And by save the day, I mean crush any hope of speedy economic recovery.
The debate on global warming and energy policy accelerated on Tuesday as two senior House Democrats unveiled a far-reaching bill to cap heat-trapping gases and quicken the country’s move away from dependence on coal and oil.
…
The draft measure, written by Representatives Henry A. Waxman of California and Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts, sets a slightly more ambitious goal for capping greenhouse gases than Mr. Obama’s proposal. The bill requires that emissions be reduced 20 percent from 2005 levels by 2020, while Mr. Obama’s plan calls for a 14 percent reduction by 2020. Both would reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases by roughly 80 percent by 2050.
The Waxman-Markey bill, known as the American Clean Energy and Security Act, emerges at a time when many Americans, and their representatives in Congress, are wary of wide-ranging environmental legislation that could raise energy costs and potentially cripple industry. The bill also comes as the Environmental Protection Agency is about to exert regulatory authority over greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. The bill would pre-empt that effort and create a new cap-and-trade scheme to control carbon emissions.
There is no basis for this legislation, despite Obama’s fraudulent insistence that global warming is unquestionable gospel.
A cap and trade system would produce significant economic harm for marginal environmental benefit. The “cap” refers to a limit on the amount of CO2 that may be emitted by burning certain fossil fuels. The “trade” refers to the ability of rights to emit to be sold as commodities.
This is essentially a system to ration the use of oil, gas and coal in the U.S. The result will be significantly higher prices for electricity and gasoline. That makes this system a regressive tax (that’s starting to be a pattern). And by adding such costs to domestic manufacturing, the bill will force companies to move offshore, adding yet more job losses to our already dour economic environment. This is yet another Democratic proposal that America cannot afford.
1 comment
Print This Post
President Barack Obama announced today that he had effectively fired the CEO of General Motors. His announcement was nothing short of extraordinary:
GM has made a good faith effort to restructure over the past several months — but the plan that they’ve put forward is, in its current form, not strong enough. However, after broad consultation with a range of industry experts and financial advisors, I’m absolutely confident that GM can rise again, providing that it undergoes a fundamental restructuring. As an initial step, GM is announcing today that Rick Wagoner is stepping aside as Chairman and CEO. This is not meant as a condemnation of Mr. Wagoner, who’s devoted his life to this company and has had a distinguished career; rather, it’s a recognition that will take new vision and new direction to create the GM of the future.
Translation: “I just fired the CEO of a U.S. corporation. No one is beyond my reach.”
Who are these “industry experts?” What makes them more qualified to evaluate GM than investors who are willing to put their own money on the line? To put it another way, who do you think has more incentive to get it right: investors betting their own money, or “industry experts” betting yours?
In this context, my administration will offer General Motors adequate working capital over the next 60 days. And during this time, my team will be working closely with GM to produce a better business plan. They must ask themselves: Have they consolidated enough unprofitable brands? Have they cleaned up their balance sheets, or are they still saddled with so much debt that they can’t make future investments? Above all, have they created a credible model for how not only to survive, but to succeed in this competitive global market?
Despite this announcement describing all the ways in which government is now dictating the direction of GM, Obama made sure to assure us plebes that, in fact, he really has no desire or intention to run GM from Washington D.C.
But that’s not all. The government is now going to guarantee the warranty’s of GM and Chrysler. This, The One proclaimed, will make your warranty “safer than it’s ever been.” Well, isn’t that reassuring? No. To any person who has observed even a fraction of the history of government run anything, it’s not in the slightest bit credible.
What we’ve witnessed in the first few months of this Presidency is the opening stage of a war on capitalism, a blitzkrieg on free enterprise. GM is just one battle in this war. There will be more casualties and further government transgressions into the territory of freedom. And make no mistake, freedom itself it what’s ultimately under assault. Economic freedom is a necessary, though not sufficient, condition for political freedom. Or to put it another way, no people have ever had political freedom without economic freedom. By doing his best to take away the latter, Barack Obama is undermining the foundations of the former.
Leave a comment Print This Post
So apparently tonight the moonbats are going to be celebrating “Earth Hour.” The ritual involves turning off all lights for one hour, wherein the moonbats can pretend they are savages at one with mother earth. They also hope to draw attention to the perniciousness of “climate change,” that tautological boogeyman.
