Neat, Plausible, and Wrong

I thought you might be interested in Walter Russell Mead’s explanation in his most recent Wall Street Journal column of the Biden Administration’s embrace of a “green agenda”:

Bidenites think that climate offers an opportunity to pry Democratic greens and harder-left progressives apart. The deep-blue progressives want massive cuts in the military budget and a wholesale reorientation of American foreign policy toward longtime left-wing goals. Overall, the idea is a transformation of American budget priorities toward domestic spending.

Many greens, on the other hand, are more centrist in their general foreign-policy approach and, if satisfied that the administration is actively pursuing a hard-hitting climate agenda, will with varying degrees of enthusiasm support such Biden goals as a tougher policy toward China.

Bidenites reason that if they make enough greens happy enough with ambitious climate policies, and if they deliver enough money to enough progressive interest groups at home, the administration can count on enough Democratic support to pursue a strong Asia policy.
Central to this calculation is the belief of many in Bidenworld that pursuing a climate agenda entails at most a modest and manageable cost. If that’s correct, the path forward looks clear. Advancing the energy transition at home while pressing other countries to do the same addresses an important international problem and cements the administration’s political hold on an important segment of its base.

He goes on to relate that to the “energy crisis” being experienced in many if not most of the countries around the world.

I wanted to make a few observations. First, I was reminded of H. L. Mencken’s more than century old wisecrack:

There is always a well-known solution to every human problem — neat, plausible, and wrong.

If you paint in broad enough strokes, leaving out the implementation details, accomplishing just about anything looks simple. It is only when you dig into the implementation details and evaluate their costs and run-on effects that the actual cost becomes clear. Shorter: the devil is in the details.

Second, I’m willing to give the Biden Administration the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think that a “green” agenda is purely a matter of political expediency for them. I think they view it as a lovely coincidence that such an agenda bears political benefits. But I think they’re sincere about it—sincere and wrong. I don’t believe they have a secret motive of benefiting authoritarian energy-producing countries who probably don’t give a damn about the environment one way or another.

My third observation is this: isn’t provoking an “energy crisis” the point of a “green” agenda? What do they think will happen if you raise prices (the effect of carbon taxes, for example) and constrain supply, e.g. by abandoning nuclear power as the Germans have done?