Archive for Michael Heberling

Michael Heberling is president of the Baker College Center for Graduate Studies in Flint, Michigan.

Government Moonshine

From its minor role as an oxygenate additive for gasoline, ethanol has become the darling of Washington. Politicians embrace ethanol as a miracle elixir. All the fashionable energy buzzwords can be applied to it. It is “green power”; it’s “renewable” and will provide “energy independence” for America. Legislation has been promoting ethanol nonstop. The Energy [...]

24Mar2010 | Michael Heberling | 4 comments | Continued

Government Motors

Government Motors by Michael Heberling Michael Heberling (mheber01@baker.edu) is president of the Baker College Center for Graduate Studies in Flint, Michigan. If Washington owns it, it just can’t keep its hands off. —Senator Lamar Alexander Twenty-five years ago President Reagan told auto workers in Orion, Michigan, “You’ve demonstrated when the chips are down, what people [...]

23Oct2009 | Michael Heberling | 6 comments | Continued

Dim Bulbs

“Hell, there are no rules here—we’re trying to accomplish something.” —Thomas A. Edison Edison’s words may have been true in the 1800s. Today, however, we have plenty of rules, thanks to the U.S. Congress. Some are so bizarre that you have to question the judgment of those who come up with them. One rule in [...]

10Jun2009 | Michael Heberling | 30 comments | Continued

Global Warming Revisited

In the May 2001 Freeman I published “Unprecedented Global Warming?” which noted that climate change (global warming and global cooling) is a continuing phenomenon and that what we’ve witnessed in the last 25 years is “by no means unprecedented.” The Medieval Warm Period (800-1300), which took place without SUVs, power plants, or factories, was warmer [...]

24Apr2009 | Michael Heberling | 13 comments | Continued

Too Big to Fail

“Once you lose your freedom to fail, you also lose your freedom to succeed and you cease to be a free society.” —U.S. Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas In March 2008 the investment banking firm Bear Sterns failed and the federal government quickly stepped in. The public was inundated with the phrase “too big to fail” [...]

2Mar2009 | Michael Heberling | 8 comments | Continued

Whom Should We Thank for High Gas Prices?

I am writing this after having just filled my tank with gasoline at $3.99 per gallon. Oil is over $125 a barrel. Big Oil and their CEOs are the hands-down favorite to win the Snidely Whiplash People’s Choice Award. Since Big Oil is our favorite villain, no one really wants to hear about the other [...]

1Jul2008 | Michael Heberling | 2 comments | Continued

Mandating Renewable Energy: It’s Not Easy Being Green

Environmentalists abhor all fossil fuels (coal, natural gas, and petroleum) and nuclear energy. They collectively refer to this type of energy as “brown” power. Along with a bipartisan collection of Washington politicians, they instead advocate “green,” or “renewable,” power. This earth-friendly alternative energy includes geothermal, hydroelectric, biomass, solar, and wind. While we all know that [...]

1Oct2006 | Michael Heberling | 5 comments | Continued

Government-Mandated Fuel-Efficiency Standards

Government mistakes have long lives. In response to the energy crisis of the 1970s, Congress passed the Energy Policy and Conservation Act. This legislation had two major objectives: 1) Reduce our overall consumption of petroleum and 2) reduce our dependence on foreign oil (meaning OPEC). The means to accomplish this was CAFE, Corporate Average Fuel [...]

1Sep2006 | Michael Heberling | 3 comments | Continued

Government-Reformulated Gas: Bad in More Ways than One

The amended Clean Air Act (CAA) of 1990 called for cleaner automobile-engine combustion and a reduction in tailpipe emissions. To meet these goals, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) directed the petroleum industry to modify the composition of gasoline to comply with the “Oxygenated” and “Reformulated” Gasoline (RFG) Programs. While only those parts of the country [...]

1Sep2003 | Michael Heberling | 1 comment | Continued

Washington’s Centrally Planned Heating and Cooling

While the Clinton administration had eight years to “save the environment,” it waited until the final days to push through a flurry of questionable environmental regulations. Among these was the regulation that would require increasing the efficiency of central air conditioners and heat pumps by 30 percent. In the arcane language of the energy business, [...]

1Jul2003 | Michael Heberling | Comments Off | Continued

Frankenstein Television

The televisions that Americans have loved for over 50 years will soon become obsolete. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has mandated that the analog TV broadcast signals be turned off in 2006. After that date all TV broadcasts will be “digital.” This mandate appears to be at odds with the wishes of the American people. [...]

1Feb2003 | Michael Heberling | 6 comments | Continued

Washing Your Clothes Washington’s Way

Our home is becoming less and less our castle as the government moves in . . . one room at a time. First there was the bathroom. Working toilets were outlawed in 1992 in favor of the environmentally friendly government toilets. (See my “The Federally Mandated Toilet Still Doesn’t Work,” November 2001.) On January 1, [...]

1Jan2002 | Michael Heberling | 3 comments | Continued

The Federally Mandated Toilet Still Doesn’t Work

Three years ago we moved into our newly built home in Grand Blanc, Michigan. The whole family was excited. While all new houses have some problems, I was not expecting the toilets to be among them. How could this be? After all, these toilets were brand new. As it turns out, that was precisely the [...]

1Nov2001 | Michael Heberling | 34 comments | Continued

Unprecedented Global Warming?

One of the most contentious issues of the day is global warming. Those who openly discuss the subject fall into one of two camps. First, there are the environmental alarmists who only see the world in terms of urban sprawl, deforestation, and pollution. For this group, global warming provides the much-needed justification to curtail, or [...]

1May2001 | Michael Heberling | 3 comments | Continued

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