Category Archives: Economics

Business, Economics, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

Trump, And Climate

24 Comments

Thoughts from Judith Curry. tl;dr He’s not crazy:

In my post Trumping the elites, I stated that Trump’s election provided an opportunity for a more rational energy and climate policy. Many in the blog comments and the twitosphere found this to be an incomprehensible statement.

Here is what I think needs to be done, and I do see opportunities for these in a Trump administration:

  • a review of climate science that includes a faithful and transparent representation of uncertainties in 21st century projections of global and regional climate change
  • reopening of the ‘endangerment’ issue, as to whether warming is ‘dangerous’
  • a do-over on assessing the social cost of carbon, that accounts for full uncertainty in the climate model simulations, the integrated assessment models and their inputs.
  • support funding for Earth observing systems (satellite, surface, ocean) and research on natural climate variability.

Even if politics are to ‘trump’ the conclusions of these analyses, it would be clear that the Trump administration has done its due diligence on this issue in terms of gathering and assessing information. If the Trump administration were to accomplish the first 3 items, they might have a scientifically and economically defensible basis for pulling out of the Paris agreement and canceling Obama’s Clean Power Plan.

I noted the other day on Twitter that if Myron is the new EPA administrator, we’ll finally have one who is not a rabid environmentalist, and will follow the law, doing actual cost/benefit analyses. As a bonus, many EPA employees may quit (though it’s unclear if they have any marketable skills outside of government).

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Orion

13 Comments

The slow, inevitable death begins:

Entering into the transition period between presidents, NASA’s administrator, Charles Bolden, has encouraged the next White House administration to continue support for Orion and the Space Launch System rocket, which account for more than $3 billion annually. Congress, too, has expressed a strong interest in continuing work on these vehicles.

However one source told Ars that it may become necessary to choose either the Orion capsule or NASA rocket in the coming years as the space agency looks to pare back its budget, and this might necessitate going to a less expensive, more privately developed vehicle. “Look,” this source said, “if you have to cancel a program, this is a responsible way of lining up a replacement.”

It will be a bloody political battle, but ultimately, SLS won’t be far behind.

Business, Economics, History, Law, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Post-Election Thoughts

153 Comments

In no particular order:

1) Despite his “approval rating,” this was an utter repudiation of the last eight years (and to a lesser degree, the previous eight years under Bush). Trump is Obama’s “legacy.”

2) I hope, and even expect, that Giuliani will be the next AG. He will take the handcuffs off the FBI, and finally get to the bottom of all of the Obama lawlessness as well as hers. In the spirit of reconciliation, Trump should offer her a pardon, on condition they shut down the foundation, and she exit our lives.

3) There will obviously be no post-election confirmation of Garland. Ginsburg and Breyer will probably be rethinking their retirement plans.

4) I assume that House Republicans have a repeal and replace plan to give to Trump in January.

5) Expect a flurry of executive orders undoing much of Obama’s lawlessness in the first week.

More anon.

[Update a few minutes later]

Will “liberals” finally discover the appeal of limited government?

[Update a few minutes later]

Predictably, embittered Democrats engage in racist outbursts. Well, this is nothing new; they have historically been the party of racism.

[Update a couple minutes later]

[Update a couple more minutes later]

Would’t accepting a last-minute pardon from Obama be a tacit admission that someone did something wrong? That’s why Nixon didn’t necessarily want one.

[Update a while later]

It occurs to me that now that the crime family has no favors to offer, the donations to the Clinton Crime Foundation will start to, or immediately dry up.

[Late-morning update]

Yes, a large part of Trump’s appeal is a backlash against the fascism of political correctness.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

SLS

8 Comments

Bob Zimmerman has some thoughts on potential upcoming (and unsurprising, since it doesn’t really matter whether or not it actually flies) schedule slips:

…it means that it will have literally taken NASA two decades to build and fly a single manned Orion capsule, beginning when George Bush ordered the construction of the Crew Exploration Vehicle in January 2004.

Plenty of time to take it behind the barn and put it out of its misery.