent conversation over energy legislation is a good example, and I am ashamed to say that I've been guilty of it with regard to the House Waxman-Markey climate legislation. But here's a great refutation of that point, from a Grist chat with energy analyst Trevor Houser:

"Our litmus test for legislation that will fundamentally alter the behavior of the U.S. energy sector -- a $2.2 trillion part of the U.S. economy -- for the next 40 years is whether or not it can be kept under 100 pages?"

Sometimes wanting simple is just being simple. Brilliant.