Instapundit » Glenn Reynolds

Author Archive: Glenn Reynolds

May 8, 2025

ICYMI: GONE FISHING: I’m off to a secure, undisclosed vacation for a week and will be as offline as I can manage. I have a few posts saved, but the rest of the Insta-Crew will keep the lights on while I enjoy a much-deserved (and much-needed!) break. See you in a week! Well, a bit more than that.

IT’S NOT AS IF THE GOVERNMENT IS RUN FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE PEOPLE: Government Officials and Contractors Are Surprisingly Indifferent to Human Trafficking.

I MEAN, YEAH.

Well I guess 99% of your political views are based on economic illiteracy. https://t.co/8JSG3wv4Ru

— Dan Crenshaw (@DanCrenshawTX) May 7, 2025

WELL, YES, YOU’RE TALKING TO A LEFTIST AFTER ALL:

Well I guess 99% of your political views are based on economic illiteracy. https://t.co/8JSG3wv4Ru

— Dan Crenshaw (@DanCrenshawTX) May 7, 2025

ELITE PREJUDICES AGAINST THE SOUTH GUARANTEE THIS: Mississippi Can’t Possibly Have Good Schools: And yet it does. Are we ready to deal?

Wikipedia has an entry dedicated to the phrase “Thank God for Mississippi” because its horrible performance on so many metrics saves other states the embarrassment of finishing last. The term has been used since at least 1945.

Which has made it awkward in recent years as Mississippi has become the fastest improving school system in the country.

You read that right. Mississippi is taking names.

In 2003, only the District of Columbia had more fourth graders in the lowest achievement level on our national reading test (NAEP) than Mississippi.1 By 2024, only four states had fewer.

To be fair, for nearly all those years when Mississippi was a joke, it was ruled by Democrats.

Related: ‘F’ Is for Democrat: Colorado’s Collapse Under One-Party Rule. “Colorado’s economic report card is in and my beloved home state — formerly a solid A and B student — just flunked every subject.”

But they’re making A+ in graft.

GONE FISHING: I’m off to a secure, undisclosed vacation for a week and will be as offline as I can manage. I have a few posts saved, but the rest of the Insta-Crew will keep the lights on while I enjoy a much-deserved (and much-needed!) break. See you in a week! Well, a bit more than that.

HMM: CFTC ‘Staff’ Placed on Leave Amid Investigation. “The interesting reference Chairman Pham made regarding the union leadership’s part in facilitating this fraud might also turn out to be uncomfortable for those folks, considering the seriousness of the violations listed in the IG report. Chairman Pham does say ‘criminal violations of the law’ in her official statement and ‘members’ of the staff have been put on administrative leave. Could be a serious house cleaning coming.”

The government needs a lot of that.

May 7, 2025

JOEL KOTKIN: Who Gets Hurt with Green Policies?

Since the early 2000s, governors and legislators from both parties have signed onto a climate agenda in California that is making energy steadily unaffordable.

Gasoline in California, according to AAA, which tracks national gas prices daily, costs an average of about $4.78, compared with $3.16 nationally. The cost of electricity in the state is now the highest in the continental U.S., at 30.22 cents per kilowatt hour.

You might want to blame the discrepancies on greed — Big Oil practicing price gouging, as Gov. Gavin Newsom has suggested, and utilities lining their shareholders’ pockets. But at the pump and on your light and power bill, California’s high energy prices are better understood as a self-inflicted wound, traceable to the state’s quixotic green energy policy.

Log In
Advertisement
Voices
Joel Kotkin
The high cost of California’s green energy policies
A vehicle plugged in for charging
An electric vehicle plugged in at a charging station in Anaheim. California’s climate agenda relies on expensive, and intermittent, energy sources, such as wind and solar.
(Jae C. Hong / Associated Press)
By Joel KotkinContributing writer
May 7, 2025 3 AM PT

Since the early 2000s, governors and legislators from both parties have signed onto a climate agenda in California that is making energy steadily unaffordable.

Gasoline in California, according to AAA, which tracks national gas prices daily, costs an average of about $4.78, compared with $3.16 nationally. The cost of electricity in the state is now the highest in the continental U.S., at 30.22 cents per kilowatt hour.

You might want to blame the discrepancies on greed — Big Oil practicing price gouging, as Gov. Gavin Newsom has suggested, and utilities lining their shareholders’ pockets. But at the pump and on your light and power bill, California’s high energy prices are better understood as a self-inflicted wound, traceable to the state’s quixotic green energy policy.

The notoriously high cost of gas in the state is the result of a lot of factors — we tax gas to pay for road infrastructure and a less-polluting fuel mix in the summer months. Last year, Sacramento decided to move harder, faster toward its goal of a carbon-less future, adding disincentives for refineries and incentives for EVs that the California Air Resources Board has predicted will add 47 cents a gallon at the pump.
Advertisement

Overall, California’s zero-carbon climate policies — pushing EVs as your next car purchase and heat pumps to cool and heat your house — rely largely on electricity that in turn depends on expensive, and intermittent, energy sources, such as wind and solar. Come hell or high water, California’s leaders are trying to regulate, tax and incentivize their way to electricity that is 100% carbon-free by 2045.

Unfortunately, as green-skeptic energy analyst Robert Bryce notes in books and on his Substack, wherever governments have tried to base their energy supply on a swift shift to renewables — the UK, Germany, California — the result has been huge spikes in energy prices. Germany’s vaunted industrial economy has slowed in part, according to most observers, because of the high cost of renewable energy.

It’s a built-in cost of government run by crooks and morons.

ED MORRISSEY: Pulitzers Carry On Grand Tradition Of … Walter Duranty.

OH, THERE’S A SHOCK: Stanford Review: China Conducting Academic Espionage at Stanford.

CATS AND DOGS, LIVING TOGETHER:

This is a 1980's Ghostbusters movie moment.😳 https://t.co/xWbs5s8ft3 pic.twitter.com/UZIA487sok

— Trent Telenko (@TrentTelenko) May 7, 2025

OPEN THREAD: Enjoy!

A FULL INTERVIEW BY SALENA ZITO: Pete Hegseth’s hard choices: Today’s decisions and tomorrow’s military.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: Resilience lunar lander enters orbit around the moon.

CHANGE: Trump withdraws surgeon general nominee, replaces her with Stanford grad, doctor.

I DON’T HAVE THAT, SO GOOD: Alzheimer’s Could Be Linked to a Common Virus You Already Have.

HAHA:

So let me get this straight… Palestinian protesters stormed the building, took it over and now that police are blocking them from leaving are begging and pleading to be let out? Thats some epic irony right there!

— 🔥Dark to Light🔥 1776 – 2024 (@pitbullpatriot3) May 7, 2025