“We created a way of raising standards of living that we can’t possibly pass on to our children. It has to collapse, unless adults stand up and say, ‘This is a Ponzi scheme. We have not generated real wealth, and we are destroying a livable climate.’” (Joe Romm, quoted in Thomas Friedman, Is the Inflection Point Near?, New York Times, March 7, 2009)

“Is there any more single-minded, simple pleasure than viewing with alarm? At times it is even better than sex.” (Kenneth Boulding (1970), p. 160. [1]

Are free-market optimists the dumb ones who jump off tall buildings and report that everything is fine, even breezy, on the way down? Or are those who fear, rant, and make this analogy bungee-jumping with reality?

The optimists have been jumping off buildings ever since Robert Thomas Malthus’s An Essay on Population was published in 1798–and not hitting the ground.…

“A recent Politico article on the bad messaging of Democrats on climate and energy, Democrats Bite on Burgers and Straws–and Republicans Feast, is fair warning. It is high time the hometown paper of the center of the oil and gas industry stop the blatant bias against the very energies that consumers naturally prefer.”

There is no representation for conservatives or libertarians on the editorial board of the Houston Chronicle. So when it comes to energy, fossil fuels (because of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions) are seen as the enemy of the climate rather than a greening agent; protection against heat, cold, and precipitation; and a first responder after weather extremes.

Mineral energies in capitalist settings have much to do with the precipitous drop of climate-related deaths in the last century–and are essential to human betterment going forward.…

“Discoveries, like resources, may well be infinite: the more we discover, the more we are able to discover.” (Julian Simon, The Ultimate Resource 2, p. 82)

“The world is not ‘a bundle of hay’ but a living growing complex of matter and energy, a process rather than a thing.” ( Erich Zimmermann, World Resources and Industries, 1951, p. 815.

What explains the happy fact (really the miracle of man) that the more we discover, the more we find out if left to discover? Instead of mineral depletion, we have mineral expansion–turning the Malthusian predicament on its head. And instead of weather/climate doom, we have successful adaptation in wealthy (as in healthy) free economies.

Labor Day has passed, a day that could be renamed Energy Day for the saved labor that modern energy has transferred to machines and appliances.…

“What is needed is universally affordable air conditioning, which means inexpensive power to run the units. The Green New Deal and, specifically, a carbon tax, whether during the summer cooling peak or the winter heating peak, is a death wish for humane, comfortable living.”

Red, white, and blue Americans should stay comfortable this summer and not heed calls for voluntary A/C conservation. Ditching self-interest is a step on the road to energy serfdom where “carbon guilt” is adjunct to mandatory policies. Citizen voters should be clear: affordable, plentiful free-market energy comes before sacrificial political energy.

Media Spin

The mainstream media, pushing climate alarmism doubly as an anti-Trump meme, is focused on heat waves and the irony of increased CO2 emissions from more air conditioning.

“Historic heat wave is double whammy for climate change,” reads The Hill.…