Can Environmentalists Think? by Bret Stephens

When it comes to the question of how best to transport oil, environmentalists tend to act like rabbis being asked for advice on how best to roast a pig: The thing should not be done in the first place. So opposition to Keystone XL becomes an assertion of virtue, indifferent to such lesser considerations as efficiency (or succulence).

But the pig will be roasted. The oil will be pumped. What happens then?

The Spitzer Method from the WSJ

After he used the threat of a corporate indictment and death penalty to force AIG’s board to fire Mr. Greenberg, the new management made the giant mortgage bets that would inflame the financial crisis. Shareholders also suffered greatly when Mr. Spitzer forced a management decapitation at insurance broker Marsh & McLennan and installed as CEO Mike Cherkasky, a nice guy who knew nothing about insurance.

101M Get Food Aid from Federal Gov’t; Outnumber Full-Time Private Sector Workers 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that a total of 101,000,000 people currently participate in at least one of the 15 food programs offered by the agency, at a cost of $114 billion in fiscal year 2012.

That means the number of Americans receiving food assistance has surpassed the number of full-time private sector workers in the U.S.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), there were 97,180,000 full-time private sector workers in 2012.

– See more at: http://cnsnews.com/news/article/101m-get-food-aid-federal-gov-t-outnumber-full-time-private-sector-workers#sthash.oho6W9bU.dpuf

No, Virginia, Nothing Is Really Risk Free

In fact and in principle, it is impossible to make riskless deposits out of the inherently risky business of banking. But governments everywhere insist on trying to do it anyway. Therefore, they are often put in the position of desperately wanting to bail out depositors by moving losses from the banks to the taxpayers, as has been the case once again in this cycle in many countries, including, of course, the United States. But the taxpayers are the depositors. The risk has merely been moved to a different form, not eliminated.

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