Crony capitalism

Greenfail Number–What Are We Up To Now? Ethanol

Featured image From the Telegraph, a report on a new study that finds “Biofuels are ‘worse than petrol’ for the environment.” “Green” biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel are in fact worse for the environment than petrol, a landmark new study has found. This, of course, assumes that emitting CO2 is bad. The alternative energy source has long been praised for being carbon-neutral because the plants it is made from absorb carbon »

Can Hillary be bought? Elizabeth Warren thinks so

Featured image Hillary Clinton responds to criticism over the speaking fees she has received from corporate America, and Wall Street in particular, by challenging critics to cite one vote in which, as a Senator, she bowed to these interests. When she used this response last night, Bernie Sanders failed to cite any such vote. But Elizabeth Warren has cited one. America Rising calls attention to the following exchange between Warren and Bill »

Renewable Cronyism

Featured image I take a more benign view than most conservatives of some of the dreadful budget compromises of the recent omnibus, because spending packages are always going to contain a lot of give and take. Better to look at the long game, to judge if any small victories or compromises may make possible better outcomes down the road. Such small details are as unsatisfying as cold peas, and often don’t pan »

Taking the Pope to School

Featured image A number of people have pointed out that one of the problems with Pope Francis’s views about “capitalism” is that he’s never actually seen it, as his home nation of Argentina (along with much of the rest of Latin America) practices what is better understood as “corporatism,” which is crony capitalism on steroids—not even capitalism at all. Ian Vasquez of the Cato Institute, citing the database of the invaluable HumanProgress »

Trump tests the intelligence of populists

Featured image It’s well documented that until fairly recently Donald Trump was a Democrat and that he took mostly liberal positions on major issues. But Kevin Williamson deepens our understanding of Trump’s non-conservatism — as well as his deep cynicism — by looking at how the tycoon has tried to influence American politics through money. Williamson makes his point by comparing Trump to others who, as Donald likes to say, are “really »

What Sen. Cruz said

Featured image The charter for the Export-Import Bank ended on June 30. That’s the good news. Congress now seems to be resurrecting the bank. That’s the bad news. The Wall Street Journal editorial reporting the events in process is “Raising Ex-Im from the dead” (accessible via Google here). The Journal editorial states that, as part of the trade bill jostling, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell promised Democrats a vote on renewing the »

Is the Government Mandating Incompetent Banking?

Featured image For years, I heard from my friends in the banking industry that the government was requiring them to make bad loans. They could stand it, on account of Freddie and Fannie taking the risk off their hands and transferring it to the taxpayers, at least as far as mortgages were concerned, although the bad loans didn’t end there. We all know how that turned out. Dodd-Frank, legislation that was passed »

A Desire Named Streetcar

Featured image After the fetish for renewable energy that’s expensive and intermittent, the greatest fixation of the utopian left is mass transit, especially light rail—a 19th century technology for 21st century mobility needs. (Who says the left isn’t reactionary?) It has long been an embarrassment that the cars for our various light rail systems that taxpayers have been massively subsidizing come mostly from overseas manufacturers. That’s why one of the items buried »

The sun ain’t gonna shine anymore

Featured image Reader Martin Karo brings us up to date on a story that has not received anywhere near enough attention: No doubt most readers know of the $2.2 billion Ivanpah solar plant, a huge project in the Mojave Desert which is easily visible from many planes flying in the Los Angeles – Las Vegas vicinity. It has been controversial from even before its start — it required relocating large numbers of »

Is Nancy Pelosi a crook?

Featured image Lachlan Marklay, writing in the Washington Free Beacon, reports that Nancy Pelosi steered more than a billion dollars in subsidies to a light rail project that benefitted a company run by a high-dollar Democratic donor and in which her husband is a major investor. Here, according to Marklay, is how the scheme operated: Pelosi has worked for more than a decade to steer taxpayer funds to a light rail project »

Charles Koch: How to Get Our Economy Moving Again

Featured image If there is anyone in the world who knows how to create wealth and generate good, high-paying jobs, it is Charles Koch. In USA Today, Koch sets out a basic prescription for how to improve our economy, accompanied by some eye-popping statistics: Like most Americans, I am deeply concerned about our weak economic recovery and its effects on millions of families. Opportunity, especially for the young and disadvantaged, is declining. »

Crony capitalism and the GOP fault line

Featured image Yesterday, I discussed a new study by the Pew Research Center. It identifies two main groups of Republicans — “business conservatives” and “staunch conservatives.” The two factions agree on much, but they part company when it comes to their attitude towards corporations. Most steadfast conservatives say too much power is concentrated in the hands of a few large companies, and they are evenly split as to whether the economic system »

Listen To My Interview on the Bill Bennett Show re Tom Steyer

Featured image Wednesday morning on the Bill Bennett show, Bill and I talked about Tom Steyer, the Democrats’ top money man, and my post The Epic Hypocrisy of Tom Steyer. They have sent me the audio file of the interview, so you can play it right here. It is around 16 minutes long, and includes some calls: Bill has a great show; among its many virtues is the fact that, as you »

Listen To My Interview on the Hugh Hewitt Show re Tom Steyer

Featured image Last night on the Hugh Hewitt show, Hugh and I talked about Tom Steyer, the Democrats’ top money man, and my post The Epic Hypocrisy of Tom Steyer. Someone put the audio of the interview up on YouTube, along with some apt graphics. So here it is; the interview runs a little over eight minutes: Hugh is hitting the Steyer story hard, on his radio show, his web site and »

Media Alert

Featured image I will be on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show this afternoon at 6:20 EST, 5:20 CST, talking about the epic hypocrisy of Tom Steyer, which Hugh commented on here. If you are not sure where to find Hugh on your radio dial, you can listen online here. »

The Epic Hypocrisy of Tom Steyer

Featured image Billionaire hedge fund operator and “green” energy magnate Tom Steyer has pledged $100 million in the 2014 election cycle to help Democratic candidates who oppose the Keystone pipeline and who favor “green” energy over fossil fuels. Steyer claims to be a man of principle who has no financial interest in the causes he supports, but acts only for the public good. That is a ridiculous claim: Steyer is the ultimate »

Harry Reid’s Less-Than-Magnificent Obsession

Featured image The Democrats are agitating to raise the minimum wage, unemployment be damned. That was the point of this tweet by Harry Reid, earlier today: Reid’s tweet is dumb on any number of levels: 1) The economy has been far from uniform over recent decades; it is particularly during the seven years during which Reid has been Majority Leader of the Senate that middle-class Americans have suffered. Reid, of course, takes »