New at Reason

David Weigel | July 10, 2006

Jonathan Rauch is ready to solve our energy problems, if President Bush feels like checking his mail.

Comments

|7.10.06 @ 2:34AM|#

Plug-in Hybrids shouldn't be part of the equation...yet. Despite the claims of 100 MPG, real world data shows very little improvement over the same vehicle without the plug-in option. Until the 34 MPH barrier can be breeched, plug-ins are basically a non-starter.

We'd be MUCH better off with 2 cars: One would be the "highway" car (an ethynol or biodesiel hybrid ), for use on the open road and at sustained speeds, while the other would be an all electric "city" car, with a range of about 100 miles and a top speed of about 80 MPH. All of this tech is available today (the highway car would cost slightly more than the same version of a current hybrid, while the city car would be whatever car you want converted to all electric for about $5,000 - $7,000).

This is far more realistic than what has been proposed in the article.

AndrewBissell|7.10.06 @ 2:38AM|#

Pardon me, but why, exactly, is this being posted on Reason?

|7.10.06 @ 2:50AM|#

yes, what does this have to do with liberty/freedom/rights or anything at all related? it seems antithetical to those values

|7.10.06 @ 3:02AM|#

This should make for an interesting conversation.

Johnathan Rauch,

The one question I have for you is this: how do you propose that we get around a major problem (identified by Bastiat, Hayek, etc.) associated with governmental planning (and no matter how "market-oriented" your approach may seem on paper, at least some government planning will ultimately be involved in implementing such a treaty)? That is the foreclosure of alternative possibilities problem? A problem really about the nature of future knowledge, etc.

|7.10.06 @ 3:17AM|#

Apparently reason has jumped firmly into the Nixonian/Rooseveltian camp of using the command economy to enact "market" reforms.

From looking at his Farewell Address, I'd say Jefferson had the solution to the Chavez problem, as well as a firm rebuttal to Mr. Rauch's article:

peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations - entangling alliances with none

I think that single sentence would have made a far better post than Mr. Rauch's solution via central planning.

|7.10.06 @ 3:36AM|#

Two further points:

1) Googling nixonian central planning yields a somewhat relevant article from lewrockwell.com as the first link.

2) Seriously, wtf is this article doing on reason.com? What does

Oil states, notes The Economist, "fare worse on child mortality and nutrition, have lower literacy and school-enrollment rates, and do relatively worse on measures like the U.N.'s Human Development Index."

have to do with libertarianism? Is that actually an argument that is expected to persuade a liberty-oriented individual that this ludicrous treaty idea should be enacted?

|7.10.06 @ 3:36AM|#

Last week we debated "When Reason officially jumped the shark."

My answer: July 10, 2006 01:42 AM

|7.10.06 @ 4:11AM|#

Ron Bailey (who is widely acknowledged to have not only a big ballsack but also a fragrant ballsack) has also mentioned a some form of zero carbon treaty.

With that being said, I'm pretty sure Exxon would foment a coup of the US government before any such treaty occurred.

Also, if oil props up evil dictators, might not countries rich in whatever the alternative might be be the next Irans and Saudi Arabias?

Also, WSDave, its Ethanol, not Ethynol. Ethynol has a formula of HOCCH. I don't believe this form is seen though as it would probably do a keto-enol tautomerization to the corresponding ketene, O=C=CH2. Sorry for being a dick.

|7.10.06 @ 5:13AM|#

Ditto jf, PL/GG, et al.

What's with the ethanol enthusiasm? Are we supposed to convert our IC engines a la Brasil? How much will that cost, how long will it take, and who will foot the bill?

I suppose we could get heavy into coal gassification. There's another good source of hydrocarbons on the continent - oil shale and sands. Of course, they require a high world oil price in order to make them economical to exploit. Somehow, artificially reducing demand for petroleum products won't prop up the oil price.

BTW, when they "crack" petroleum, the byproducts - kerosene was mentioned - are used for other things. Won't a forced demand reduction do things like screw up the S&D for things like jet fuel? Unintended consequences, Jonny. Watch out for the Invisible Foot.

