“Locavores” believe that food produced near final consumers is superior in myriads of ways to distant imports. While they might disagree among themselves on what exactly constitutes a “local foodshed” (a 100-mile radius or the whole state of California?), they have for the most part internalized long standing populist and romantic grievances against modern agricultural science, fossil fuels, large corporations and globalization.
As they see things, our modern-day genetically-modified “corn-utopia” is soaking up a rapidly vanishing petroleum pool while delivering junk food, cancer epidemics, rural poverty, and agricultural pollution. The way forward, they tell us, actually requires several steps backward to a simpler time when consumers personally knew and trusted the farmers that fed them…
Belief Confronts Reality
Fortunately, the locavores’ dire vision is at odds with the relevant data. Although it undoubtedly pains most of them to hear this, we live (much) longer and healthier lives than our ancestors; the overall state of our environment has improved significantly over the last century; and our food supply is cheaper, safer and more secure than ever before.…
Continue ReadingLast Saturday, I spoke at the American for Prosperity’s Defending the American Dream Summit in Washington, D.C. I was one of three presenters on energy and energy/environmental issues.
Dan Simmons of the Institute for Energy Research documented the U.S.’s abundance of energy resources from two studies he helped put together: North American Energy Inventory and Hard Facts. Myron Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute reviewed climate change issues and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s war on coal.
I took a different tact and would like to highlight some of the points I made in this post.
Time to Reprioritize?
As tragic as Obama’s policies have been to the fossil industry, and as wasteful as his fetish over “green jobs” has been to the taxpayer, emphasizing these points of disagreement with his administration overlooks a much more serious sleeping energy giant—electric industry policy.…
Continue Reading“[Romney] will allow the wind credit to expire, end the stimulus boondoggles and create a level playing field on which all sources of energy can compete on their merits.”
– Romney campaign spokesman, “Wind Energy Tax Credit Splits Obama, Romney,” Des Moines Register, July 30, 2012.
The extension of the 20-year old Production Tax Credit (PTC) for windpower and other qualifying renewable energy is a wedge issue in the national political campaign. And with growing state-level pushback against government subsidies for qualifying renewables, it is time to ‘put-up-or-shut-up’ for on-grid wind and solar technologies.
And it was VERY good news that the Romney campaign issued a statement two days ago officially opposing an extension of the wind PTC. The other side wants him to walk it back, but few tangibles epitomize the fluff and failure of government-knows-best than taxpayer investments in wind power and solar power
AWEA: In Panic Mode
Meanwhile, the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) has pumped millions of dollars into a lobbying campaign to secure the PTC’s extension.…
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