From: Anne Marie Tobias (atobias@interwoven.com)
Date: Tue Jun 05 2001 - 23:42:40 MDT
Samantha Atkins wrote:
> Anne Marie Tobias wrote:
> >
> > Howdy all,
> >
> > Spike Jones wrote:
> >
> > > Anne Marie Tobias wrote:
> > >
> > > > Why did the energy crisis suddenly blossom, when
> > > > fossil fuels strongest advocate entered the white house?
> > >
> > > Because the population of Taxifornia continued to rise and
> > > no new power generation capacity was being built. This
> > > "crisis" was foreseen at least four years ago by people who
> > > concern themselves with this sort of thing. I refer you to
> > > Ideas Futures, where memes to that effect were offered
> > > for sale some time ago.
> >
> > The businesses that provide us with power and fossil fuel have
> > a long history of manipulation, and social engineering on their
> > own behalf, bending or breaking the laws to fit their need or
> > desire, and doing whatever it took throughout the third world
> > to get what they wanted (up to and including, murder, control
> > of local govenments, and insiting revolutions.)
>
> Can you name any major business that doesn't have a "long
> history of manipulation"? Any system of politics? Laws are
> made to be bend to the needs of real entities, they are servants
> of the interests of people. This includes the interests of
> businesses as well as other groups.
>
> This is not to excuse really shady and terrible things of course
> but it is to point out that you are painting with an overly
> broad brush.
Actually, you're right, I am. I think that most business is very much
within the borders of decent behavior, and social conscience.
I also agree that business is more dynamic than government, and
that there is a need sometimes for quick thinking entrepeneurs to
work around a lethargic and dull witted government.
That said, I find certain "KINDS" od business appauling. I find
the behavior of certain businesses cynical, self serving in the mind
boggling extreme, and I am saddened that our culture doesn't
inspire people to show greater responsibility and/or compassion.
The mining industry has struggled (read paid off politicians by the
boat load) to make sure that no changes have been made mining
laws since the time of the Pony Express (which pretty much means
anything goes... if you're willing to stake a claim, you can do what
you please.) The results are that an investment firm comes in, they
build a huge shallow cyanide lake. They fill it with rediculously
poor gold ore. They then process the cyanide solution to extract
the gold. This is only economical if done on an immense scale.
The side effect is that they produce a superfund site that will cost
tax payers billions of dollars to clean up. In the mean time, this
huge lake looks like the only water for 50 miles, so every bird
that see's it come for a bath and a drink, killing virtually every
wild bird for an area larger than Rhode Island. That's a cynical,
self serving business... it damages the world and it screws the
public, and makes a very few people moderately wealthy. This
is the kind of thinking that I find an abomination, and it's pervasive
in our society... the want to fence off ideas, the desire to charge
others for everything including breathing, the inclination to sue at
the drop at a hat... it all points to a mindset that's based on "Screw
them... any THEM... before they screw you... get your slice little
piggy." This isn't going to work!
> > As these companies have become autonomous multinational
> > organizations, their loyalty to America has eroded, and they
> > have begun to treating us just like any other junky is treated by
> > their dealer.
> >
>
> Loyalty to one nation would be considered "nationalism" and even
> corporate fascism or so-called "state capitalism". America,
> as a political entity did more than a little throughout the last
> century and especially during the depression years to jolly well
> earn the disloyalty and distrust of businesses. It is not
> exactly one-sided.
>
> The junky analogy is utterly unjustified.
Oh I disagree... we are addicted to fossil fuels as certainly and
surely as any junky. If you were to cut the flow off tomorrow...
the disaster would rival any nuclear holocaust. Our economy runs
on oil and coal... and if you think the oil and coal companies have
not spent billions over the duration making sure that was the case
and that it stays that way... think again. At every turn, the fossil fuel
producers have jerked the strings of government to get precisely
what they wanted when they wanted it. I'm not even saying that's
evil... they have an obligation to their employees, and stock holders
to be as clever as they can in keeping fossil fuel the dominant way
of doing things... I am saying that what's good for Shell Oil, or BP,
may not be good for Homo Sapiens.
> > I never argued that the bed that California finds itself was not
> > for the most part of it's own making. There is plenty of blame
> > to go around for everybody to take a good healthy slice.
> >
>
> Business did not force California to ignore its future energy
> projections and population and energy use increased.
However, business interests from the east colluded with idiots
in the state capitol to (The Duck and Petey boy), and their plan
blew up in everybodies face.
> > What I am saying is that, it must be obvious to anybody with
> > funtioning retinas, that the collapse of California's energy
> > balancing act came precisely with the exchange of keys to the
> > administrative branch of the Fedreal government. That the
>
> Correlation is not causation.
