Interview with retired CIA agent Robert Baer

**Crazed Rabbit** · 02-13-2006, 00:51

Oh, please. No great scientific advances have happened because the government tried to control market forces. Any money the government invests in trying to find alternate energy will probably be wasted. Look at the subsidies to US automakers to make a hybrid; yet they were beat by Toyota.

Private innovation is a much more powerful force, and one that doesn't require taxpayer's money.

Government designers are not bound by the real world of profits and praticality. It's like designing a car on Jupiter for use on Earth.

Mr. Baer's analysis is interesting. I'm not surprised by the armchair analyst attitude he speaks off. Why go to the 'stans if you can get the same money sitting behind a desk? I'm not sure I agree with his pessimism on Iraq. He makes good points about oblivious politicians and overreliance on satellites over human intel.

Crazed Rabbit

**Tribesman** · 02-13-2006, 01:16

Oh, please. No great scientific advances have happened because the government tried to control market forces. Any money the government invests in trying to find alternate energy will probably be wasted. Look at the subsidies to US automakers to make a hybrid; yet they were beat by Toyota.

Rabbit , are you not aware that Toyotas hybrid development was very heavily subsidised by their government , as was Hondas .

Private innovation is a much more powerful force, and one that doesn't require taxpayer's money.
Following Japans "private innovation free market " success , South Korea has descided to follow their example and increase the subsidies to its own auto industry .
On a sort of related theme , Toyota have branched out into the roof garden business , to avail of the Japanese government subsidies for their new environmental building regulations .

Government subsidies and tax incentives are bad for innovation and development ....yeah right

**Watchman** · 02-13-2006, 01:16

I've severe doubts of the ability of the US system to actually get the money it invests into the location it should actually end up in. But... how sure are you Toyota didn't get gov't subsidies ? Just wonderin'...

Anyway, massive governement expenditure on "prestige projects" gave us nuclear power, space flight, and all the innumerable spin-offs like computer industry and God knows what else. Just a little reminder.

**Tribesman** · 02-13-2006, 01:19

But... how sure are you Toyota didn't get gov't subsidies ? Just wonderin'...

Hehehe.....perhaps he didn't type in Toyotas government subsidies into his search function

**Watchman** · 02-13-2006, 01:26

Curio: Saturday's newspaper had a bit on PGA Peugeot Citroën's diesel-hybrid commuter car project. Just remebered.

**Lemur** · 02-13-2006, 04:38

Originally Posted by Crazed Rabbit

Oh, please. No great scientific advances have happened because the government tried to control market forces. Any money the government invests in trying to find alternate energy will probably be wasted. Look at the subsidies to US automakers to make a hybrid; yet they were beat by Toyota.

Private innovation is a much more powerful force, and one that doesn't require taxpayer's money.

Rabbit, there's a place for the market and there's a place for the government. The free market didn't build the atom bomb. The free market didn't build the space prorgam.

I am *not* suggesting that we should continue with our wasteful patchwork of pork subsidies to manufacturers who couldn't give a damn about the overall welfare of our nation. Rather, I was suggesting that a full-scale mobilisation would be useful to get us out of the energy trap we're in. Something along the lines of locking up several hundred of our best minds in Nevada and giving them a deadline. It worked before.

And as others have pointed out, both Honda and Toyota received massive subsidies to achieve their hybrids. But it isn't as though hybrids are the answer anyway -- they're nothing but a stop-gap measure with considerable downsides of their own.

It is possible to believe in the free market *and* the possibility of governmental good.

**Watchman** · 02-13-2006, 09:56

AFAIK the main issue with the hybrids is the cost, which is currently way above standard engines. The Peugeot Citroën folks interviewed in the article said they were aiming to getting a consumer-affordable model out by 2010, but...

Still, at least they work on the existing distribution network. Once people finally get around to replacing gasoline with hydrogen fuel cells or something that'll also require a distribution logistics overhaul, and that is going to be a pain and a half.

**Lemur** · 02-13-2006, 23:16

This is the sort of thing I'm talking about. Real change, not just slapping toxic battery packs into cars at taxpayer expense.

[edit]

Teh link was broken. Fixxored.

**Samurai Waki** · 02-13-2006, 23:24

Originally Posted by Watchman

Still, at least they work on the existing distribution network. Once people finally get around to replacing gasoline with hydrogen fuel cells or something that'll also require a distribution logistics overhaul, and that is going to be a pain and a half.

California is already building Hydrogen Fuel Pumps... and there will be about 150 in service by 2010. Which is still severly small compared to Gasoline Pumps, which number in the 10 thousands probably.