John Stossel: Top 10 government promises gone wrong

New at Reason: John Stossel on the Alpaca Bubble and Negative Unintended Consequences
The government is unequalled in producing one thing, writes John Stossel, and that's negative Unintended Consequences. Find a government activity, and you’ll find bad results that even the program's advocates probably don't like. Here's one example: The government has created a speculative bubble in the alpaca breeding industry. View this article. ...

On The Horizon: Liquid Fuels Made By Sunlight
Sunlight pours a lot of energy onto the surface of the Earth. But one huge challenge is to figure out how to capture that energy and turn it into fuels to power our cars and trucks. Fossil Fuels won't last forever, so scientists and engineers are looking for new and efficient ways to capture Solar Energy for fuel. One promising technique relies on a common material most people have never heard of: the element cerium. The ultimate goal is to say 'How can we take solar photons and convert that int...

Green Technology - Biomass
The Recovery Act of 2009 allocated $800 million dollars to the United States Biomass Program. Biomass energy sources are garbage, wood, waste, landfill gases, and Alcohol fuels. Ethanol is the most popular and widely used Biofuel. Currently, a majority of ethanol production comes from corn, but new technologies are being developed to make ethanol from a variety of agricultural and forestry resources, such as animal or wood waste (Department of Energy, 2010). There are two types of Ethanol fuel, ...

Green Fields: Ethanol production rises 13% this year over 2009
The U.S. Energy Information Agency reports that Ethanol production in the United States is running 13 percent ahead of a year ago. For the week ending Dec. 17, domestic production totaled 892,000 barrels per day, down 4 percent from the week before. Bad Weather cut into demand. The agency said 4.8 billion bushels of this year's 12 billion to 13 billion bushel corn crop will be needed to satisfy Ethanol demand. ...

Jim and Bills excellent misadventure
This is a web formatted version of the PDF found here on Dr. James Hansen’s Columbia.edu web site. I don’t have much respect left for Dr. Hansen, particularly when he uses the word “deniers” nine times in this interview. The interview itself is like pal-review, since McKibben isn’t capable of being an unbiased interviewer, and particularly since he co-authored a book with Hansen. Reading it, you can feel some of the anger these two guys have for people like you and ...

EPA Moves Toward Limits on Greenhouse Gases
In what could be one of the most significant regulatory changes since its founding, the EPA has moved toward imposing limits on Greenhouse Gases with a finding that such gases now present a “serious problem . . . for future generations.” The move could have widespread environmental benefits apart from Climate Change in forcing more fuel efficient cars and greater limitations on Power Plants and industrial sources. The EPA finding of endangerment prepares allows for the EPA to act if ...

Obama to regulate refinery gases
The Obama Administration has said it will regulate greenhouse Gas Emissions from Power Plants amid opposition from industry and Republicans in Congress. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said it would regulate emissions from Fossil Fuel Power Plants by 2011 and petroleum refineries by 2012. President Barack Obama is pushing the EPA to cut emissions after a Climate Bill failed in Congress this year. But Republican lawmakers have said the EPA's new rules will harm The Economy. The EPA...

New boimass rules could hamper growth in industry
By Stephan Burklin Maine Watchdog.org A recently released study claims that new regulations on the Biomass industry may hinder Renewable Energy development and jeopardize U.S. energy policies. The National Alliance of Forest Owners (NAFO) commissioned Atlanta-based Forisk Consulting to examine the potential impact of the “tailoring rule,” which the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) promulgated in May to regulate greenhouse Gas Emissions under the Clean Air Act. The rule itself...

Your Piece of the Keeling Curve
Associated Press Plant Scherer, a coal-fired plant in Juliette, Ga. In an article in Wednesday’s Times, I discussed the rapid increase of Carbon Dioxide in the atmosphere, and the scientific debate over the likely consequences of that rise. One point I did not emphasize much is the extent to which we all own a piece of this problem. Pretty much everyone on the planet is burning Fossil Fuels and contributing to the rise of Greenhouse Gases, but some of us are contributing a lot more than ot...

Wake Up Call
Jubilant lawmakers took a victory lap at Ground Zero, hailing the dramatic passage of the 9/11 health law as significantly more than just another political win, write our Lucadamo and McAuliff. "President Obama is planning the first major reorganization of his administration, preparing to shuffle several positions in the West Wing as he tries to fortify his political team for the realities of divided government and his own re-election," reports the NYT. "The embattled boss of a ci...

Seminars to focus on dairy farming
A group of dairy farmers will be taught to think more like CEOs and CFOs in a three-session series of seminars beginning in late January. "All of the things apply to any farm," said Peggy L. Murray, farm business management educator at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Lewis County and organizer of the upcoming Academy for Dairy Executives. "It doesn't matter if you're a 50-cow dairy or a 1,000-cow dairy." The academy will focus on many areas of high-performance management, including fi...

There's A Little $9 Billion Bauble Under The Tree For Wall St., Multinationals
It's all about jobs, jobs, jobs, as Obama likes to say. Only they're going overseas: Amid all the goodies for Ethanol producers, NASCAR racetracks and the like, the tax-cut Compromise Legislation approved by Congress this month also includes a little-noticed sop for Wall Street banks and major multinationals. And it only costs U.S. Taxpayers $9 billion. Under the provision, Financial Services firms and manufacturers can defer U.S. taxes on overseas income from a type of Financial Transaction kn...

Complex issues for China, North and South Korea?
by Andrew, Allied Liberty News Yes, I asked just that question. Consider this, N.Korea is armed with pre-vietnam era Soviet and Chinese Military hardware. N.Korea does not so much as breathe without China's orders. China is facing a huge monetary Inflation problem. This is in part due to fuel prices but mostly due to China allowing their own economy grow by a totally unsustainable 12%. In economics, when something grows in numbers or value by 12% in one year, you get what Economists call a "bu...

