The Highlights - Vol. 20
The latest compilation of news, politics, & culture
The Misleading Media Groupthink On China’s Renewable Energy - Ira Stoll, Washington Free Beacon
The reality is that China is heavily dependent on imported oil, while the U.S. is a net exporter of energy.
AP, New York Times, Wall Street Journal scramble to spin Iran War as Beijing win
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The gist of the story—that the Iran war somehow demonstrates that China is right about wind and solar energy—is a fantasy, not a fact. Even if you rely on China’s own unreliable data, the International Energy Agency lists coal and coal products as 71 percent of China’s energy production, and solar, wind, and other renewables combined at 5.4 percent.
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The AP website also lists a “partnership” with the China News Service. It describes the China News Service as providing “News and insight from daily life in China,” illustrating the partnership with a pair of adorable pandas. “China News Service (CNS) provides in-depth news from China to an international audience, with coverage including feature stories and topics such as current events, art, lifestyle, people and travel,” the AP website says. What AP doesn’t say is that China News Service is controlled by the Chinese government and its governing Communist Party.
The World Is Facing Horrors in China—and Looking Away
China’s human rights abuses can no longer be denied. Evidently, however, they can be ignored.
Legal advisers help migrants pose as gay to get asylum, undercover BBC investigation finds
Cato’s Debt Dispatch breaks down the week’s fiscal stories:
California's Home Care Program Loses Billions to Fraud Every Year - (This, as Cato scholar Dominik Lett and the Debt Dispatch have pointed out, is a consequence of Medicaid’s open-ended financing structure, which incentivizes states to “maximize enrollment over program integrity to capture as many federal dollars as possible.”)
Cato scholars argue for clearer separation between immigration and public benefits, highlighting undocumented immigrants’ access to housing assistance programs like the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC). They propose excluding noncitizens from federal welfare and entitlement benefits.
How States are Using TANF as a Slush Fund. States are redirecting TANF funds away from basic assistance, using them for alternative services and even plugging budget shortfalls. This mismanagement, including misspent funds in Mississippi, highlights the need for increased oversight and reporting requirements.
School Lunch Programs Have Expanded Beyond Low-Income Kids. The Biden administration lowered the CEP threshold, resulting in nearly three-quarters of public school students being eligible for taxpayer-funded meals.
RMS of Georgia, LLC v. EPA
In our latest Supreme Court amicus brief, filed in RMS v. EPA, we emphasize the importance of the non-delegation doctrine to the Constitution’s separation of powers.
The Supreme Court has long recognized a “nondelegation doctrine,” which holds that Congress must provide executive agencies with an “intelligible principle” to govern the exercise of delegated authority. During the Second World War, however, the doctrine entered a period of dormancy, as wartime decisions deferential to the political branches truncated its development. Congress has since avoided difficult policy choices by granting broad authority to agencies—undermining the separation of powers and diminishing individual liberty. The Court now has a chance to revive and clarify the doctrine in a case called RMS v. EPA.
Congress cannot hand an executive agency unbounded power to decide who may participate in a multibillion-dollar market.
Not So Great Takes
Sen. Tim Kaine: We Had Diplomatic Control Over Iran Getting A Nuclear Weapon Until Trump Tore It Up
As you know, Iran entered into an agreement with the United States and other nations, both allies of the U.S. and China and Russia in 2016, reaffirming that they would never purchase, seek, or acquire a nuclear weapon," Kaine said. Donald Trump tore that up."
"So, J.D. Vance says now that Iran won't agree to what they agreed to 10 years ago. I'm sure Iran wonders if we agree to it, will the United States tear it up again and bomb our civilian infrastructure and kill school children, and engage in an assassination campaign against our leadership," he said. "This is not going to be an easy negotiation because the last negotiation that led to a control of Iran's nuclear program, the U.S. made the decision to tear it up and walk away from the deal." "I think that decision by President Trump to tear up a diplomatic deal will go down in history as one of the worst decisions in the foreign policy space ever made by an American president. If you make diplomacy impossible, you tend to make war inevitable," he said.
Sen. Kelly: The Last Thing I Would Want In A Space Shuttle Crew Would Be 7 White U.S. Navy Pilots