Energy Subsidies: Cronyism Breeds Cronyism

Nuclear plant owners expand search for rescue to more states, the Associated Press reports;

The natural gas boom that has hammered coal mines and driven down utility bills is hitting nuclear power plants, sending multi-billion-dollar energy companies in search of a financial rescue in states where competitive electricity markets have compounded the effect.

The plant owners' strategy is similar to that in Illinois and New York: give nuclear power megawatts the kind of preferential treatment and premium payments that are given to renewable energies, such as wind and solar.

New Jersey is in on the act. Public Service Electric and Gas (PSEG) succeeded in getting a nuclear  “bailout” bill through the legislature and sent to Governor Murphy. The same bill required a compromise, via a companion bill, creating massive new subsidies--labeled “incentives,” not bailouts) for unreliables solar and wind.

As usual, cronyism breeds cronyism. “That guy’s getting a subsidy, so why not me.” How about eliminating the "preferential treatment and premium payments" throughout the energy industry, and letting market forces—the cumulative individual voluntary choices of producers and consumers—determine energy sources?

Related Reading:

Free the Market to Sort Out the Future Course of the Energy Industry

If ‘Renewable Energy’ Technology Has Truly ‘Proven Itself,’ Why Does the Renewable Industry Need NJ’s 80% 'Renewable' Mandate?

Climate Change Catastrophists Who Oppose Nuclear have Anti-Humanist Premises

Drug Advertising: New Zealand and the USA are Right, and the Rest of the World is Wrong

A New Jersey Star-Ledger letter, Drug advertising dangerous, argues against prescription drug advertising, concluding

There are only two countries in the world that allow direct to consumer pharmaceutical advertising: New Zealand and the USA. I wonder why?

The implication—the author doesn’t answer his own question—is that Pharmaceutical companies engage in deceptive advertising because they “put profits over people.” But who is really putting dollars over patient health?

I left these comments:

“There are only two countries in the world that allow direct to consumer pharmaceutical advertising: New Zealand and the USA. I wonder why?”

Because New Zealand and the USA are the only two countries that respect pharma companies’ freedom of speech and consumers’ right to take the responsibility to rationally judge for themselves what medical options there are. Other countries—all of whom have some form of socialized, government-funded healthcare—would rather put cost above healthcare needs. They’d rather let people suffer and die needlessly rather than spend the money, as their systems go broke. It’s easier to get away with their blood savings when people are less likely to be informed of all of the options available.

False advertising can be dealt with through criminal fraud laws. Otherwise, government should protect the rights of the pharmaceutical companies to advertise the life-enhancing, life-saving prescription drugs they produce and of consumers who want to be informed. Anyone is free to ignore the advertisements, or to refuse to buy the drugs. But, for Levin and his ilk to demand to use the government’s guns to outlaw the advertisements is just plain thuggery. We should prefer live-and-let-live. It is immoral, not to mention unconstitutional, to legally ban drug advertising. It inhibits free trade and free speech, two inalienable individual rights.

-------------------------------------

When governments pay, they have a vested incentive to control the treatment narrative. Another important question to ask is, “All but two countries in the world, New Zealand and the USA, legally ban prescription drug advertising. Why is that?” Maybe it’s because state bureaucrats don't want to be bothered by more informed consumers asking about other treatment options or learning about new advanced drug options that are more costly than the state wants to spend. Can there be any other reason?

Related Reading:

Pharmaphobia—Thomas P. Stossel

On Mylan’s EpiPen Pricing Controversy

Challenge the ‘100% Renewables” Fanatics on their Underlying anti-Humanism

In a New Jersey Star-Ledger column, After outages, Phil Murphy needs to take a look at where electricity comes from, Paul Mulshine once again takes on the anti-pipeliners. He points out the energy disaster now unfolding in another state where Environmentalists have been getting their way, Mulshine believes that “[NJ Governor Phil] Murphy could learn a lot more if he focused his attention on what's been going on this winter in his native state of Massachusetts”:

There, environmental extremists prevailed upon state legislators to prevent the construction of pipeline capacity that could give the state access to the cheap and plentiful natural gas from the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania.

A win for the environment? Not exactly. A recent editorial in the Boston Globe [Our Russian ‘pipeline,’ and its ugly toll] noted that instead of using fracked gas from Pennsylvania, some of the utilities switched to liquefied natural gas from Russia that came in on a tanker.

The editorial noted that the production of imported LNG is both more expensive and more carbon-intensive than domestic gas.