There are alternatives, however. CEI is promoting Human Achievement Hour, where we can celebrate the wonderful advances made by humanity, and all the people that electricity has brought out of poverty. So brighten your evening, celebrate humanity’s achievements and fight moonbattery by turning all your lights on for one hour.
1 comment Print This Post
Yesterday President Obama hosted the first ever online town hall, where questions were submitted online, and voted on, by citizens across the nation. I commend the President for attempting to bring modern technology into his government. Sadly, he faced none of my piercing questions. But here they are for you:
1. “Why do you believe that you can allocate resources in a manner that is not prohibitively wasteful when no government in the history of the world has ever been able to successfully do so? What makes your technocrats better informed than free markets?”
2. “How does an energy tax not equal a tax on middle and lower income earners? Do you think we don’t use any energy? It’s money out of our pocket just the same as an income tax increase.”
3. “How do you justify prosecuting Madoff for running a pyramid scheme while the federal government continues to force us into one (Social Security) at the point of a gun? At least Madoff’s was voluntary!”
They were particularly hostile to my swipe at their beloved Social Security, voting question 3 down at a 2:1 ratio. Question 1 did surprisingly well at almost a 1:1 ratio, garnering 19 positives for 23 negatives.
As for the substance of the event, it was as disappointing as one would expect from President Obama. The first question Obama took was on education, and his answer was dreadful. He identified two problems with education: lack of resources and a 19th century education model.
On the first problem, he says that there “aren’t enough teachers,” that they “aren’t getting enough of the training they need,” and that there’s a “shortage of supplies.” He adds, “There are schools that I’ve seen that were built in the 1850 that are still being used but haven’t been upgraded the way they need to.” He uses all this as evidence that there aren’t enough resources. But this does not follow. He refers to the second problem as “one that money alone cannot solve,” giving the impression that he thinks the first problem can be solved by money alone. But if that were true, the problem would have been solved already. Spending on education has continuously risen; while the problems described by the president have not gotten any better.
The problem is not lack of resources, but how those resources are allocated. Specifically, the government run system lacks accountability and has little incentive to spend money improving education instead of padding administrative salaries. The only way to solve this problem of allocation is to move to a market model, where competition will reduce inefficiencies and spur innovation.
On the second problem Obama similarly misses the mark. Yes, our system is outdated. Yes, we still have time off during the summer, despite the fact that most students aren’t going home to help with the harvest anymore. But what is the reason? The reason we have a 19th century model still operating in the 21st century is because a government run system is necessarily going to be unwieldy and unresponsive to changing circumstances. Until we break the government monopoly on education, we will continue to toil in educational backwardness.
I noticed from the online voting that the most popular questions all had to do with marijuana legalization. Obama did not ignore these questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Three point five million people voted. I have to say that there was one question that was voted on that ranked fairly high and that was whether legalizing marijuana would improve the economy — (laughter) — and job creation. And I don’t know what this says about the online audience — (laughter) — but I just want — I don’t want people to think that — this was a fairly popular question; we want to make sure that it was answered. The answer is, no, I don’t think that is a good strategy — (laughter) — to grow our economy. (Applause.)
So — all right.
He did, however, dismiss them without satisfactory answer. Treating this issue as nothing more than a question of economic recovery, he ignored the larger dissatisfaction with the failed drug war and its consequences.
Most of the other questions were stupid, but you can read the rest of them here.
Leave a comment Print This Post
Apparently it isn’t enough to describe our efforts to fight terrorism as Overseas Contingency Operations. Our wondrous leaders have now decided that terrorism is not, in fact, terrorism. There is no terrorism. Rather, there are “man-caused disasters.” You know, like global warming.
You see, the President’s Homeland Security Secretary thinks the word terrorism isn’t very nice, that it represents those darned old-fashioned “politics of fear.” So she wiped out terrorism with a stroke of her pen…or her tongue.
Don’t get us wrong. Janet Napolitano didn’t do anything that will save any lives or make us any safer or stop any of the bad guys. She just eliminated it from her vocabulary and renamed it a “man-caused disaster.”
