November 14, 2024

Are You Even Aware That There Is Another Big UN Climate Conference Going On?

November 14, 2024/ Francis Menton

The overwhelming focus of the environmental movement over the past three decades and more has been the push to eliminate the use of hydrocarbon fuels and transform the world’s energy system into something based on supposedly cleaner wind and sun.
This effort has always been doomed to failure, because energy produced by wind and sun does not work satisfactorily and is wildly too expensive. So it has long been obvious to the well-informed that this whole effort will inevitably go away at some point. But after the desperate cries of crisis and alarm from thousands of activists for decades on end, and after the trillions of dollars government funds invested, how could that possibly occur?
My prediction has long been that at some point the whole thing would just quietly fade away, as if it had never happened.

November 12, 2024

Ideas For An Incoming Trump Administration: Climate And Energy Edition

November 12, 2024/ Francis Menton

The arena of climate and energy is sufficiently large that it deserves its own post of ideas for the incoming Trump administration. The Biden people went so far off the rails in this area that there are far more topics than I can cover. I’ll have to stick to some highlights.
Communications.
As I noted in the previous post, changing the communications of the prior administration should be an easy and obvious first priority. However, the Trump people notably did a poor job on this subject the first time out.
The subject of climate and energy is pervasive through the websites of dozens of federal agencies. Let’s just note a few examples:

November 08, 2024

November 08, 2024/ Francis Menton

Eight years ago, the incoming Trump administration did not “hit the ground running,” to say the least. Indeed, many have speculated that Trump was surprised that he had won.
Whether or not that is true, he was not ready with a slate of people to fill the top cabinet and other posts. On top of that, many of his early initiatives quickly got stalled or hobbled by an orchestrated barrage of attacks from the Deep State.
This time around, I expect a very different scenario. The Trump transition project looks much better prepared. Nobody is going to buy the kind of Deep State scams that stalled Trump’s first administration. Both houses of Congress look like they will be supportive. There is a real opportunity for Trump’s team to come in with an immediate “shock and awe” cascade of initiatives to put the Deep State on the back foot.
So herewith some ideas for early actions that I would hope Trump will take.

November 06, 2024

November 06, 2024/ Francis Menton

Donald Trump has now decisively won the presidency. I have a big collection of ideas for him on things to do once he takes office. So far, I’ve been holding off on writing about those ideas, not wanting to get ahead of myself only to then have him lose the election. Now, the gates can open.
But for today, I have another topic to consider: the relatively tiny shift in party control of seats in the House of Representatives. Indeed, the shift is so small that it is not even completely clear at this writing that the Republicans will control the House. (Current betting odds are around 91% that Republicans will retain control.). Why didn’t Trump have any meaningful coattails in the House? The answer to that question can give some insights into how the respective parties’ odds might change the next time out.
From what I could observe in my own region, a big part of the answer to the question lies in the issue of abortion.

November 03, 2024

November 03, 2024/ Francis Menton

Without doubt, Vice President Kamala Harris has made it as difficult as possible to pin down exactly where she stands on major policy issues.
Besides studiously avoiding challenging interviews, she has also made a series of notable reversals of previous policy stances, for example abandoning previous support for banning private health insurance, for banning “fracking” for oil and gas, and for banning internal combustion cars.
These are all huge issues. If she has walked away from all of these positions, then how can you tell where she stands on anything?
Actually, I would submit that it is easy to figure out how Harris will govern on almost any issue.

November 02, 2024

November 02, 2024/ Francis Menton

In a post on October 23, I noted that, during this election cycle, “energy realism” has suddenly become a positive electoral issue for Republicans.
The positive electoral effect comes from pointing out that a forced energy transition increases consumer costs, limits choice, and destroys jobs. Examples cited included President Trump’s use in his campaign in Michigan of the Biden-Harris regulations restricting combustion vehicles, and his use in Pennsylvania of Harris statements that she would ban fracking.
But there is another approach out there to the subject of energy realism, which has been taken up by many Republican candidates and energy think tanks. That approach goes by the name “all of the above.”