Economy
Returning Trump To The White House Would Reverse Biden’s ‘Energy Ideocracy
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
With a second term for former President Donald Trump suddenly seeming far more likely in the wake of President Joe Biden’s shocking debate performance, the decision by a Louisiana federal judge Monday to place a hold on the Biden Energy Department’s bizarre “pause” on Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) permitting highlights a clear example of how energy policy would shift with a Trump win in November.
In rendering his decision, Federal District Judge James Cain, Jr. called the justifications for the paus offered by Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm and DOE staff “completely without reason or logic and is perhaps the epiphany of ideocracy.”
Oof. Of course, that is pretty much what I wrote here about it back in February after the policy was put in place, though I did leave out the part about “ideocracy.”
Simply put, a second Trump presidency would put a quick end to interventionist efforts by the federal government to pick winners and losers in the energy space. Such ideocratic efforts have throughout history most often created unintended consequences that do great damage to impacted industries and the overall economy.
Indeed, Biden’s ideocratic efforts to force adoption of electric vehicles on an increasingly reluctant American public are already doing great damage to the domestic auto industry.
Last month, Fisker became the latest in a succession of pure-play EV makers to go into bankruptcy. Peer company Rivian was teetering on the brink of having to make a similar move before it was bailed out by angel investor Volkswagen’s pledge to pour $5 billion of new capital into its operations in the coming years.
Ford Motor Company has struggled in its own efforts to mount a successful line of EVs, reporting billions of dollars in losses in the process. Investor pressures became so intense after the company lost $132,000 on every unit sold in Q1 2024 that management announced a move to delay and cancel billions in planned additional EV investments in favor of shifting focus to hybrid cars instead.
Biden’s and Interior Secretary Deb Haaland’s similarly ideocratic efforts to subsidize massive wind developments off the North Atlantic shores of New England have predictably produced similarly damaging results. A parade of planned projects by major wind developers like Equinor, Orsted, and BP have been cancelled as Biden-induced inflation caused their costs to mushroom. A few have been renewed, but with renegotiated power supply rates that will cause utility customers’ bills to explode. Add to that the fact that at least 98 marine mammals — some listed as endangered species — have washed up dead on the beaches of New Jersey alone as wind development has ramped up. You can also add ecological disaster to the economic damage related to this ideocratic pursuit.
Economic and other displacements related to Biden’s ideocratic subsidies for wind and solar industrial installations onshore have become so noticeable and impactful that they are now being opposed in local communities all over the country, with many being rejected outright. Energy Analyst Robert Bryce keeps an excellent comprehensive database of these rejections at his own website.
Even with the local pushback, though, many more proposed wind and solar sites have been approved and developed while benefitting from an array of federal and state subsidies and tax incentives. Unfortunately, the flooding of power grids in Texas and across the rest of the country with unpredictable intermittent generation has had the ideocratic impact of dramatically reducing the stability and reliability of electricity service across the country.
The simple truth is that, in describing the Biden/Granholm LNG permitting pause as “perhaps the epiphany of ideocracy,” Judge Cain could have just as well have been describing the entirety of the administration’s energy policies.
I am asked every day by friends, family and readers alike what changes a second Trump administration would bring to energy policy. It is a question I have always struggled to answer in 50 words or less.
But now, thanks to Judge Cain, I will have a ready answer: “Trump would reverse Biden’s energy ideocracy.”
David Blackmon is an energy writer and consultant based in Texas. He spent 40 years in the oil and gas business, where he specialized in public policy and communications.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Featured Image Credit: Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz
Business
Opposition leader Poilievre calling for end of prorogation to deal with Trump’s tariffs
From Conservative Party Communications
The Hon. Pierre Poilievre, Leader of the Conservative Party of Canada and the Official Opposition, released the following statement on the threat of tariffs from the US:
“Canada is facing a critical challenge. On February 1st we are facing the risk of unjustified 25% tariffs by our largest trading partner that would have damaging consequences across our country. Our American counterparts say they want to stop the illegal flow of drugs and other criminal activity at our border. The Liberal government admits their weak border is a problem. That is why they announced a multibillion-dollar border plan—a plan they cannot fund because they shut down Parliament, preventing MPs and Senators from authorizing the funds.
“We also need retaliatory tariffs, something that requires urgent Parliamentary consideration.
“Yet, Liberals have shut Parliament in the middle of this crisis. Canada has never been so weak, and things have never been so out of control. Liberals are putting themselves and their leadership politics ahead of the country. Freeland and Carney are fighting for power rather than fighting for Canada.
“Common Sense Conservatives are calling for Trudeau to reopen Parliament now to pass new border controls, agree on trade retaliation and prepare a plan to rescue Canada’s weak economy.
“The Prime Minister has the power to ask the Governor General to cut short prorogation and get our Parliament working.
“Open Parliament. Take back control. Put Canada First.”
Carbon Tax
Carbon tax tripping up Liberal leadership hopefuls
The Liberals and progressives everywhere were so close. At the height of their influence, no one, certainly anywhere in the English speaking world could make this claim: “Climate change IS NOT an existential threat to planet earth.” Those who did were immediately sidelined, ostracized by their cohorts, dismissed by corporate media and social media behemoths. Sure the battle still rages, but only in their information world where you still see phrases like “climate change denialist”.
You see their information world has not yet realized something new has happened. History writers will say Elon Musk stopped the progressives in their tracks by buying Twitter, releasing the Twitter files and eventually with Donald Trump, swinging the information world in the direction of X. If you have doubts just look at this picture. While the Twitter files reveal the new information world was under the, let’s say ‘secret influence’ of the White House, this photo shows those same tech power brokers are publicly, and happily celebrating the man they worked secretly to bring down. Or at least they’re not ashamed to publicly text their friends about it. The fact they’re not hiding probably reveals their eager support.