Consumer Corner: Only one way to avoid a hangover -- don't drink
Published: Dec. 26, 2010 at 4:30 AM The only way to be sure you won't get hung over is to avoid consuming Alcohol. Combining different forms of alcohol will make a hangover that much worse. Chicago, Dec. 26 (UPI) -- New Year's, Halloween and St. Patrick's Day have one thing in common: People who normally don't consume much alcohol get plastered. My brother used to refer to those holidays as amateur nights. So with the New Year just around the corner, what better time to examine various cures fo...

Whats a little war mongering between earnings reports?
Weapons of Mass Destruction via sampitech at flickr.com Well, I see our Foreign Policy has really learned it’s lessons…and that lesson is how much of this profit goes to the Caymans? Despite sanctions and trade embargoes, over the past decade the United States government has granted special licenses allowing American companies to do billions of dollars in business with Iran and other countries blacklisted as state sponsors of Terrorism, an examination by The New York Times has foun...

Branstad: Power Fund likely will continue
Gov.-elect Terry Branstad campaigned against the Iowa Power Fund, which promotes development of Renewable Energy, but on Thursday said he expects the fund to live on within a retooled Economic Development department. Departing Gov. Chet Culver, a Democrat, championed creation of the Power Fund and the Office of Energy Independence, which administers the fund. Branstad said the office likely will be eliminated. The Power Fund has attracted support from business and agriculture because of Iowa's...

T. Boone Pickens: Our Ongoing Energy Crisis
One billion dollars every day. That's how much money we're sending overseas to fund our dangerous and growing Addiction to OPEC oil. This year, I've spent a lot of time talking about Natural Gas, and the need to tap into everything domestic--from nuclear to Natural Gas, from wind to Ethanol, from solar to domestic oil--to address our energy needs. Our dependence on OPEC oil is a national crisis. It threatens our economy, our National Security and our environment. How much of a concern is it?...

'Active financing' exemption for some businesses to cost taxpayers $9 billion
Amid all the goodies for Ethanol producers, NASCAR racetracks and the like, the tax-cut Compromise Legislation approved by Congress this month also includes a little-noticed sop for Wall Street banks and major multinationals. And it only costs U.S. Taxpayers $9 billion. Under the provision, Financial Services firms and manufacturers can defer U.S. taxes on overseas income from a type of Financial Transaction known as "active financing." Boosters say the two-year exemption helps lev...

Carbon accountants stand to profit from EPA plan to regulate emissions
Photo: William N.The U.S. EPA's move Thursday to issue a plan for the Regulation of greenhouse Gas Emissions from large industrial Polluters will undoubtedly intensify the climate-change war. But for a host of startups that make software to manage corporate Carbon Emissions, the EPA action is a holiday gift that will keep on giving year-round. The agency will propose emission standards for Fossil Fuel Power Plants and oil refineries -- which it says account for almost 40 percent of the nation's ...

BYPASS CONGRESS: EPA moves unilaterally to limit greenhouse gases...
WASHINGTON (AP) — Stymied in Congress, the Obama Administration is moving unilaterally to clamp down on greenhouse emissions, announcing plans for new Power Plants and Oil Refinery emission standards over the next year. In an announcement posted on the agency's website late Thursday, Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson said the aim was to better cope with Pollution contributing to Climate Change. "We are following through on our commitment to proceed in a measured an...

EPA Announces Landmark Greenhouse Gas Regulations Plan For Nation's Biggest Polluters
The Huffington Post Zoe Triska First Posted: 12-23-10 The Obama Administration announced landmark plans Thursday to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the Unites States. A Press Release from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that new standards granted under the Clean Air Act will be implemented in 2012. The EPA also announced that it is taking unprecedented action to issue air permits to industries in Texas, due to the state's non-compliance with new regulations...

Kook Global Warmer James Hansen: ClimateGate was a 'Viscous' Hoax by Professional Swiftboaters
How sad. The Global Warming hoaxers are reduced to smearing people and omitting critical information. Seems we've been down this road before.IPCC scientists had done a good job of producing a comprehensive report. It is a rather thankless task, on top of their normal jobs, often requiring them to work sixty, eighty, or more hours per week, with no pay for overtime or for working on the IPCC report. Yet they were portrayed as incompetent or, worse, dishonest. Scientists do indeed have deficienc...

Expert warns China on food future
BEIJING, Dec. 23 (UPI) -- A United Nations expert says China's ability to feed its population is uncertain as its amount of Arable Land diminishes amid increased urbanization. United Nations Envoy Olivier De Schutter says the country's capability of feeding one-fifth the world's population will become more precarious because of land degradation, urbanization and an over-reliance on Fossil Fuels and Fertilizers, Britain's The Guardian reported Thursday. "The shrinking of Arable Land and the massi...

EPA moving unilaterally to limit greenhouse gases
WASHINGTON (AP) - Stymied in Congress, the Obama Administration is moving unilaterally to clamp down on greenhouse emissions, announcing plans for new Power Plants and Oil Refinery emission standards over the next year. In an announcement posted on the agency's website late Thursday, Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson said the aim was to better cope with Pollution contributing to Climate Change. "We are following through on our commitment to proceed in a measured and ca...

Gasoline Prices Hit $3 a Gallon Nationwide
Source: Reuters Today, the national average price for a gallon of gas has risen to over $3 a gallon for the first time since October, 2008, when it felt like the bottom had just dropped out of the American Economy. According to the AAA Fuel Gauge Report, the price for a gallon of Gasoline nationwide hit $3.013. California once again has the highest Gas Prices in the Lower 48 states, hovering at about $3.27 a gallon. In total, 26 states plus the District of Columbia have Gas Prices exceeding $3 a...