The world runs on luck and credit. The wind and solar ‘industries’ are running out of both. What might have sounded a little hopeful 20 years ago, sounds utterly ridiculous today. Talk about an all-wind and sun-powered future these days smacks of a mixture of delusion and desperation. Wind turbine manufacturers are bleeding cash, with […]
Kansas City voters sensibly rejected spending money on light rail at least seven times. But that common sense apparently didn’t extent to streetcars, which are an even dumber idea than light rail as streetcars are slower than buses, far more expensive, and can’t get out of their own way if … Continue reading →
On Wednesday in Denver, we had the pleasure of joining Dr. Roger Pielke Jr. (UC Boulder) and Chris Wright, CEO and Chairman of Liberty Energy for a live discussion as part of Liberty Energy’s “Liberty and Energy” Presentation Series. Roger is a Professor in the Environmental Studies department at the University of Colorado Boulder and […]
I am not bullish about China’s economy. Even 10 or more years ago, when many people thought China was going to be the economic superpower of the 21st century, I poured cold water on those predictions. Simply stated, China suffers from too much bad economic policy. Is it as bad as it was during Mao’s […]
Perhaps the worst war plan in American history. (Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq, page 115) ‘It failed utterly.’ (Verdict of Marek Belka, Prime Minister of Poland which contributed troops to the coalition, describing the entire American project to invade and ‘liberate’ Iraq, p.347) Bad assumptions The US Army invaded Iraq on 20 March […]
‘Yee-haw is not a foreign policy.’ (Hand-written sign in the bar of the British compound of the Green Zone, Baghdad) Why America invaded Iraq In March 2003 the US Army, accompanied by forces from the so-called ‘coalition of the willing’, invaded Iraq with the aim of overthrowing Saddam Hussein. The architects of the invasion, US […]
In Monty Python’s film, “The Life of Brian,” the lead character hangs hopelessly on the cross when a small army arrives to rescue him. His relief is short-lived as Otto, the leader, promptly announces that they are the crack suicide squad trained to kill themselves “within 20 seconds.” The scene came to mind yesterday as […]
Radio NZ reports that Minister for Social Development Carmel Sepuloni was on the campaign trail in Christchurch yesterday defending her government’s performance. She said that: “Her government had seen higher numbers of beneficiaries moving into jobs …” Yet the numbers on a Jobseeker benefit continue to climb. Technically her assertion may be true but it’s…
I don’t know how Anna Krylov manages to sustain a successful career as an accomplished and honored theoretical and quantum chemist at the University of Southern California—while at the same time turning out long and thoughtful pieces that attack the ruination of science by the Authoritarian Left. She was, for example, the main author of […]
When I meet Americans who self-identify as “socialists,” it is quite uncommon for them to advocate the abolition of private property and the “collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods”–which is the dictionary definition of socialism. Instead most of the American “socialists” I meet favor a more…
If a drug or medical device has already gone through the regulatory gauntlet at the FDA and Australia, or in the UK and Canada, or the EU and Taiwan, or Switzerland and Singapore, does it seem all that likely that Medsafe’s going to find anything that everyone else missed?Sure, Medsafe has ‘expedited’ processes for drugs…
It is election season, and since the performance of the economy enables (or disables) so much of what political parties want to do, or to spend, it is worth having a look at a few charts. There have been plenty on inflation this year, and plenty of fiscal policy in just the last few weeks. […]
It is of course precarious to criticize the present-day worship of “indigenous knowledge”, as it’s all too easy to dismiss that criticism as racism or bigotry. The problem is not that the empirical knowledge of indigenous people is worthless, because it isn’t. Although it’s often derived from trial and error, that is still a way […]
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
In Hume’s spirit, I will attempt to serve as an ambassador from my world of economics, and help in “finding topics of conversation fit for the entertainment of rational creatures.”
“We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. We know that in secrecy error undetected will flourish and subvert”. - J Robert Oppenheimer.
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