The Real Insurrectionists: The Federal Workforce

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  • The word “insurrection” has been liberally applied in the press to describe the January 6, 2021, Capitol Hill riot that ended with intrusion by demonstrators into the Capitol Building.

  • If the word “insurrection” can be applied there, then how about to the current efforts of federal bureaucrats to insulate themselves and their chosen policies from the control of newly re-elected President Trump?

  • In this post on October 1 (title: “The Greater ‘Threat To Democracy’ — Part III: Democrats Rule Even If Republicans Win”), I discussed multiple instances of efforts within the Biden administration to insulate its policies from getting changed by a new administration elected by the voters. Examples discussed in that post included efforts at NIH and EPA to entrench the idea that “The Science” somehow requires continuation of the policies of the current administration on things like Covid and climate change.

  • In that post, I promised more examples to come. Here is a small roundup:

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Yet Another Unbelievably Stupid Law To Harass The People

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  • Just when you think that things might be about to turn around with regard to the explosion of unbelievably stupid laws and regulations to harass and annoy the people, along comes another one that’s stupid enough to top them all.

  • This one has sprung up seemingly out of nowhere in the past few weeks, in notices that have gone out among the New York co-op and condo communities. But the law’s application is far broader than just these communities. I suspect that many readers have received such notices in many diverse contexts.

  • The law in question is a federal statute called the Corporate Transparency Act.

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A Look At President-Elect Trump's Picks For The Key Energy Policy Positions

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  • Over the past two weeks, President-elect Trump has engaged in rapid-fire announcements of his picks for the cabinet and other top positions.

  • Among the announced selections are Trump’s nominees for the three top positions in climate and energy policy: EPA Administrator (Lee Zeldin), Secretary of Energy (Chris Wright), and Secretary of the Interior (Doug Burgum). In this post I will take a first look at these nominees.

  • Without doubt, these three Trump appointees will be an enormous improvement over the Biden administration functionaries they will replace (EPA Administrator Michael Regan, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, and Interior Secretary Deb Haaland). The three outgoing Bidenauts are all committed fanatic climate warriors, fighting every day to restrict development and use of hydrocarbon fuels, and thus to make America weaker and Americans poorer. Having them in office has been like having the country’s energy policy under the control of a cabal of its worst enemies.

  • But is there anything about President-elect Trump’s nominees for these positions that we should be at least somewhat concerned about?

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What Happens After Major Cuts In Government Spending? The Latest From Argentina

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  • If you believe the messaging of the Trump transition, big cuts in U.S. government spending are coming. Announced cabinet appointments include several who are opponents of the mission of the agencies they will soon be heading. A new Department of Government Efficiency is to be created, headed by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, with instructions to take an ax to wasteful programs.

  • But, assuming that some big cuts actually get implemented, you know what inevitably comes next: Because all government spending is (foolishly) counted as a 100% addition to GDP, the cuts first get recorded as a decline in GDP. Economists on the left (e.g., Krugman) then immediately scream that the cuts have failed, the country has gone into recession, and the people are suffering.

  • In recent U.S. experience, the Republicans have never had the political fortitude to stay the course.

  • But let’s look at the latest news from Argentina.

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

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  • 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.

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Ideas For An Incoming Trump Administration: Climate And Energy Edition

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  • 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:

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