Tag: Energy
Havoc is no way to run a country
President Trump’s freeze on government grants and contracts is already wrecking havoc in my world. I’m not, even indirectly, the intended recipient of any frozen funds. But organizations I know and appreciate are laying off personnel, stiffing suppliers, and disrupting their programs.
This is loony. If this lasts 90 days, it will create economic havoc and even cause serious health problems, since Medicaid is affected. Longer will generate recession. Trump inherited a thriving economy. He is now imploding it.
A Federal judge yesterday afternoon froze the freeze, but only temporarily. No doubt this lawless Administration will continue to not make good on many disbursements. Then it will wait for the courts to rule and appeal each decision that goes against Trump.
Why?
The Administration has several reasons for this churlish behavior. It say it wants expenditure aligned with Trump’s priorities. Things don’t work that way. Congress gets to appropriate funds. It is the President’s responsibility to execute what the Congress wants. Trump’s effort to freeze appropriated funds for Ukraine was the cause of his first impeachment. It’s not a lesson he wants to learn.
What are Trump’s priorities? Cutting expenditure is one of them. That will make room for extension of the tax cuts he got approved in a Republican Congress in 2017. They helped mainly the wealthy, including people like himself. But they did not deliver economic benefits.
The idea behind this debacle is not only to cut government expenditure. It’s to shift whatever remains. Trump has already spoken warmly about funding manned flight to Mars and a missile defense shield for the US. He wants to buy Greenland. His “drill baby drill” motto is aimed at providing energy to satisfy the voracious appetite of artificial intelligence software. Trump is a sucker for high-profile national prestige projects that will put money in his billionaire friends’ pockets. He figures they will also bring him attention and adulation.
Disaster awaits
Quite the contrary. Trump’s tax cuts and prestige projects are on the road to national ruin. Trump has no idea what the government does and how it enables the economy to grow. Trillion-dollar cuts, which is what he promised, are nowhere to be found without causing serious economic pain.
The prestige projects are not so hot either.
The Israeli missile defense he wants for the US has an effective range of less than 50 miles.
Denmark isn’t selling Greenland, though it is willing to talk about security as well as development of its resources.
Renewable sources of electricity are now competitive with fossil fuels.
It will be hard to find investors to expand drilling dramatically, especially as the US is already net energy independent. Courtesy of Joe Biden.
Manned flight to Mars is a boondoggle for Elon Musk. There is nothing that robots can’t do better than human beings on Mars. They also don’t get bored on a 9 month voyage (one way).
Kamala Harris had it right:
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Stevenson’s army, April 26
– US will reassure South Korea over nuclear weapons, says WSJ. More background from NYT.
-Speaker McCarthy changed the debt bill to appease members favoring ethanol and set rule avoiding amendments except for one.
– Lawfare reviews book on broken promises to Ukraine over nukes.
– WaPo tells how to build a SCIF.
– USA Today depicts Us evacuations from Sudan.
-Axios discloses Cyber Command/CISA secret operations [scroll to second story]
-Some in DOD happy at Tucker Carlson’s firing.
– US helped Guaido escape to Florida
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, March 23
I am back from a week in Doha when I wasn’t posting, and Charlie is back from a few days away:
Back at my desktop and partway through the accumulated newspapers, here are some links.
– Stimson has a bunch of reports. I especially liked the “Chimera of Technological Superiority” paper.
– Lots of Iraq reflections [today is the 20th anniversary of the start of the US war]. Reporter John Walcott was right. As was Jim Fallows.
– A Marine calls for a more family friendly military personnel system
– SAIS prof Ed Joseph sees a Kosovo deal.
– US News said US intell helped India against China.
– Fred Kaplan assesses the Xi-Putin summit. WaPo notes the absence of a pipeline deal.
– Two views on US aid to Ukraine: surprising success or much too slow.
– NYT analyzes DeSantis foreign policy.
– Max Boot sees return to 1930s GOP foreign policy.
– RollCall notes Biden’s high success rate with Congress.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, February 14
– NYT says Ukraine order for aid groups to leave Bakhmut may be prelude to its own withdrawal.
– WaPo says US has warned Ukraine of problems sustaining aid levels.
– Politico says US won’t send ATACMs because of US inventory shortages.
– Moldova says Russia planned coup.
– Ian Bremmer doubts US sabotaged Nordstream 2.
– Fred Kaplan explains new search for balloons.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, February 8
-WaPo reports on China’s vast surveillance programs-
-China’s balloon program was reported last year.
-WSJ reports China now has more ICBM launchers than US, though many are empty.
-SASC Chairman Reed says Ukraine has more urgent needs than F16s
–Russia threatens expulsions of US officials
-FT says Iran is now shipping Russian oil.
-Axios says US asked Israel & PA to “pause” actions.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
– In WOTR, former student urges “learning culture”
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Stevenson’s army, February 1
– Air Force opposes Chinese-owned corn mill
– Ukraine hasn’t boosted US defense firms.
– But CSIS sees problems with US industrial base.
– CSIS also worries about US weapons inventories.
– AP says more weapons going to Korea.
– Reuters says longer-range rockets going to Ukraine.
– Pew sees bigger partisan divide on support to Ukraine.
– US says Russia is violating New Start treaty. In FT, Rose Gottemoeller says this could be fixed.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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