Event: Sept 11—A Decade Later: Lessons for the Future

Sep 3, 2011 | Politics

• Upheavals in the Middle East: Assessing the Political Landscape

  What lessons can be drawn from the popular rebellions in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and elsewhere in the Arab-Islamic world? Will these uprisings lead to fundamental changes to the political landscape? Who stands to gain the most from these changes? What impact might they have for U.S. interests in the region?

• The Islamist Threat: From AfPak to Jyllands-Posten and Times Square

  In the years since the attacks of 9/11, what have we learned about the nature of the enemy that struck that day? What have we learned from the U.S. response, under G.W. Bush and now Barack Obama, that should shape current and future policy? If a failure of pre-9/11 policy-thinking was to neglect ‘connecting the dots,’ what patterns or trends can be identified now about developments in the Middle East, Europe (such as the furor over cartoons of Mohammad) and North America?

• Iran, Israel and the West

  If—or when—Iran gains nuclear-weapons capability, what would be the impact on the region, on Israel, and on American interests? What lessons can be learned from America’s policy toward Iran—not only in recent years, but going back to the emergence of the Islamist regime in Teheran? What policy options are available to the U.S. for responding to Iran and its Islamist affiliates?

Alex Epstein Launches the Center for Industrial Progress

Sep 2, 2011 | Politics

Last month I left my position as the Ayn Rand Institute's Fellow on energy issues to start a new energy startup called the Center for Industrial Progress. Before I say anything about the new project, I just want to thank the Institute for all the support, intellectual and financial, that it has given me over the last decade--and that includes support for my decision to strike out on my own, which has always been a dream of mine.The basic concept behind the Center for Industrial Progress is that our culture desperately needs to re-embrace industrial progress as a cultural ideal. America's industrial progress has been declining, and with it, our economy--in large part thanks to the influence of the "green" movemenet, which has opposed industrial progress in the name of minimizing man's impact on nature. At CIP, we celebrate man's impact on nature, just as our ancestors celebrated Americans' ability to "tame a continent." We celebrate the never-ending project of the industrial revolution: to harness more and more energy to feed machines that do more and more work to make our lives better and better. This project is the key both to taking the American standard of living to the next level and to improving conditions for the desperately poor--the industrially poor--around the world.We reject the false dichotomy between industrial progress and environmental progress; historically, industrialization has brought with it a radical improvement of the human environment. Indeed, industrial progress is the improvement of the human environment, from sanitation systems to sturdier buildings to less onerous job conditions to the production of creature comforts to having healthy, fresh food at one's disposal year round, to the luxury of being able to preserve and travel to the most beautiful parts of nature. And so long as we embrace policies that protect property rights, including air and water rights, we protect industrial development and protect individuals from pollution. What "green" policies do is not improve the human environment, but sacrifice it to the non-human environment--just ask anyone trying to build an industrial project today.For too long, Americans have taken industrial progress for granted, and carelessly embraced "going green" as an ideal--expecting that the unprecedented standard of living we had would automatically continue, even though we permitted environmentalists to oppose new energy production and new development at every turn. Today, we are paying the price, with an economy whose productive fundamentals are less and less sound. This needs to change--but not just to stave off the current problems. At CIP, our goal is not simply to stop bad policies and preserve the status quo. It is to champion great policies, policies that fully respect property rights and fully allow free markets, such that the brilliantly talented individuals of this great country can lead us to the next industrial renaissance.At CIP, we believe that the potential for industrial progress is unlimited. Human beings, if left free,  have unlimited potential to produce more energy, create more wealth, create more productivity, raise living standards for every hard-working person, increase leisure time, transport things more quickly, conduct more complex scientific experiments, build sturdier, more comfortable places to live, travel farther and faster, experience more, and generally make life better and better. We can do this as a nation if we make industrial progress a cultural ideal, a goal to strive for. That is the goal of the Center for Industrial Progress. Or, to use one of our slogans, our goal is to convince Americans to stop "Going Green" and start "Going Industrial."As for how we're going to do that, including what collaborators will be involved, stay tuned. And keep up with our various websites:http://www.alexepstein.comhttp://www.youtube.com/industrialprogresshttp://powerhour.alexepstein.comAlso, note that I will be doing a lot more public speaking this coming Fall and Winter, so if you want to hear an illuminating, entertaining talk on today's most important energy/industrial/environmental issues, go www.alexepstein.com and click on "Book Me" for my all new lineup, including "The Green Blackout," "In Defense of Fracking," and "Why America Needs to Stop Going Green and Start Going Industrial."