"As a result, to a greater extent than anywhere else in the United States, the Commonwealth now expects people in places like Russia, Trinidad and Tobago, and Yemen to shoulder the environmental burdens of providing natural gas that state policy makers have showily rejected here," it said.

Then there were the utilities that replaced the clean-burning gas with oil and coal, both of which are much dirtier. But so what? The anti-pipeline crowd was appeased.

Unfortunately, the anti-pipeline people are Luddites. You can determine that by going to the website of 350.org, the leading anti-pipeline group.

"Stop Fossil Fuels: Build 100% Renewables," it reads.

In labeling the anti-pipeliners “luddites”, Mulshine undoubtedly refers to their opposition to superior energy technologies, like fracking and pipelines. Nonetheless, I left this comment:

“Unfortunately, the anti-pipeline people are Luddites.”

I think “Luddite” gives them too much credit. The Luddites opposed labor saving machines because they displaced some jobs, which they saw as bad for human well-being. They were wrong. But at least their motive was pro-human.

The anti-pipeline movement is not pro-human. The movement is rooted in Environmentalist ideology that values undisturbed nature over human industrial progress. Why do Environmentalists oppose every reliable economical energy technology? Reliable energy drives industrial progress, so opposing reliables while increasing reliance on unreliable so-called “renewable” energy—they couldn’t get away with opposing all energy—will inhibit further human-caused “environmental destruction”. Since altering nature to human benefit is what industry is all about, the Environmentalists are anti-human well-being, the opposite of the Luddites.

As to [another point Mulshine makes], tree-clearing around power line rights-of-way, I doubt Environmentalists would allow the destruction of trees if they could stop it.

----------------------------------------------------

Even bigger problems could be in store for Massachusetts. As Michael Bastasch reports for The Daily Caller, Rolling Blackouts Could Become A Fact Of Life In New England as new natural gas pipelines are kept from being built and existing coal and nuclear plants—two more reliable energy sources hated by Environmentalists—are slated to be shut down. Unlike the bratty “100% renewables now!” whim-worshipers, energy industrialists look years down the road. We ignore them at our peril. A “100% renewable energy” future is a bleak place for human life.

Related Reading:

Mulshine on the ‘National Anti-Pipeline Movement’

The ‘Jihad on Pipelines,’ New Jersey Front

The Risks of the Pilgrim Pipeline—and the Risks of Not Having Pipelines

Are Pipelines a Threat to Water?

Our Russian ‘pipeline,’ and its ugly toll--the Boston Globe Editorial Board

The End of Doom: Environmental Renewal in the Twenty-first Century—Ronald Bailey
The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels Hardcover—Alex Epstein

The American Dream

At the height of the immigration debate early in 2017, an op-ed published in the Hunterdon County Democrat opined that The promise of the American Dream is in jeopardy. Kira T. Lawrence opens with;

President Donald Trump administration's xenophobic attacks on refugees and immigrants are antithetical to the bedrock values of our nation. They erode our moral standing. They encourage and embolden our enemies and thereby threaten our national security. This is not who we are as a people.

Though a little vague, I agree with the basic sentiment. Trump’s hostility toward immigration is fundamentally opposed to America’s bedrock values. Lawrence goes on;

I grew up learning about an America history defined by the principles of hope, freedom, respect, and opportunity.

This needs clarification. Yes. A hope for a better life based on freedom and respect for the unalienable rights of the individual to his life, liberty, and pursuit of personal happiness is the essence of the American Dream. I have a problem with the last part . . . the “and opportunity.” There is no and opportunity: The freedom is the opportunity. Critically—and though it is implicit in the right to life—one must explicitly add the right to property. Earned property—the material product of one’s own mental and physical labor.

Adam Mossoff puts it succinctly in a Townhall piece, Patents Are Property Rights, Not A “Bizarre Regulatory Lobby”;

On the basis of this classic moral justification for all property rights — that people should have the fruits of their productive labors secured to them as their property — early American legislators and judges secured stable and effective property rights to innovators and creators.

This was part-and-parcel of American exceptionalism.

Mossoff’s piece was focussed on intellectual property rights. But as he understood, the basic principle of rights extends to all earned property.

Back to lawrence, she cites specific personal experiences of people coming to America to escape political and religious oppression or crippling economic destitution—all for the opportunity that freedom and a protective government offered in the way of hope. But;

All of us Americans, save our fellow citizens who are Native Americans, have similar stories. The dates, names, and countries of origin may differ, but the reasons for seeking our shores -- to escape the nightmares of war, violence, famine, and religious persecution and to chase the American Dream -- have not changed.

