Climate beat: Admit Green Agenda’s Costs
It’s “absurd to focus solely on lives saved” if the cost is “societal destruction,” yet politicians do just that “in the name of fighting climate change,” laments Bjorn Lomborg at The Wall Street Journal. By claiming they’re “following the science,” they obscure “lopsided” trade-offs. Climate change is real, but not the “existential crisis” activists claim. Meanwhile, “the world still gets four-fifths of its energy from fossil fuels,” and “economist Neil Record showed an abrupt end to fossil fuel use would cause six billion deaths in less than a year.” Fact is, “net zero is more than seven times as costly as the climate problem.” Sensible debate involves “all the facts,” including costs. “When politicians try to shut down discussion” by claiming they’re following the science, “don’t let them.”
Gaza war: Biden’s Problematic ‘Pier’ Plan
President Biden’s plan to build a temporary pier in Gaza to deliver humanitarian aid is “likely to create more problems than solutions,” warn Jonathan Sweet & Mark Toth at The Hill. “Although well-intentioned from a humanitarian standpoint,” the pier presents “a new target” for Hamas and other Iranian proxies and “will have to be defended from mortar, rocket, aerial drone and unmanned surface vehicle attacks” while contending with crowds of “desperate Palestinians.” It could bring a repeat of the bombing at “Kabul Airport’s Abbey Gate in Afghanistan in August 2021, killing 13 American service members and 170 Afghans” amid the US withdrawal. And the Pentagon estimates building the pier will require 1,000 US troops, contra Biden’s promise it can be done without US “boots on the ground.” “Distribution of humanitarian aid is still [an] issue,” but “putting more Americans at risk is not the solution.”
Ed desk: Berkeley’s Pro-Israel Live-In
Berkeley prof Ron Hassner “is staging a sit-in protest to bring attention to a rising tide of Jew-hatred on campus — and the administration’s inaction in the face of it,” living in his office and refusing to leave, reports Julia Steinberg at The Free Press. Why? “The word Zionist had become a slur on campus,” with Jewish students assaulted by pro-Hamas protestors — all part of “the broader atmosphere of Jew-hate that’s swept the Bay Area since Hamas’ October 7 attack.” “At 53, Hassner marched in his first protest only earlier this month,” when “he joined a San Francisco march against antisemitism.” But Hassner now feels “that something had to be done” and “keeps a lamp on his window, facing Berkeley thoroughfare Bancroft Way, at all times.”
Libertarian: Joe’s Tax Hike Spells Disaster
Hiking the corporate income tax rate from 21% to 28%, as per President Biden’s budget, “would raise revenue for sure,” but “do it in the most damaging way possible,” thunders Reason’s Veronique de Rugy. “Yes, corporations do write the checks to the IRS, but the economic weight will be partially or fully shifted to others, such as workers through lower wages, consumers through higher prices, or shareholders through lower returns on investment,” meaning “taxpayers making less than that $400,000 will be shouldering the cost of the corporate tax hike.” Also, “raising the corporate income tax at home makes [businesses] less competitive abroad.” This is “a misstep we can ill afford amid the delicate dance of post-pandemic recovery and an increasingly competitive global economy.”
Social-media watch: TikTok Is Just an App
It’s doubtful “how TikTok remains the hub for internet and youth culture,” argues Kate Lindsay at The Atlantic in the wake of the House vote to force parent company ByteDance to sell. Yes, US users “number more than 150 million” yet it’s “far from America’s favorite social-media app” and its “growth has flat lined.” Plus, “YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat have all responded to the rise of TikTok by creating their own endlessly scrolling, vertical, algorithmically controlled video feeds.” In India, “people simply migrated elsewhere” after a 2020 TikTok ban. No cause to panic, with so many “other apps to choose from.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board
This story originally appeared on NYPost