Right, like the Ameriacn hostages held in the middle-east being
released 4 days after Ronald Reagan took office... or Sadam
still being in power... please... their not even trying to hide the
bald faced BS any... they figure we're stupid sheep, and even if
we catch them with their hands in the cookie jar, we haven't the
intelligence or the attention span to control or punish.
> > prior administration had at some piont made it very clear that
> > it wasn't going to kill the goose that layed the golden eggs,
> > and that high tech was the engine that drove the national
> > economy.Were Californians, arrogant? You betcha. Were
>
> Irrelevant.
Really? You don't think that Bill Clinton and the West Coast
technorati weren't snuggling on cold winter nights??? The whole
E-conomy was Bill Clinton's baby... it's what made him bullet
proof!
> > Californians stupid not to manage their infrastructure more
> > wisely? Duh! Were Californians set for a fall? OF Course!
> > AND it was possible to exist in that vacuum, as long as it was
> > clear that the FED would do whatever it took to protect it's
>
> But that is worse than the illness! The FED does not exist to
> bail out every moronic entity, individual, corporate or state
> that cannot project its own budget and will not plan and build
> appropriately. Attempting to do so is a large part of why our
> government is one of the largest debtor nations.
It depends on what you determine is the greater good... creating
an artificial environment in which something brilliant may grow,
or tweaking with the natural order of things... I do agree that we
need to put things in their equilibrium state and stop screwing
with them... it's just that the transition if done digitally... can be
extremely disruptive and destructive. Dogma should take a back
seat to common sense.
> That was no vacuum, it was cynical and childish irresponsibility
> and something much worse.
> > golden asset. Change hands, and suddenly we have a FED
> > that just don't don't care if California eats it... in fact the new
> > FED loves the energy guys, and if fossil fuel guys feel like
> > pumping dozens of billions of dollars out of the California
> > economy... well it's just teach those tight ass envirowackos in
> > LALA land who really has them by the short and curlies...
>
> Your picturesque language has very little semantic content. Go
> take out your ire on gross human stupidity instead of seemingly
> whining that the FED doesn't like us anymore and doesn't
> care. Caring and doing something stupid that fundamentally
> does not help the problem are not related.
No... I'm angry because the FED threw the baby out with the
bath water.
Creating a steady and sane path from the rediculous to at least the
vaguely practical, would have been a great move. Pulling all the
underpinnings out of the California economy, has been destructive
to California, to the US economy, and to world economy. This
process could have been handled over a 16 month time span and
there wold have been nary a ripple. Instead it was decided that
taking a 2 x 4 to California, to get it's attention, was a somehow
more desireable stratedgy. There are real people being hurt here.
There are real businesses, businesses that made a difference that
are gone now. There are serious repecussions that could have
easily been avoided by a little diplomacy and foresight. This was
a terrible way to manage a bad situation.
> > It's all a matter of priorities... California was a hot house
> > garden... and artificial nirvana, and when GW had all that
> > internet crap ripped out of the whitehouse it didn't that the
> > power of the Amazing Carnack to figure California's sweet
> > days were real numbered.
> >
>
> Where on earth do you get this stuff? Do you think California
> is only about internet or that California only exists at the
> sufference of the Imperial Fed and its current Soveign
> Highness? Give me a break.
Yeah, Okay... I'm being hyperbolic... it still doesn't change the
fact that GW it high tech phobic, and that this state is the center
of the information economy. GW is fighting his Daddy's war...
and it has more to do with the past that the future, and the last
thing we need right now with exponential technological advance
in our face is a group of men who think they can legislate and
dominate the US back into a time when hard industry was king.
> > I mean when that Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
> > acknowledges that what the Western Utilies have engaged in
> > amounts to highjacking, and extortion... it's pretty fair to say
> > that things have gotten a wee bit extreme.
> >
>
> So what would you recommend? Have some federal commission
> determine what is whose fair share and who is going to make what
> if any profit and toss the market and free-enterprise out the
> window for the duration of the "crises"?
I would say that if a significant number of people can't afford to heat
and light their homes, that the power and gas prices have been set
too high. I would say that if the power industry is seeing an 800%
increase in profits, and that, the profit results in a state being able to
provide basic service to it's citizens, that the power company has
set it prices unfairly high. The whole reason that we regulate folks
like the power industries is because their product is essential to
modern life... as in without it... people begin to die... when such a
company has priced it's product or service out of the reach of a
sigificant percentage of a states population, and begun to cause
the disentegration of a states critical infrastructure, I say it's time
to say stop... nobody wants you not to make a fair profit... but
what you're doing amounts to extortion. What you doing amounts
to holding a state hostage and raping it for quick gain. I can't in
any sense condone that kind of behavior even if it is good business.
