Politics

The Politicized World of Public Lands As Revealed in Hearings of the U.s. House Committee on Natural Resources

The Natural Resources committee of the U.S. House of Representatives recently held three hearings addressing oil and gas resources on federal lands and waters. On June 6 the committee considered several proposed drafts revising various aspects of the onshore oil and gas leasing and permitting processes. The second hearing, on June 14, concerned the proposed …

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The Need for Electricity Retail Market Reforms

Lynne Kiesling and I have an article in the Fall 2017 Regulation magazine asserting “the need for electricity retail market reforms” (PDF). Our general theme is, as the subtitle puts it, “An innovative 21st century retail electric power market is within reach, but won’t emerge until we ditch 20th century regulations.” We begin: School budgets always seem tight, so …

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Giberson Makes His Mark on Wall Street and Other Notes on Price Gouging Commentary

I get a mention in the September 12, 2017, Deal Book column in the New York Times: “Price caps discourage extraordinary supply efforts that would help bring goods in high demand into the affected area,” Michael Giberson, an instructor with the Center for Energy Commerce in the Rawls College of Business at Texas Tech University, …

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Nancy Maclean’s Generalized Rewriting of James Buchanan’s Views on Democracy

I have only read a small bit of Nancy MacLean’s book on James M. Buchanan, public choice, and politics. I’m reluctant to buy a copy, but I wanted to see if it was as bad as some critics have said. (Now you know something of my limited knowledge of and pre-existing bias against the book. …

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Fun with Footnotes (a Game of Scholarly Discovery)

“Let’s … have … fun … with … footnote[s],” MacLean said.* Here is a simple game of scholarship that anyone can play and everyone who plays by accepted norms of scholarship wins!** How to play: Take the recently published book Democracy in Chains, open it randomly to a page in the text, find a footnote …

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Lobbyists for Wind and Solar Energy Ready to Fight Doe Grid Policy Study

Soon after Energy Secretary Rick Perry requested DOE staff to prepare a report on how public policies affected the electric power grid, lobbyists for the wind energy and solar energy industries struck back. In an op-ed appearing in The Hill, Megan Hansen and I identify why we think the renewable power industries are so sensitive …

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What Energy Policies Ought Conservatives Favor–a Good Example of Bad Policy Analysis

An opinion piece at MarketWatch makes a bundle of analytical mistakes as it tries to build the case that persons with conservative political views should prefer the energy policy views of Hillary Clinton over those of Donald Trump. In this case I read the “Clinton” and “Trump” names as a kind of stand-in or representative for …

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Trump and Clinton on Energy Policy During the Second Presidential Debate

From the transcript posted by PolitiFact, the exchange on energy issues from the October 9 debate between Donald J. Trump and Hillary Clinton: COOPER: We have one more question from Ken Bone about energy policy. Ken? QUESTION: What steps will your energy policy take to meet our energy needs, while at the same time remaining …

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On Trump’s Energy Policy: Big Players Are Bad News for Energy Policy

My commentary, “Trump’s policy may undermine pro-growth intentions,” appears in the October 2016 issue of Nature Energy. Here is one of my favorite parts: Trump’s emphasis on energy independence, in North Dakota and elsewhere, has been common among both Republicans and Democrats. President Richard Nixon declared energy independence a priority in an effort to blame the Organization …

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