Utopia, you are standing in it!

It is a long time now that I wanted to have a deeper look into the cost of systems based on intermittent power sources, but didn’t know where to begin. That is why I was very interested when I came across a cleantechnica article by Georg Nitsche who created a renewable electricity calculator in order […]

Looking into a 100 percent Renewable Electricity Calculator for the United States: overview

It is remarkable but true that per capita US economic growth has hewed close to a trendline of 2% per year for the last 150 years. Here’s a recent figure showing this pattern from Charles Jones in his paper “The Outlook for Long-Term Economic Growth,” as prepared for the annual symposium at Jackson Hole hosted…

The Remarkable Steadiness of US Economic Growth

Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson 688 pages Simon & Schuster Published: Sept 2023 Despite my bias against biographies of people whose lives are still unfolding, Walter Isaacson’s review of Elon Musk proved irresistibly tempting. I was lured by the prospect of gaining insight into Musk’s entrepreneurial magic and the possibility of understanding what makes this […]

Unrelated Reading: “Elon Musk” by Walter Isaacson

Operation Market Garden was a failed operation by the allied forces, which would have dire consequences for the Netherlands in the winter that followed. Irish journalist and author, Cornelius Ryan wrote the book “A Bridge too Far” about the operation. Market Garden was divided in two parts. Market: airborne forces of Lieutenant General Lewis H. […]

Market Garden

Wind and solar have lost their ‘social licence’; the masses no longer believe the ‘clean and green’ propaganda. Wrecked communities, wrecked environments and wrecked economies are too difficult to hide or spin away. Once people get a grip on the great wind and solar scam, their conversion is irreversible. The original trope had it that […]

Clean, Safe & Reliable Nuclear Power the Environment’s Best Friend

James Francis Edward Stuart (June 10, 1688 – January 1, 1766), nicknamed the Old Pretender by Whigs, was the son of King James II-VII of England, Scotland and Ireland, and his second wife, Mary of Modena, (Maria Beatrice d’Este), the second (but eldest surviving) child of Alfonso IV, Duke of Modena, and his wife, Laura […]

September 16, 1701: Prince James, the Prince of Wales claims the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland. Part I.

The problem with taking GST off of food has little to do with the revenue cost of the policy, it’s that it’s just dumb to begin with. Any gains to households are smaller than those that could be achieved through other instruments, and there’s long-term cost to the integrity of the tax system. So I […]

ERIC CRAMPTON: Foreign buyer taxes

If Labour ministers and our left-leaning media knew more about New Zealand’s political history they would stop giving so much publicity to National’s tax-cut plans, ill-advised though they might be. The attacks are only increasing the likelihood that National will be elected. In one celebrated election, 1928, the government and the media concentrated so much…

MICHAEL BASSETT: OUR MEDIA STILL DON’T GET IT

I recently wrote a column about five facts that justified the start of an impeachment inquiry. While I have stressed that I do not believe that there is currently sufficient evidence for an actual impeachment, I am mystified by the claim that there is not ample evidence to warrant an inquiry into possible impeachable offenses.…

CNN’s Makes the Case for an Impeachment Inquiry

Populism at the country level is at an all-time high, with more than 25% of nations currently governed by populists. How do economies perform under populist leaders? We build a new long run cross- country database to study the macroeconomic history of populism. We identify 51 populist presidents and prime ministers from 1900 to 2020 […]

Populism fact of the day

Is it okay for oppressed minorities to evince blatantly racist attitudes, claiming, for example, that they are “genetically superior to other groups”? (Needless to say, the claim I’m discussing here is not backed by evidence.) I’d argue that no, dismissing entire groups as inferior based purely on stereotypes is wrong, whoever does it. But it’s […]

Co-leader of N.Z.’s Māori Party claims that Māori are a genetically superior group

By Paul Homewood Who cares about whales? Whales might be dying because of sonar surveying, but Greenpeace simply ignores the science that doesn’t suit it.

Why Won’t Greenpeace Admit Wind Turbines May Be Killing Whales?

In my study of European Royalty and the history of monarchy in general one of the things that I’ve learned is that the concept of monarchy has been in a constant state of evolution and adaptation. I even see that here with the development of the title and position of Roman Emperor. To historians, and […]

When is an Emperor not an Emperor? Caesar Augustus. Part I.

That was a weird 24 hours or so. If you had told me a week ago that anything I was involved with would be the lead item on Morning Report and on the two TV channels’ evening news bulletins, I would not have believed you. Election campaigns are funny things. I don’t want to say […]

The fiscal gap that is macroeconomically significant

Throughout the English Civil Wars, it was common for people to switch sides between Parliamentarians and Royalists; these people earned the nickname ‘turncoat’. Dr Patrick Little from our Lords 1640-1660 project explores two obscure figures in the Civil Wars and why they became turncoats. The English Civil War divided communities along religious and political lines. But […]

Changing sides: ‘turncoats’ in the English Civil Wars