I am Brian’s complete lack of surprise. Really, we should have seen this coming. A candidate that elevated style of substance would inevitably, as President, emphasize words over reality.
Leave a comment Print This Post
No, not the people from South America that seem to have such an unusually high concentration of sexy women:
New Jersey is drawing the line when it comes to bikini waxing.
The state Board of Cosmetology and Hairstyling is moving toward a ban on genital waxing altogether after two women reported being injured in their quest for a smooth bikini line.
Both women were hospitalized for infections following so-called “Brazilian” bikini waxes; one of the women has filed a lawsuit, according to Jeff Lamm, a spokesman for New Jersey’s Division of Consumer Affairs, which oversees the cosmetology board.
Technically, genital waxing has never been allowed — only the face, neck, abdomen, legs and arms are permitted — but because bare-it-all “Brazilians” weren’t specifically banned, state regulators haven’t enforced the law.
Ugh…technically, it has.
Do I really need to go into much detail about why it’s stupid to ban elective activity over a few people getting hurt? Really? Nah…I don’t.
Leave a comment Print This Post
We need to bring this man to the U.S.
Leave a comment Print This Post
The attacks on capitalism being led by the likes of Barack Obama and Mario Cuomo have consequences.
The following is a letter sent on Tuesday by Jake DeSantis, an executive vice president of the American International Group’s financial products unit, to Edward M. Liddy, the chief executive of A.I.G.
DEAR Mr. Liddy,
It is with deep regret that I submit my notice of resignation from A.I.G. Financial Products. I hope you take the time to read this entire letter. Before describing the details of my decision, I want to offer some context:
I am proud of everything I have done for the commodity and equity divisions of A.I.G.-F.P. I was in no way involved in — or responsible for — the credit default swap transactions that have hamstrung A.I.G. Nor were more than a handful of the 400 current employees of A.I.G.-F.P. Most of those responsible have left the company and have conspicuously escaped the public outrage.
After 12 months of hard work dismantling the company — during which A.I.G. reassured us many times we would be rewarded in March 2009 — we in the financial products unit have been betrayed by A.I.G. and are being unfairly persecuted by elected officials. In response to this, I will now leave the company and donate my entire post-tax retention payment to those suffering from the global economic downturn. My intent is to keep none of the money myself.
I take this action after 11 years of dedicated, honorable service to A.I.G. I can no longer effectively perform my duties in this dysfunctional environment, nor am I being paid to do so. Like you, I was asked to work for an annual salary of $1, and I agreed out of a sense of duty to the company and to the public officials who have come to its aid. Having now been let down by both, I can no longer justify spending 10, 12, 14 hours a day away from my family for the benefit of those who have let me down.
…
Read the entire letter.
Leave a comment Print This Post
I’ve long been critical of the phrase “war on terror,” as I found it unspecific in identifying our true enemy, radical jihad. But this is just ridiculous:
The Obama administration appears to be backing away from the phrase “global war on terror,” a signature rhetorical legacy of its predecessor.
In a memo e-mailed this week to Pentagon staff members, the Defense Department’s office of security review noted that “this administration prefers to avoid using the term ‘Long War’ or ‘Global War on Terror’ [GWOT.] Please use ‘Overseas Contingency Operation.’ ”
What the hell does that even mean?
This Ain’t Hell remembers when Clinton similarly changed “rogue nations” to “nations of concern.”
1 comment Print This Post
The British are all gonna die…if they don’t kill a bunch of their population first:
JONATHON PORRITT, one of Gordon Brown’s leading green advisers, is to warn that Britain must drastically reduce its population if it is to build a sustainable society.
Porritt’s call will come at this week’s annual conference of the Optimum Population Trust (OPT), of which he is patron.
The trust will release research suggesting UK population must be cut to 30m if the country wants to feed itself sustainably.
Porritt said: “Population growth, plus economic growth, is putting the world under terrible pressure.
The environmentalists hate human progress and prosperity. They hate that people can better their quality of life, which is why they are all up in arms over the fact that India now has an affordable car.
Leave a comment Print This Post
Sorry, no posts matched your criteria.
I am a libertarian-conservative blogger living in the DC area. I have a Master's degree in Political Science and work in public policy, but please don't hold that against me.
