There’s a lot of debate in left-wing-commentaryland at the moment about electricity and gas prices, ‘fuel poverty’, and how these relate to the profits made by energy companies.
The problem is, the debate is nonsense: UK utilities are losing out from high energy prices - and utility bills are currently far too low in any case. [...]

A long time ago on a blog far away, I posted a graph showing the oil price in euros. The resulting trace looked rather different from the conventional US$ measure.
With that blog dead, several years passed, and another round of ‘oooh, isn’t oil expensive’ fussing currently taking place, I thought it might be a good [...]

It’s always something of a fish/barrel/firearms combo going for Spiked and their writers. But given the scandalous denial of the facts and complete absence of research in one particular piece, I’ll do it anyway.

Whilst it’s common knowledge that a diet low in animal products is healthier, cheaper and better for you (and better for the animals, of course), it’s less known that it’s also a lot better in the fight against climate change.

When walking around Holborn a few months ago, I stumbled across the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital. At first, I assumed it was some kind of comedy quack money-fleecing outfit. Then I noticed the NHS signs on the door, and decided that it had probably been founded by Victorian herbalists and subsequently turned into a proper [...]

(A guest post by Gus of 1820 fame.)
Anyone who didn’t believe in karma should take a peek at what’s going on in the Antarctic Ocean. As Associated Press reports: “The crew of a Japanese whaling ship (the Nisshin Maru) stranded in Antarctic waters by a fire that killed one seaman were trying to repair its [...]

We’re constantly bombarded with news that suggests the global economy is enjoying an indefinite growth spurt. Britain is in year 15 of a boom, China and India are the economic super powers of the future, America grows steadily despite all Bush’s attempts to the contrary. Even in continental Europe, which we’re told is well on [...]

Even though I presume that you, dear reader, laudably don’t buy The Times, nonetheless you may glance at headlines whilst passing a news-stand.
Yesterday’s main story was headlined ‘THE GREEN DIVIDE: Times poll shows the gulf between words and action on the environment’.
It shows nothing of the sort. The table that, ahem, proves it uses reasoning [...]

Home Secretary John Reid has compared the need for innovative ways of unearthing terrorist plots to the fortuitous inventions that helped turn the tide in the Second World War. Once again the maxim that a little knowledge goes a long way is amply demonstrated by governmental short-sightedness.

Thomas Paine once wrote:
Every age and generation must be free to act for itself, in all cases as the ages and generations which preceded it. The vanity and presumption of governing beyond the grave is the most ridiculous and insolent of all tyrannies. Man has no property in man; neither has any generation [...]

It is difficult to overstate the case with climate change. There is no bigger issue. Calm and informed voices - even David Attenborough’s - are saying it is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. Indeed, it could even be the last.
Next month, the Camp for Climate Action plans to kickstart a campaign of radical [...]

Google Trends is rather an impressive new piece of software. In the style of late-90s favourites like Search Voyeur, it allows you to see what other people are hunting for. But instead of merely providing a list and allowing you to marvel at others’ illiteracy and perversion (these days, a function that Sitemeter is admirably [...]

The scenes in New Orleans over the last week haven’t exactly been a great advertisement for government’s ability to fulfil the responsibilities it claims to undertake in return for the right to tax. But libertarianism’s also been having a hard time down there on the levees. When government broke, voluntarism and mutual aid didn’t step [...]

Abortion. There, I’ve said it. That’s another 100 extra hits on the statcounter today, fellow Sharpeners. There’s nothing the political world likes more than a contentious moral issue, and this particular issue is one of the daddies. This post was going to be a collaborative effort between me and Katie, but alas she is too [...]