The 2015 ITIF Luddite Award

Technological innovation is the wellspring of human progress, providing higher living standards, improved health, a cleaner environment, increased access to information and many other benefits. Yet despite all of these benefits, a growing array of interests—some economic, some ideological— now stand in stubborn opposition to innovation.

Read more at ITIF
(Hat tip: KimR) Read More......

Cruz: Don't Believe 'If You Like Your Internet, You Can Keep Your Internet’

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) urged members of the public not to believe promises of “if you like your Internet, you can keep your Internet” in a speech on Thursday. ✧ Cruz declared “don’t mess with the Internet.” And asked “which has greater innovation, the United States Post Office or Facebook and Twitter? Which has greater innovation, taxi commissions in local cities or Lyft and Uber? Every time you put unelected bureaucrats in charge of a market, they stifle innovation and what they also do is they favor the big boys. If you think for a minute that the FCC is going to listen to small start-ups, than you’re ignoring the history of every other instance of regulation.”

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Barone: Free Market, Not Government Policy, Drives Energy Boom

MICHAEL BARONE: In contrast to the marginal effects of much ballyhooed public policies, there has been a huge breakthrough in energy production in the past couple of years. Read more at Townhall...

There is a lesson here for public policy generally, including health care. No centralized government expert predicted the vast expansion in energy supply from hydraulic fracking. It was produced by decentralized specialists in firms subject to market competition.

Learn a little about "hydraulic fracking" in this article. --bc Read More......

Cost-effective ways to address climate change

WASHINGTON POST, 11/17/2010 by Bjorn Lomborg (Hat tip: John H. Detweiler) - One of the scarier predictions about global warming is the suggestion that melting glaciers and ice caps could cause sea levels to rise as much as 15 to 20 feet over the next century. Set aside the fact that the best research we have - from the United Nations climate panel - says that global sea levels are not likely to rise more than about 20 inches by 2100. Rather, let's imagine that over the next 80 or 90 years, a giant port city - say, Tokyo - found itself engulfed by a sea-level rise of about 15 feet. Millions of inhabitants would be imperiled, along with trillions of dollars' worth of infrastructure. Without a vast global effort, could we cope with such a terrifying catastrophe?

Well, we already have. In fact, we're doing it right now. Read more at the Washington Post... Read More......