President issues Executive Order on National Resources Defense Preparedness. And of course it wouldn’t be this Administration without the requisite loan guarantees, subsidy payments, and the like. Ignoring the utter totalitarian nature of this, someone ought to remind the Planners about Jimmy Carter’s adventures in synfuels, or the Mineral Management Program in the Post-War era. Here’s a hint: they failed. They failed spectacularly.
File this under the audacity of hope over experience.
The way I read this order, the president and his minions can seize control of, say, Nucor, in order to guarantee that there might be enough steel to build solar-powered ships equipped with sails, windmills and radar antennas in an advanced but integrated mess of confusion on deck. On the solar aircraft carriers, we’ll launch hot air balloons with colorful advertising promoting good nutrition for sailors.