Kevin

|7.10.06 @ 6:47AM|#

Yes, we should tax the piss out of gasoline, lower income taxes to compensate, and let the chips fall where they may. We should also quit building fifteen-lane expressways and start building lots more trains and subways.

The government subsidizes just about every form of energy production in a myriad of ways, and it is impossible to guess how they compare relatively. Drop all the subsidies, make polluter's pay, and watch a miraculous change happen.

|7.10.06 @ 8:12AM|#

I won't advocate for any centralized effort to reduce gasoline usage, but individual efforts to reduce gasoline usage mean that:

1) You save money.
2) You send less money to state-run oil companies in such unsavory places as Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela. (I would have included Iraq on that list of unsavory places, but everybody assures me that Iraq is becoming a liberal paradise.)

I'm just saying.

|7.10.06 @ 9:24AM|#

Just because you can use tradeable credits to set up a market doesn't mean something is free-market or pro-liberty. We could set up tradeable credits in speech rights too, and while it would likely work better than some central planning proposal for limiting speech, it's still ultimately coercively limiting speech.

I thought Rauch's article was building up to some modest proposal=type twist at the end where he proposed that we set up this treaty and then bow out of it, leaving a number of countries with significantly lower oil demand, and thereby lowering our own oil costs. But alas...

|7.10.06 @ 9:54AM|#

Unintended consequences: if there was no gasoline, what would I use to clean my paint brushes and oily rags?

|7.10.06 @ 9:54AM|#

Just today I was going to crack out the card and actually subscribe already. Unless this garbabe is thoroughly repudiated for the central-planning statism it is, forget it.

Am I missing something, Rauch? Please tell me you were just being exceptionally, brilliantly sarcastic.

|7.10.06 @ 9:57AM|#

*garbage --- good Lord

|7.10.06 @ 10:25AM|#

Did Statism Today run out of column space?

Thomas Paine's Goiter|7.10.06 @ 10:30AM|#

Russ beat me to it.

Reason = Fonzie.

Jennifer|7.10.06 @ 10:50AM|#

Oh, enough about the goddamned shark already. The shark can still kick all y'all's asses.

I am not certain what I think about Rauch's proposal, but I'm willing to consider the possibility that when it comes to some things, including energy issues, we as a society have painted ourselves into a corner, and maybe--just maybe--this might be a problem that cannot be properly solved by rugged individualists doing their individually rugged things.

(I cut my leg shaving this morning, and now the little drops of blood fall drip drip drip into the tank.)

|7.10.06 @ 11:06AM|#

Let's just mandate everyone to be happy too.

Jennifer|7.10.06 @ 11:13AM|#

Yeah, suggesting ways to reduce our national dependence on a resource controlled by fanatics who hate our guts is exactly like giving "Don't Worry, Be Happy" the force of law.

Garth|7.10.06 @ 11:14AM|#

What got us into this bind was the decision that the public sector should be in the business of building roads, thereby subsidizing the automobile, and it's human minions, over all other forms of transportation.

Roadbuilding is very expensive, both as an initial investment and in terms of upkeep. Had the private sector been left in charge we would have much more train travel, much less suburban spawl, higher density, smaller homes, and probably no WalMart nor the drive-through.

But we would also use much much much less gasoline (and oil) would probably use loads more nuclear, and might very well not have this global warming problem quite the way we do today.

Garth|7.10.06 @ 11:33AM|#

Oh, and we would walk and bike more places, and therefore not have an obesity �epidemic�. We might also know our neighbors' names and demonstrate more civic involvement��.

|7.10.06 @ 12:00PM|#

Had the private sector been left in charge we would have much more train travel, much less suburban spawl, higher density, smaller homes, and probably no WalMart nor the drive-through.

But people HATE trains and LOVE sprawl. At least, that's what I read around here.

|7.10.06 @ 12:07PM|#

"Had the private sector been left in charge we would have much more train travel, much less suburban spawl, higher density, smaller homes, and probably no WalMart nor the drive-through."