Why exclude Native Americans, aka American Indians? True, they didn’t literally “come to our shores.” They were already here. And true, the treatment of the Indians by European immigrants was often brutally inhumane. But the Indians didn’t enjoy individual freedom, either. They lived in a tribal “society” that also included “the nightmares of war, violence, famine, and religious persecution.” Yes, it took until the 1920s before American Indians received their full rightful American citizenship. History is messy. But can anyone truly say that life for everyone, including American Indians, is not superior in individual rights-guaranteed America than in any oppressive tribal existence, wherever and however it is manifested?

Lawrence concludes;

If we fail to honor our history, we betray the legacy of our ancestors. If we fail to defend and uphold our core values of freedom, respect, and opportunity, which have made our country a beacon of hope and prosperity around the world, we fundamentally jeopardize the enduring promise of the American Dream.

And we must remember that the American Dream is not some guarantee of prosperity or happiness. It is not the promise of the proverbial house with the white picket fence in the suburbs. It is simply the freedom of all individuals, working and trading, freely expressing themselves, living by their own conscientious beliefs, to pursue prosperity and happiness guaranteed by the unalienable rights to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of one’s own chosen values and goals--the unimpeded pursuit of happiness. It is the guarantee of political equality--that is, equality for all, rich and poor, young and old, of whatever race, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, etc.--that is only possible through equality before the law. It is intellectual, economic, and political freedom all wrapped up into one social system.

That, and only that--the hope and opportunity afforded by freedom based on individual rights--is the American Dream.

Related Reading:

The Declaration of Independence

QUORA: 'Can certain forms of capitalism be made to work for the people instead of just the elite?'

QUORA: Can certain forms of capitalism be made to work for the people instead of just the elite?: The questioner provided the following link as a subtitle--https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/1/31/1477596/-Enjoying-a-better-quality-of

I left this answer:

Capitalism liberates the “common man” to work and trade for his own benefit; to earn and keep property; to worship a God--or not--according to his own conscience; to speak his mind. In other words, capitalism frees the individual from control by elites by recognizing and protecting the unalienable individual rights of all people to live by their own judgement, values, and goals, equally and at all times. Prior to capitalism, aristocratic elites got rich by looting the peasants. Under capitalism, people get rich by trade that enriches others and only with the consent of those they trade with. Capitalism, properly understood, doesn’t “work for” anyone. It comes in only one “form”: It frees people to work for themselves. That is the only “form” capitalism can have.

As to the Daily Kos article Enjoying a better quality of life with Democratic Socialism linked to above, “Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public roads, bridges, schools, parks, water treatment facilities, and more”; yes, they are “all socialism”. And all dependent on exploiting capitalism—that is, on exploiting productive, self-responsible individuals.

Every dime that funds those (and like) government programs is taken by force of taxation from private individuals who earned it. Just look at your paycheck. You can see it. And more is taken stealthily, through corporate and business taxation, or by inflationary central bank money expansion. That money collected by government from private producers is then paid out to private individuals and companies to build and maintain the roads and parks, etc.; or paid out in the form of “government benefits” for retirement, old age healthcare, or “charity” healthcare for the poor.

All of this can be provided privately, if the rights of individuals are respected and as people choose—a choice that, to the extent government steps in, is denied to the “common man” by the socialist elites. It makes no difference whether the elites are elected, appointed by elected officials, or seize power by force: They are still elites who claim the authority to supercede the rights of the “common man”.

It is only capitalism, to the extent it is allowed to flourish, that makes these socialist programs possible. If you doubt that, then consider that every society that has ever existed has had some form of government; a king, a feudal lord, a tribal chief, a church, a dictator, or what have you. Yet through all the centuries, grinding poverty was the norm for “the masses”. Where was the “better quality of life?” Why do we have poverty-ridden so-called “third world countries” today? They have governments, too. Why is it that only countries that have a substantial degree of capitalist freedom can have generous socialist/welfare state programs?

