HE WAS RIGHT ABOUT THE NUCLEAR OPTION TOO:

Nuclear war theorist Herman Kahn provided at least partial inspiration for film director Stanley Kubrick's maniacal Dr. Strangelove. (The character's accent, at least, was likely based on that of German emigres Henry Kissinger or Wehrner Von Braun.) Kubrick had read Kahn's 1960 treatise "On Thermonuclear War" and met with him several times when planning the 1964 black comedy. That unforgettable cinematic depiction and interpretation of Khan-ism -- a nuclear conflict between the US and USSR was not "unthinkable" -- if not necessarily the man himself, helped cement Kahn's historical reputation as a dangerous Cold Warrior.

But the 1970s detente era saw the second act of Kahn's career, that of a futurist. At the very time the professional long-term forecasting industry was taking a pessimistic turn fueled by environmental catastrophism, this thinker of dark, unthinkable thoughts stood out as a sunny purveyor of techno-capitalist optimism. Rather than a few minutes before nuclear midnight, dawn was always just breaking in a world of abundance led by a recharged Reaganite America, a view he distilled in his 1983 book, "The Coming Boom." (Liberals were dismissive and, it turns out, wrong. The period from 1983 through 2007 has been called The Long Boom because of its strong and steady economic growth. It was also the period that saw the rise of Silicon Valley as the nation's and world's tech core.)

That same year, just a few months before his death, Khan joined with several other right-of-center thinkers in assailing the eco-pessimist "Global 2000 Report" that had been commissioned by the Carter administration. Anyone who had read another Kahn book, "The Next 200 Years," would hardly be surprised at Kahn's reaction. He and his co-authors argue that "because of the evolution of knowledge and technology, resources are increasing rather than fixed. More technology and more capital are vital. ... Enough resources will be available at reasonable costs so that reasonable rates of growth can be achieved. ... Current levels of absolute poverty will decrease almost everywhere. Thus, in this view, all things considered, the long-range outlook is quite good." [...]

Is there a place for such pro-growth, future-oriented, techno-optimism in American politics today?

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