Yes, because riding on a train is just what I want to do every morning. Nothing like sitting next to Captain Mumbles: The Wonder Bum as he quaffs from his morning bottle of Fortified Ripple��.

Jennifer|7.10.06 @ 12:12PM|#

If nothing else, I'd like to see gas taxes high enough so that they and they alone pay for the cost of roads, including building, maintenance, winter plowing and sanding, electricity for streetlights--everything. Let cars and car owners pay their own non-subsidized way, and then the private sector will be able to develop competitive alternatives.

Garth|7.10.06 @ 12:18PM|#

Mediageek.... your choice, but then your dime: there would probably by some private toll roads about for people like you....

And private trains would no more allow bums riding along than they would breast-feeding mothers (here's my bid for a 270 post comment section!) ... or maybe they would -- their rules: and it would cost money to ride -- no subsidies. So, probably no bums.

And no-one really likes sprawl for sprawl's sake: they just like the convenience of being able to drive to everything...

|7.10.06 @ 12:32PM|#

yes, what does this have to do with liberty/freedom/rights or anything at all related? it seems antithetical to those values

Because the only "freedoms" of interest to the editors of Reason are 500 cable channels, a gay bar on every block, and allowing the country to be used as a planetary lint trap.

|7.10.06 @ 12:34PM|#

And no-one really likes sprawl for sprawl's sake

Sure they do. You can't have big, cheap houses & WalMarts without it. People may *pretend* they don't like it - maybe they're sick of sitting in traffic, for example, but in the end sprawl is the basis for their lifestyle.

Garth|7.10.06 @ 12:43PM|#

Pat Pending,

You forgot the MARIJUANA!

Rhywun,

O.K. Maybe they "like" the big houses . . . but why exactly? They are hell to heat and a bitch to clean. While it is nice that the kiddies each get their own room, mom and dad each their own private cave, a formal dining room used exactly twice a year, and a formal living room mom never lets anyone enter . . If we didn't ever start having those things I don't think we would ever miss them.

Trust me: the downsizing craze will begin in earnest soon and there will be a headline "Small is Big" on some national magazine/newspaper soon.

I believe that in a denser, train centric society there would still be WalMart: it would be built out where the McMansions are now and would offer some kind of shuttle service from the nearest station or maybe delivery.

|7.10.06 @ 12:55PM|#

Maybe they "like" the big houses . . . but why exactly? They are hell to heat and a bitch to clean.

That's what Filipinas are for.

|7.10.06 @ 12:55PM|#

Seeing how well the government handles farm policy, retirement policy, drug policy, food policy, transportation policy, etc I am sure that everyone here has a great deal of confidence that a federal energy policy is going to be wonderful.

What is it about energy that makes people who see how incompetent government is every day think that they will be anymore competent with energy policy?????

|7.10.06 @ 1:06PM|#

Garth:

People like big houses because they impress other people. Pathetic status insecurity is the birthright of every middle class American.

|7.10.06 @ 2:21PM|#

"Mediageek.... your choice, but then your dime: there would probably by some private toll roads about for people like you...."

FWIW, I'm currently looking for a house that's closer to the office, and plan to purchase a more fuel-efficient vehicle in the next couple of years.

I just *hate* public transportation.

As thoreau pointed out above, doing most of these things end up being economically beneficial for the person doing them. For that reason I am taking these actions.

But, like I said before, I fucking *hate* public transport.

|7.10.06 @ 3:22PM|#

I fucking *hate* cars, so that makes us even.

|7.10.06 @ 3:56PM|#

Yeah, suggesting ways to reduce our national dependence on a resource controlled by fanatics who hate our guts is exactly like giving "Don't Worry, Be Happy" the force of law.

Comment by: Jennifer at July 10, 2006 11:13 AM

Theoretically, how is passing a law banning gasoline for use in the private sector a "suggestion"?

|7.10.06 @ 3:59PM|#

Incidentally, I agree with your next comment Jennifer.

Garth|7.10.06 @ 4:01PM|#

Mediageek: excellent for you... and you are at the vanguard of the next wave....