Amy Peikoff Talks with Jihad Watch’s Robert Spencer

Sep 1, 2011 | Politics

I am pleased to share, as a podcast, my interview with Robert Spencer, director of Jihad Watch and author of many books, including two New York Times bestsellers, The Truth About Muhammad and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades). We have been reading Mr. Spencer’s Qur’an Commentary as a supplement to our reading of the Koran for our Koran Reading Group. Mr. Spencer answers a range of questions in the interview, from general observations about the poetic nature of the Koran, to discussion and interpretation of specific passages of it–including those that call for the use of violence against non-Muslims and require women to produce four witnesses in order to prove that they were raped. You can listen to and download the interview here: Robert Spencer Interview

Warren Buffet Hypocrite

Aug 30, 2011 | Politics

Omaha-based billionaire investor Warren Buffet announced this week that he’d invest $5 billion in newly-issued preferred stock of troubled Bank of America (yielding 6%), not unlike the $10 billion he invested in the preferred shares of a shaky Goldman Sachs (yielding 10%) back in 2008. Neither bank would exist today absent the billions-of-dollars in bailouts they got from Washington (taxpayers) or the billions in cheap loans they got from the Federal Reserve. Buffet simultaneously complains that he and other rich Americans are materially under-taxed. But if he had any real integrity on such matters, if Buffet were to practice what he preaches, he’d send his $15 billion to the U.S. Treasury, via PayPal, here.  Yet he refuses to do so. Why?

Amy Peikoff Q & A On Privacy and Social Media

Aug 30, 2011 | Politics

Richard Lindzen: A Modern Day Galileo on Climate

Jul 18, 2011 | Politics

Cartoon by Cox and Forkum.

 [...] [Lindzen argues that] the answer that emerges from most climate models is wrong because they assume the Earth's clouds and water will amplify the rising heat. According to Lindzen's calculations, the clouds should have the opposite effect, minimizing the warming effect.

In his paper, Rahmstorf added a "Personal Postscript": "Can Lindzen seriously believe that a vast conspiracy of thousands of climatologists worldwide is misleading the public for personal gain? All this seems completely out of touch with the world of climate science as I know it and, to be frank, simply ludicrous." In a reply, Lindzen skewered Rahmstorf in a footnote, arguing that the German scientist was "addicted to the use of words like 'entirely,' 'fact,' 'irrefutable,' etc. Such words are inappropriate to a primitive and immature science -- which is what climate science is at present."

Richard Goody, 90, who taught meteorology to Lindzen at Harvard, says the critics of his former pupil are "focusing on his propensity to debate. He [Lindzen] loves debating. He absorbs an enormous amount of information, and he loves arguing with you about it. Since he's so well-informed and so smart, he usually wins. This doesn't endear you to a lot of people." [...] Goody is quick to add: "But science is not about gentility. It's about discussing the facts. He's just doing what he should do." [...] "This machine turns out a number for something that will happen 100 years in the future. Science doesn't usually work that way. There's not much evidence about the behavior of these climate models," he said.

[...] Roger Pielke Jr., a political scientist at the University of Colorado, specializes in studying the scientific process. He sees the rough-and-tumble of the climate debate as an unstable brew of science and politics. "If we were to view science as a field where a lot of conflicts happen, then Lindzen is an expected part of the scenery. But if science is a community where there is only one acceptable view, then Lindzen stands out." Pielke blames environmental groups for making climate a two-sided debate.

[...] In a paper he wrote earlier this year, he managed to lash out at his scientific critics, bureaucrats, politicians -- including former Vice President Al Gore -- and environmental groups before training his rhetoric on the public. "And finally, there are the numerous well-meaning individuals who have allowed propagandists to convince them that in accepting the alarmist view of anthropogenic climate change, they are displaying intelligence and virtue. For them, their psychic welfare is at stake," he wrote.

The paper gives the essence of his argument, which is that, while man-caused warming certainly exists, by itself it is small. It was roughly 0.7 degree Celsius in the 20th century. If the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere doubles, which many scientists predict that it will by the end of this century, that will increase global mean temperatures by a little more than 1 degree, he thinks. "A hundred years from now, I don't really know, but I don't think it [the climate] will be radically different. The climate is always changing. It's natural variability," he said in an interview.

