Great article. You have so accurately put your finger on the root cause of Europe's demise. I would like to add one thing however. Europe's adherence to net zero policies to stave off a nonexistent climate catastrophe is devastating their economic health by raising energy costs and making most all industries noncompetitive with the rest of the world. Folks calling the shots in Europe still believe signalling climate virtue at the expense of their economy is the best way to maintain power.
i suspect that adherence to be more a symptom of rot than a root cause. the leaders of that movement have never been sincere. it's just a perfect pretext to take economic control and ruin economies. there is no such thing as a rich country with low per capita energy use.
You may be correct that climate lunacy is more a symptom than a cause of Europe's dysfunction, but it's a very bold statement to imply the EU leaders actually want to ruin their economy as opposed to just making that necessary sacrifice to keep power. Maybe, but things are very dire indeed if that's true.
who is paying these leaders? are they enemies of the west or beneficiaries of crisis and collapse? it's very difficult to stay on top of a vibrant, dynamic economy. it's easy to stay the oligarch of a stagnant one.
That's a question that continues to baffle me. Don't these fools in charge of us realise that when the whole building collapses they will be under the rubble too, or do they just not care?
Yes true, "follow the money" is very predictive of bad behavior. You are probably aware that China has very handsomely funded US environmental groups that engage in litigation and advocacy against the fossil fuel industry and that Qatar, among other Islamic States, provide loads of financial support to academic institutions promoting anti-western sentiment. I agree, a country has to diligently maintain its Western ideals to avert collapse. Too many of us assume that most people in the world want the same things that we do and that they are happy to see Western cultures advance and thrive.
Agreed. What happened to Germany is staggering to behold. They have single-handedly destroyed their industrial base with their "green" policies. Then the US blew up Nordstream, their last source of cheap energy, and the Germans do nothing.
Germany doing nothing actually would have been preferable. Instead they shut down their last 3 large, state of the art, nuclear power plants in April 2023, and continued with their $500 billion investment in solar and wind in a country with comparatively little wind or sunshine. Their self sacrificing based on platitudes is embarrassing.
Yep. Mind-boggling. Here in Switzerland, the more stupid among us voted to close down our nuke power stations. Fortunately, the government has been slow walking the closures, and we also get a lot of energy from hydro.
By contrast, Japan is rolling out small self-contained molten salt nuclear reactors (which can't melt down unless the laws of physics change) all over their grid. I would love to have one myself (they're about the size of a shipping container and will put out 1 megawatt for 30 years before needing refueling).
Great article. You have so accurately put your finger on the root cause of Europe's demise. I would like to add one thing however. Europe's adherence to net zero policies to stave off a nonexistent climate catastrophe is devastating their economic health by raising energy costs and making most all industries noncompetitive with the rest of the world. Folks calling the shots in Europe still believe signalling climate virtue at the expense of their economy is the best way to maintain power.
i suspect that adherence to be more a symptom of rot than a root cause. the leaders of that movement have never been sincere. it's just a perfect pretext to take economic control and ruin economies. there is no such thing as a rich country with low per capita energy use.
You may be correct that climate lunacy is more a symptom than a cause of Europe's dysfunction, but it's a very bold statement to imply the EU leaders actually want to ruin their economy as opposed to just making that necessary sacrifice to keep power. Maybe, but things are very dire indeed if that's true.
a potential pivot is this:
who is paying these leaders? are they enemies of the west or beneficiaries of crisis and collapse? it's very difficult to stay on top of a vibrant, dynamic economy. it's easy to stay the oligarch of a stagnant one.
That's a question that continues to baffle me. Don't these fools in charge of us realise that when the whole building collapses they will be under the rubble too, or do they just not care?
Yes true, "follow the money" is very predictive of bad behavior. You are probably aware that China has very handsomely funded US environmental groups that engage in litigation and advocacy against the fossil fuel industry and that Qatar, among other Islamic States, provide loads of financial support to academic institutions promoting anti-western sentiment. I agree, a country has to diligently maintain its Western ideals to avert collapse. Too many of us assume that most people in the world want the same things that we do and that they are happy to see Western cultures advance and thrive.
Why not both enemies and beneficiaries?
There is NO DOUBT that the economic destruction is intentional. Zero.
Agreed. What happened to Germany is staggering to behold. They have single-handedly destroyed their industrial base with their "green" policies. Then the US blew up Nordstream, their last source of cheap energy, and the Germans do nothing.
Germany doing nothing actually would have been preferable. Instead they shut down their last 3 large, state of the art, nuclear power plants in April 2023, and continued with their $500 billion investment in solar and wind in a country with comparatively little wind or sunshine. Their self sacrificing based on platitudes is embarrassing.
Yep. Mind-boggling. Here in Switzerland, the more stupid among us voted to close down our nuke power stations. Fortunately, the government has been slow walking the closures, and we also get a lot of energy from hydro.
By contrast, Japan is rolling out small self-contained molten salt nuclear reactors (which can't melt down unless the laws of physics change) all over their grid. I would love to have one myself (they're about the size of a shipping container and will put out 1 megawatt for 30 years before needing refueling).