But please keep in mind that this is not "public" transportation I am talking about in the traditonal sense: it would be private and the fare would cover its use: no subsidies from the gubmint. I think you would find that lots of the things that make you hate public transport would not be a problem in the alternate universe.

Reminds me of the last time I thought SNL was funny: Eddie Murphy went on a bus in "whiteface" and when it was only he and "other" white people on the bus, a big party broke out.....

That's what this better-heeled private commute might well be like: ever take the train to Stamford CT from Midtown Manhattan on a Friday night: nothin but a bunch of investment bankers all loaded up with beers and lettin' loose.

Jennifer|7.10.06 @ 5:22PM|#

Theoretically, how is passing a law banning gasoline for use in the private sector a "suggestion"?

Well, jcavar, I've already said that I'm not certain how I feel about Rauch's proposal. So I'm not exactly arguing in favor of it.

But I'm not exactly opposed either. The thing is, ignoring any possible environmental downsides, as well as the possibility that oil supplies may not remain high enough for us to continue our high-energy-consumption lifestyle, my problem lies with where the oil comes from. If this were still the 1950s, when America was the world's major source of oil, or if most of our oil came from allies like Norway and the Brits (before the North Sea fields went into decline), I wouldn't much care. Drive a one MPG Hummer if you want--it's your money.

But now when we buy oil a lot of that money goes to our enemies. I remember when the "War on Terror" was still new (and Iraq hadn't become part of it) somebody wrote a column that made the following point: when we fought the Nazis, we had to fund our own war effort. But imagine how much more difficult WW2 would have been for us if, in addition to paying for our own war effort, we were funding the Germans at the same time.

It's similar to why I try not to buy any goods made in China--not only do I worry that such items may have been produced by slave labor, but there's also this disquieting thought that we may well be at war with them in the next couple of decades, and I'd rather not pay for a war machine that could one day be turned against me.

|7.10.06 @ 5:58PM|#

Obviously, we could never use zero gasoline. So lets assume that we could use 80% less. Then lets assume we could save half of that 80% shoving ears of corn in our gas tanks and stuff like that. The other half of the reduction would need to be transferred to the electric grid. Could the grid take the extra load? I have my doubts.
And what a about a manufacturing plant in Podunk, Iowa whose workers drive in from a large distance? How long until Widgets Inc is required by law to provide power hookups for recharging?
I have a better idea for Mr. Bush:
Starting January 1, 2007, no federally owned non-military vehicle purchased may be powered exclusively by gas/diesel. If the government feels we should reduce our dependence on foreign oil, I suggest they go first.

|7.10.06 @ 6:22PM|#

This is simply a proposal for massive coerced destruction of global wealth. Let's pick some other natural resources that people should stop using too. How about lumber...err...trees?

|7.11.06 @ 1:02AM|#

I find it interesting that not a single reason contributor has entered this thread to justify the publication of this article.

|7.11.06 @ 1:49AM|#

Who knows, jf? Maybe they don't "feel like checking their mail," yuk yuk yuk!

|7.11.06 @ 3:14AM|#

The article presents points that are seriously troubling to libertarians, especially of the LP NAP kind. Yet, if decreased energy dependence on rogue states would be the result, that could obviously be a plus for liberty in general - the U.S. would not need the use of its military to support or defend troublesome regions, resulting in lower taxes potentially and decreased need of a U.S. security apparatus that already is intruding too far into our liberties at home. And if the result would also lead to less pollution that would obviously be a plus as well - as pollution can be seen as a form of aggression. Finally, the use of the state to support a market for tradeable credits is not the equivalent of abandoning the market altogether - afterall, the government enforces legal rules in support of market transactions already.

HeroreV|7.11.06 @ 11:33PM|#

This is absolutely ridiculous. As a libertarian, I'm completely against it. I hope this is at Reason only to promote conversation.

|7.12.06 @ 9:43PM|#

Garth:

Dealin' card games with the old men in the club car.
Penny a point ain't no one keepin' score.
Pass the paper bag that holds the bottle
Feel the wheels rumblin' 'neath the floor.

Nowadays, I never have to leave the club car.