This does not mean that government is, as the Daily Kos charges the political right with claiming, “a bad word.” Properly understood as the liberty rights-protecting, security and order providing institution it should be, government is a necessary good—until and unless it crosses the line into statism. The fact is, so-called democratic socialism—really just the socialist part of a mixed economy—cannot create “a better quality of life” in any general sense. It can, at best, benefit some at the unwilling expense of others. It can make people’s quality of life dependent on government (socialist elites). Governments under democratic socialism are redistributive entities—in effect, money laundering operations, that start with seizing private wealth, cycling it through bureaucratic government mechanisms, and returning it under legitimate-sounding labels like “Medicare” or “public schools”. Democratic socialism only appears to “work” as long as enough capitalism exists to produce the necessary material, financial, and human resources for government officials to seize and exploit. One may argue for any socialist program to be mixed in to the economy by government force. But one cannot argue that, at root, democratic socialism is a parasite on capitalism.

Related Reading:

Mazzucato’s Fantasy: The “Courageous, Entrepreneurial State”

Democratic Socialism: If the Pigs Take Over

Capitalism .org

What is Capitalism—Ayn Rand

* [Quora is a social media website founded by two former Facebook employees. According to Wikipedia:

Quora is a question-and-answer website where questions are created, answered, edited and organized by its community of users. The company was founded in June 2009, and the website was made available to the public on June 21, 2010.[3] Quora aggregates questions and answers to topics. Users can collaborate by editing questions and suggesting edits to other users' answers.[4]

[You can also reply to other users’ answers.]

A Gerrymandering Cure Worse than the Disease

From the Washington Post: Gerrymandering is the biggest obstacle to genuine democracy in the United States. So why is no one protesting?

The United States Constitution assigns state representation in the House of Representatives according to population. This is called “proportional representation.” The greater the population of the state, the more representatives that state has (every state gets at least one.) In states with more than one representative, the state must be carved up into voting districts equal to the total number of representatives, with each representative assigned to each district.

The states’ legislatures then carve up the state into voting districts equal to the number of that state’s representatives. Typically, the state legislators try to carve up the state to better the prospects for whichever party or political faction holds the most power. This is called “gerrymandering.”

Everyone agrees its a corrupt process, or at least less than ideal. Here is what the Washington Post says about gerrymandering, followed by its proposed solution:

There is an enormous paradox at the heart of American democracy. Congress is deeply and stubbornly unpopular. On average, between 10 and 15 percent of Americans approve of Congress – on a par with public support for traffic jams and cockroaches. And yet, in the 2016 election, only eight incumbents – eight out of a body of 435 representatives – were defeated at the polls.

If there is one silver bullet that could fix American democracy, it’s getting rid of gerrymandering – the now commonplace practice of drawing electoral districts in a distorted way for partisan gain. It’s also one of a dwindling number of issues that principled citizens – Democrat and Republican – should be able to agree on.

I am old enough to remember when Democrats held Congress by huge majorities. I don’t remember any Leftist complaining about gerrymandering then. Now that Republicans are competitive, they want to get rid of it. Ok, so what's their plan? Here is how the Left-leaning Washington Post would fix it:

As a result, districts from the Illinois 4th to the North Carolina 12th often look like spilled inkblots rather than coherent voting blocs. They are anything but accidental. The Illinois 4th, for example, is nicknamed “the Latin Earmuffs,” because it connects two predominantly Latino areas by a thin line that is effectively just one road. In so doing, it packs Democrats into a contorted district, ensuring that those voters cast ballots in a safely Democratic preserve. The net result is a weakening of the power of Latino votes and more Republican districts than the electoral math should reasonably yield. Because Democrats are packed together as tightly as possible in one district, Republicans have a chance to win surrounding districts even though they are vastly outnumbered geographically.

Second, fixing gerrymandering is getting easier. Given the right parameters, computer models can fairly apportion citizens into districts that are diverse, competitive and geographically sensible – ensuring that minorities are not used as pawns in a national political game. These efforts can be bolstered by stripping district drawing powers from partisan legislators and putting them into the hands of citizen-led commissions that are comprised by an equal number of Democrat- and Republican-leaning voters. Partisan politics is to be exercised within the districts, not during their formation. But gerrymandering intensifies every decade regardless, because it’s not a politically “sexy” issue. When’s the last time you saw a march against skewed districting?

The highlights are mine.

First, note how the Post assumes Latinos are automatic Democrat voters. This is racist and insulting in itself.

Now consider the solution; computer apportioning by “diversity” (i.e., race), competitiveness (ideology), and geography. This means that a racial and ideological test will have to be applied to each voter before district lines are drawn. The idea that voting preference is predetermined by genetic makeup is blatantly racist. Yet race and ideology are to be a defining characteristic of the Post’s new system. Does it make any difference whether the process is determined by “partisan legislators” or [non-partisan?] “citizen-led commissions” if the process itself is corrupt?

