[Editor note: Political capitalism, aka crony capitalism, is a major theme at MasterResource because special government favor enables three major energies: ethanol, wind power, and on-grid solar power. Gabriel Kolko, a socialist-leaning historian, popularized the term political capitalism — and concluded, with few exceptions, that business led government, rather than government (reformers) led industry, into interventionism. Kolko overstated his case, however, as this post contends, misleading free-market proponents of Kolko and political capitalism.]

“Bradley and Donway closely analyze Gabriel Kolko’s contention that nineteenth-century railroad officials sought regulation, identifying mistaken notions about private property and capitalism, as well as Kolko’s uncritical reliance on railroad statements that were coerced by the threat of legislation, weak citations, and misquotes.”

We can thank New Left historian Gabriel Kolko for the modern concept of “political capitalism” and its offspring, “regulatory capture.”…

[Editor’s note: This post from 2011 is relevant today as the Losing Left tries to impugn the motives of the free-market climate/energy realists, one target being climatologist David Legates, recently profiled at MasterResource.

David Appell, part of the controversy back in 2011, in fact, reared his head again in the comments section recently at MasterResource. An active climate alarmist with very strong opinions, he hardly rebuted his rebutters. Science is supposed to be his thing; if he would like to answer for Gina McCarthy and US EPA here, he will be given the floor.]

The public editor at the New York Times, Arthur Brisbane, recently wrote in his weekly Public Editor column about the trustworthiness of Robert Bryce, the nation’s leading energy journalist who has graduated to being a top energy public policy scholar, period.…

The Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions (AWED) is an informal coalition of individuals and organizations interested in improving national, state, and local energy & environmental policies. Our basic position is that technical matters like these should be addressed by using Real Science.

 It’s all spelled out atWiseEnergy.org, which is a wealth of energy and environmental resources.

A key element of AWED’s efforts is public education. Towards that end, every 3 weeks we put together a newsletter to balance what is found in the mainstream media about energy and environmental matters. We appreciate MasterResource for their assistance in publishing this information.

—————————

Greed Energy Economics

“$1.7 Trillion Spent… Zero CO2 Abated”

NERA Report on EPA Power Plant Rules

Are Renewables Less Effective Than Energy Efficiency at Reducing CO2

Abandoned Homes Help Us Understand Wind Turbine Annoyance…

“A groundbreaking gathering of the most acclaimed thinkers, scholars, and policymakers on our historic energy revolution, the global prosperity it will produce, and the federal policy that threatens it.”

Date: September 25/26, 2014

Place: Hyatt Regency Houston

Contact: REGISTER NOW

Kudos to the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) for hosting a state-of-the-art climate and energy conference in the nation’s energy capital. The global warming establishment, including many government-grant-dependent local university professors, may stay away. But open-minded Houstonians and visitors will get a multi-disciplinary dose of sound physical science, political economy, and resource economics at this two-day event.

TPPF describes the conference as follows:

At the Crossroads is a unique gathering of the world’s foremost experts, brought together to analyze the historical crossroads at which our county sits. The burgeoning opportunities flowing from the energy revolution are now directly threatened by federal regulatory mandates to displace coal, oil, natural gas.