Climate Scientocracy

From Alex Epstein, host of Power Hour. On this week's Power Hour I discuss "The Five Things Planet of the Humans Gets (Mostly) Right." 1. Green energy is a high-impact industrial process 2. Green energy has many undesirable environmental impacts 3. Green energy is hugely dependent on fossil fuels 4. "100% renewable" is energy accounting fraud 5. Leading green energy advocates are a terrifying combination of ignorant and dishonest Next week I'll cover "The Five Things Planet of the Human Gets Totally Wrong."

30 Apr 202046min

From Alex Epstein, host of Power Hour. This week’s Power Hour features a 2-hour interview with philosopher Onkar Ghate, focusing on why lockdowns were never a necessary or proper response to COVID-19. Dr. Ghate, a Senior Fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute and a longtime colleague (and mentor) of mine, has been doing some great work on what a truly American, pro-freedom, approach to infectious diseases looks like. Some topics we covered include: - We need objective, clearly defined laws specifying and limiting the power of government in regard to infectious diseases. - Why Sweden has more American infectious disease laws than America does. - How clearly defined laws lead to better preparedness by government, industry, and individuals. - Why more profit-making in the health care system is key to scaling capacity. - How governments have failed to do their proper job of identifying and isolating infectious individuals. - How far greater transparency from government would empower a free people to make rational decisions. - The right way to handle potential hospital capacity shortages. - How the idea of “free” health care promotes irresponsible behavior. - Why state-wide lockdowns were not the right policy with the evidence we had. - Why lockdowns were a panic-based, not reason-based policy that should be removed as quickly as possible. - How governments should make policy and communicate to citizens going forward. - Why now is the time to write to government officials—and what you should write.

23 Apr 20202h 4min

On this week's Power Hour I cover 4 topics: 1: A pro-freedom approach to COVID-19 2: My favorite COVID-19 commentators 3: The fallacy of COVID-19 and climate "denial" 4: New climate talking points

16 Apr 20201h 20min

On this week's Power Hour I cover 3 big topics: 1: Why green energy mandates would be a death blow to economic recovery Many political officials are pushing for various green energy mandates, such as the Wind Production Tax Credit, to be part of “phase 4” of the COVID-19 response. In the first segment of this week’s Power Hour I explain why the worst thing we can do at this stage is dramatically increase the price of energy, which would have the “death blow” effects of 1) decreasing American productivity and 2) increasing consumer prices. I offer a very different approach, energy freedom—including the decriminalization of nuclear energy. 2: Obama draws exactly the wrong lesson on pandemic preparedness Former President Barack Obama recently tweeted the following to great acclaim. "We've seen all too terribly the consequences of those who denied warnings of a pandemic. We can't afford any more consequences of climate denial. All of us, especially young people, have to demand better of our government at every level and vote this fall." On the second segment of this week’s Power Hour I explain why this is the wrong lesson, and look at how Obama’s and others’ “climate change fixation” took their eye off pandemic response and other urgent priorities. 3: What is our COVID-19 goal? In the final segment of this week’s Power Hour, I ask: What is our COVID-19 goal? Is it to eradicate COVID-19 or to manage it? In my view most political officials keep switching between these two goals, leading to mass confusion and unnecessary destruction. I make the case that given the reality of COVID-19 today our goal should definitely be intelligent management and that the eradication goal is doing incredible unnecessary harm.

9 Apr 202055min

With in-depth interviews of experts on controversies such as “green energy,” offshore drilling, “energy independence,” fossil fuels, etc, Power Hour seeks to help listeners get clear on these complex but vital issues. Every episode features a new guest, an extended interview/discussion, and a closing segment with my takeaways from the discussion.

1 Apr 20202h 19min

On this week’s Power Hour I explain why I’ve jumped into the COVID-19 policy debate and why I believe bad thinking methods are driving leading predictions and policies. Then I offer a first draft of a path forward, which I call “Don’t Stop Living, Live Smarter." The six key steps are: Step 1: Acknowledge the difficult reality we are in. Step 2: Recognize that an indefinite universal lockdown is both impractical and immoral. Step 3: Massively increase testing and transparency Step 4: Liberate American ingenuity to massively increase treatment ability Step 5: Help the highly vulnerable minority protect themselves. Step 6: Go back to work (and school) with virus-prevention best-practices.

26 Mar 20201h 35min

With in-depth interviews of experts on controversies such as “green energy,” offshore drilling, “energy independence,” fossil fuels, etc, Power Hour seeks to help listeners get clear on these complex but vital issues. Every episode features a new guest, an extended interview/discussion, and a closing segment with my takeaways from the discussion.

18 Mar 202059min

With in-depth interviews of experts on controversies such as “green energy,” offshore drilling, “energy independence,” fossil fuels, etc, Power Hour seeks to help listeners get clear on these complex but vital issues. Every episode features a new guest, an extended interview/discussion, and a closing segment with my takeaways from the discussion.

11 Mar 202056min