Sometimes we find it’s the people we look down our noses at who make all the difference. Like those overweight beer-guzzling hunter types who wear the red hats. (No not the Roman Cardinals, but the Appalachian trailer house occupants). These conspiracy theorists started to proclaim that the world would in fact not burn up by next weekend. Sure many of these seemed to be the same people who claim the world is flat and their neighbor is from another planet. But then more people stepped forward. Not about ‘pancake Earth’, but about the existential threat of climate change.
Family members and friends scorned and ridiculed them, and many still do. They were outraged that a regular citizen would dare to share information from a completely sane climate scientist or researcher who did not agree with the majority. They’d lose their marbles on those silly enough to cite a peer reviewed scientific paper. IF anyone was bold enough to take the time to read an entire report from NASA or Environment Canada, well you’d certainly hear someone say “You fool! You can’t do your own research!! You’re not a scientist!!”
Fortunately, funny man podcaster Jimmy Dore has the perfect comeback for these situations. Dore says when his own friends warned him only a Conspiracy Theorist would do his own research, he replied “You know before COVID doing your own research used to be called… reading”. It’s really worth two minutes to check this out. If you don’t find it funny, really funny, then I’m sorry. One day you will.
Jimmy Dore on the shaming of doing your own research and questioning the narrative during the Covid era…pic.twitter.com/PxCRVgklbj
— James Melville 🚜 (@JamesMelville) January 2, 2024
Speaking of reading, in the days before the printing press the Church and various wildly wealthy monarchs had a stranglehold on information sharing. Those who contradicted the party line could have their heads chopped off by a guillotine bought and paid for with their meagre tax offerings, or, they could expect to be publicly shamed and eternally condemned by their local preacher. Sure some of them probably deserved it but who am I to judge?
Then the printing press was invented. At first the Church leaders said, “Great now everyone can be educated, learn to read and even write themselves, and study the Bible on their own!” Eventually some of those same leaders said, “THIS IS A DISASTER! Everyone can be educated, learn to read and even write themselves, and study the Bible on their own!” After a few centuries the power structures in Europe completely changed. The Church divided into thousands of Protestant movements and the Catholic Church forever lost the political clout it never should have appreciated. Universities sprung up around libraries. Monarchs handed over power to early democratic governments. Books about science lead to scientific innovations. Average Joe’s eventually moved from underground mud huts to middle class condos in the sky.
Well the same thing is happening now with the internet. Except at breakneck speed. What took the printing press hundreds of years to accomplish, takes the internet a few months. The emergence and re-emergence of Trump Presidencies, revolutions against power structures, could not have been accomplished without the way we get information on the internet.
Sure there’s a lot of murky confusion as corporate media used to their powerful podiums of the printing press and cable tv are moving their content over to the new medium. But they’re being (sorry it’s all over, they have been) overtaken by the new form of information sharing. We’ve gone from headlines and ten second sound bites, to three hour long conversations with plenty of time for explaining and context. That’s something cable tv just didn’t have enough bandwidth to deliver.
So what does this mean for people trying to buy 1,200 square foot condos in Canada today?
Well we get to watch the power brokers struggle to retain their grip on / over our lives.
Those running to replace the son of … Hmm. Here’s a perfect example. Depending upon where you get your information from he’s either the son of Pierre, or he has an incomprehensively uncanny and impossibly accidental resemblance to a close personal family friend.
Those running to replace Liberal Leader Justin (let’s leave the last name out until the DNA results are back) definitely believe his father is Pierre. They believe Russians are our enemies. They think COVID vaccines saved the world. They think NATO is protecting Ukraine. And they certainly believe if we pay higher taxes in Canada we’ll save the world from the temperatures many of us pay thousands of dollars to escape to for a few days for six months of the year.
Carney, Gould, and Freeland don’t seem to realize everyday Canadians are simply done with the idea that a Carbon Tax in any form is going to save the world. Thanks to the internet, regular folks/voters have had time to do a little reading and listen to a few long conversations about this. Average people are understanding that CO2 makes up not 40% or 60% of the atmosphere, but .04%. Of that .04%, less than 4% is caused by humans. Mathematically it’s silly to think that paying more for food and groceries and everything else in Rosetown, Saskatchewan or Red Deer, Alberta is going to stop, slow down, or make any difference at all to global temperatures in 20 years.
It’s ironic that it’s the modern progressive movement who are stuck in the old information age. You’d think the slower thinking conservatives would hold on to the old ways and they’d be the ones trying to enforce restrictions on the new communication movement. Somehow the self proclaimed forward looking progressives are the ones trying to censor. Maybe it does make sense. Conservatives are more likely to read their history. They know the ones who censor are always trying to retain their failing grasp on power. New information consumers are ready, willing, and annoyingly attempting to debate. But there’s no debate for those who say “The science is settled.” I guess that means they’re all finished learning things.
Sorry to the Liberal Leadership hopefuls. They haven’t heard the news. Well actually they have and that’s the problem. Instead of paying attention to what’s really happening, they’re dismissing everything and everyone who doesn’t appear on the cable news channels.. other than to be ridiculed that is.
I leave you with this short video from Franco Terrazzano of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Franco explains how those vying for control of the PMO are tripping over their new versions of an old and failed Carbon Tax. Pity them. They don’t realize voters have moved on.
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