I have no problem with computer modeling. I do have a problem with collectivism. The power of the vote is individual, not collective. There is no such thing as “the power of Latino votes,” or of white votes or blacks votes or and other group assignment. All votes are equally individual (one-person-one-vote) and equally meaningful (or meaningless, to be realistic). There is only the power of the individual votes of individuals, each of whom possess his or her own independent rational mind possessing the capacity to judge for herself.


Gerrymandering is like the weather: everybody talks about it, but nobody does anything about it. Proposals to get rid of it always go nowhere. Maybe it’s in part because the solutions are worse than the problem. The Washington Post’s cure is certainly worse than the disease. You think it’s bad now, when lines are drawn by incumbent politicians? Wait until private citizens start divvying up Congressional delegations according to race and ideology!

The U.S. Constitution mandates that proportional representation shall be determined by population based on a census. Nothing more. (see Article I, section 2, clause 3 and Amendment XIV, section 2) The only fair way to divide up the districts is to follow the Constitution; count people regardless of race, ideology, or any other group characteristic. A computer program can easily do it. All you need is a programmer with a copy of the latest census.

Related Reading:

Voting Rights are Not the ‘Most Fundamental Right’—or Even a Fundamental Right

Memo to John D. Atlas: How About Let's Not Suppress Anybody's Vote, or Voice

Racism is Alive and Thriving on the Left

Democracy Fundamentalism vs. Americanism

Is the right to vote a fundamental inalienable right or a derivative civil right? The answer to that question will largely determine the future of Americanism.

The right to vote is important. But there is a stark difference between the Progressives’ concept of the vote and the vote in a free society. In a free society—that is, in the original American concept of republican government—the voting majority's will as expressed by the government officials it elects (and their appointees) is limited by iron-clad constitutional protection of individual rights.

For Progressives (or “liberals” or Leftists), the voting majority’s will is not limited in such a way. In a free society, individual rights trump the vote: that is, the losing minority in an election have nothing to fear from the politicians elected by the other side, because the politicians have no power to legislate or regulate away the losing side’s (or anyone’s) individual rights, thanks to “iron-clad constitutional protection of individual rights.”

To a Progressive, the vote supersedes individual rights. The only right that is unalienable is the right to vote. All other rights, such as rights to property and trade, and speech, are subordinated to approval of the vote.

In a constitutional republic, the ballot box is an instrument of liberation, reinforcing and extending individuals’ rights to control their own destiny. Since the government’s job is to protect individual rights, it stands to reason that the people have the right to decide, through popular elections, the individuals and methods—the “just powers”—for protecting their rights. The people’s right to choose their political leaders is derived from—but can never supersede—the individual’s right to his life, liberty, property earned through production and trade, and pursuit of happiness.

In a Democracy, the ballot box is an instrument of government-granted powers of control and oppression by the majority over the minority (or influential minority over everyone else). Since the smallest minority in any society is the individual, democracy is an instrument of aggression for the purpose of subjugation of the individual to the state. So-called “liberals” or progressives are democracy fundamentalists who worship at the altar of unfettered majority rule—majority rule unconstrained by constitutional protections for individual rights. In their radical democracist vision, the right to vote is not just a fundamental right, which it is not, but is the only fundamental right. All other rights, to the Democracy Fundamentalists, are permissions granted at the pleasure of the state on behalf of the voting majority.

To Democracy Fundamentalists, the ballot box is an instrument of aggression, control, and subjugation of the individual to the state.

It is important to note that majority democratic elections succeeded the advent of individual rights. The goal of a constitutional republic is to establish individual rights as the foundational purpose of government, then figure out the best democratic process for choosing political representation. Note the preciseness of the order in the Declaration of Independence: “[A]ll men . . . are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men. . .”

Individual rights precede government, and are thus protected absolutely from the political representatives and thus from infringement by the democratic process. The goal is not to allow the ballot box to become the club by which the most powerful political factions beat the less powerful into submission to its self-serving agenda. Democracy fundamentalists’ goal is precisely to turn the ballot box into that club.

Related Reading:

July 4, 1776: Words that Will Never Be Erased

America the Undemocratic

Atlas Shrugged: America’s Second Declaration of Independence—Onkar Ghate

On This Constitution Day, Remember the Declaration of Independence

The Conscience of the Constitution: The Declaration of Independence and the Right to Liberty – Timothy Sandefur