[...] "Now we're seeing a doubling down, a desperate movement among professional [scientific] societies that have committed themselves to the issue," he said. Asserting that groups such as the National Academy of Sciences or the American Meteorological Society are wrong about climate projections and proposed government responses doesn't endear Lindzen to the nation's science establishment. But he doesn't stop there. He proposes to cut off most government funding because it rewards what he calls "alarmist" studies about climate change and discourages dissenting views. "There has to be a return to non-government support of science," he told the Cato group. [A Climate Change Dissenter Who Has Left His Mark on U.S. Policy]

How Ben Bernake Using The Power of the FED Triggered The Great Recession

Jul 18, 2011 | Politics

[...] in 2008-2009 Bernanke did nearly let “it” happen again — a banking collapse, a depression, deflation — by bringing the U.S. financial system to its knees by roughly the same Fed policy adopted in the 1930s, followed by his blizzard of paper-money printing that has caused a dollar debasement unprecedented in U.S. history. The result has been a huge destruction of wealth, spreading fiscal chaos and stagflation as far as the eye can see.

How did Bernanke create this horrible morass? First, in 2006-2007 he deliberately inverted the Treasury yield curve, even while knowing it would cause a recession and credit-financial crisis. Second, he imposed on the reeling economy a $1.7 trillion flood of “quantitative easing” (QE), euphemistic for the hazardous policy of money-printing. His first policy caused economic stagnation, his second policy caused monetary inflation, and combined, his policies have generated “stagflation” — the corrosive mix last seen in the 1970s. It’s the direct opposite of the supply-side polices (pro-growth, sound-money) that made the 1980s and 1990s so prosperous.

How can we hold Bernanke accountable for this widespread mess? Consider first the economic stagnation. By training, Bernanke knew full well (and still knows) that an inverted Treasury yield curve — wherein the Fed deliberately keeps short-term interest rates above longer-term Treasury bond yields — invariably causes recessions and crises in the modern (fiat paper money) era.

He knows that an inverted yield curve severely and nearly instantly renders unprofitable most financial intermediation, which is the process of “borrowing short to lend long.” The normal case is for short-term borrowing yields to trade below long-term investment yields (an upward-sloped yield curve), which is profitable for credit intermediaries, given the positive yield margin. In contrast, the rarer case is for short-term rates to trade above long-term rates (an “inverted,” or downward-sloped yield curve), which is far less profitable or an outright loser for lenders, due to the negative yield margin.

Read the rest.

John Allison on Job Destruction: Rule of Regulators vs a Rule of Law

Jul 16, 2011 | Politics

[...] As a longtime banking CEO, I know first-hand and with certainty how jobs are created — and it's not by government bureaucrats waving magic wands. Jobs are created by private businesses, from the large multinational corporation down to the sole proprietor who mows grass and spreads mulch.

[...] In today's economy, entrepreneurs and business leaders are eager to ramp up production, launch new products, open new branches and create new jobs. But what's standing in the way of translating that eagerness into paychecks? Government policies that undermine the rule of law, create destructive boom-and-bust cycles, and generate massive deficits.

Under the rule of law, the legal system specifically defines unlawful behavior and gives fair warning of the punishment for wrongdoing. Instead, we suffer under the rule of regulators.

Every year, Congress and state legislatures concoct new schemes to clamp down on business freedom. Using real wrongdoers as a pretext, they declare the entire business world guilty without a trial and pass a sentence of perpetual supervision by an army of bureaucrats who halt progress until they get around to doling out licenses, permits, inspections and new rules.

The result is that businessmen live in perpetual fear of government reprisals.

Read the rest...

Capitalism Forum

Jul 15, 2011 | Politics

Republicans Going to War without a Weapon: The Budget Debate

Jul 12, 2011 | Politics

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s budget has come under severe attack for daring to curtail some elements of the entitlement state. Although we are certainly not defenders of the plan’s details — it doesn’t even cut spending — what’s striking is how easily its supporters have been put on the moral defensive, and to how devastating an effect. In a column typical of the attacks on the Ryan budget, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman called the plan “cruel,” “heartless” and “mean-spirited.” Ryan “has talked a good game about taking care of those in need,” but that can’t be reconciled with cutting the welfare state.

It was nothing new: Every attempt to cut entitlements has been denounced as unethical and immoral. But this time there was a new twist. The real motive behind the plan, critics say, is a philosophic opposition to entitlements — an opposition fueled by the ideas of the controversial philosopher Ayn Rand.

Rand of course was both an uncompromising critic of the entitlement state and a preeminent champion of laissez-faire. But whatever influence Rand might have had on Ryan’s goal — he credits her with inspiring him to go into politics — one thing is for sure: Her arguments have been conspicuously absent in the budget debate. Frankly, that’s like going to war without a weapon. Rand's ideas are indispensable in the struggle to limit government: they provide the key to answering the moral argument for the entitlement state.

Read the rest...