Even if the state created the situation that made this debacle
possible in the first place. I would sit down, and talk to the power
providers. I would say to them, make us a FAIR offer over the
next 10 years... one that doesn't require that the state populous
learn to give up reading after dark! We are reasonable people.
Then you say to the state officials... you guys are screwed... If
you build X number of power facilities over the next 10 years,
you'll get so many dollars of Federal matching funds... if you
don't we're gonna nail you with a new Federal tax to support
the production of plants in the western states, and make sure
that the cost is building in state is a whole lot cheaper. There're
amazing ways to motivate people when their butts are in a
sling. This was not the answer... too much disruption... to much
harm was done to people who were in no position to defend
themselves.
> > > > Why is that man unwilling to give California representatives more
> > > > than 20 minutes of his time...
> > >
> > > The current Taxifornia representatives are not *worth* 20
> > > minutes of his time. Or mine for that matter.
> >
> > Hhhhmmmm, interesting... The primary center of America's
> > strongest economic engine, the breeding place of biotech,
> > electronics, software, and critical technologies that will allow
> > America to compete through the next century... isn't worth
> > 20 minutes... actually GW gave the governor 40 minutes
> > finally, but the first 25 of that was ass chewing, and the last
> > 10 was laughing and letting him know how screwed he was.
> >
>
> This is not the primary center... blah, blah, blah. The primary
> center of the computer industry is intellectual (business and
> technical). If this state continues to be an utter ass then
> those assets will increasingly move elsewhere. As they
> should. I would very much hesitate to say that most of those
> assets are here anyway. Whether they are or are not is
> immaterial to what is the appropriate response of the Fed to the
> problem.
Currently California rates as the 7th largest economy in the world.
The list of Number Ones that California is, with respect to the US
is awe inspiring. High Tech is one of those things. No combination
of any 4 other states even comes close. What does being even a
braying ass have to do with the size of the crater you make if you
drop a rock as big as California.
If you think for a moment, that impacting this economy won't have
worldwide repercussions...
I'm just saying nobody who is either in his right mind, or hasn't a
big agenda, does to California what GW has done. That and GW
isn't exactly known for his tact... he hasn't even wiped the crude off
his hands for heaven sake.
> > > > The largest economic engine in
> > > > the country, and the president won't talk to the governor...
> > > > What's wrong with this picture.
> > >
> > > Because this governor seems to be confused on the concept
> > > of ownership for starters. Yesterday's SF Chron, which I
> > > totally admit is not a trustworthy news source, quoted Red
> > > Davis threatening to seize the assets of municipal power
> > > generation facilities, invoking the emergency powers act.
> > > This act was designed to allow the governor to seize assets
> > > in true emergencies, such as natural disasters and war, where
> > > lives are at stake. I fail to see how it can be applied to a
> > > manmade disaster which cluey ideas-futurists have seen
> > > coming for years. Now Davis whines because the fed
> > > refuses to invoke price caps, after the failure of Taxifornia
> > > to build capacity caused the price to skyrocket in
> > > the first place.
> >
> > Hey this disaster was years in the making. The two idiots in the
> > State Capitol, both Republicans, had been playing footsies with
> > Eastern energy interests for nearly a decade and a half before
> > Gray was handed to dung burger... If you were that elected
> > leader of this state what would you do? Tell the folks, OK
> > you twit's you screwed up... you made your bed, now sleep in
> > it! Shortly after your assasination, and the local community had
> > converted your grave site into a sewage treatment plant...
> >
>
> This is an interesting mythology. Both parties created the mess
> along with a lot of very foolish voters, environmentalists,
> lawyers and so on. But the mess began with the idea that the
> State should control Energy production and distribution at least
> in part "for our own good". We are now seeing the results of
> that fundamentally flawed idea. It has been building for a few
> decades. The question is how to avoid such debacles in the
> future and how to defuse this one without creating worse
> problems than we have already.
I'm not disagreeing with you... read what I said again... all the
folks you describe are indeed guilty as charged. The problem I
keep pointing to, is the mistake of just letting the situation go
critical. It should have been stopped, and handled in a sane and
responsible fashion. To let California spin into a disaster, is the
worst possible idiocy. It also points to a callus, and thoughtless
person willing to pave over the welfare of the entire country to
get what he wants, and you best believe what he wants is just
what the people who put him in office want.
> > The Governor is screwed. He has a job. To advocate California
> > and make this problem go away by any means he see's fit. You
> > may not agree with him, or like him, and find anything he's done
> > to meet wit you philosophic ideals. Ask him if he cares. He's
> > looking square down the barrel at 1,000,000+ people in the state
> > who won't be able to afford power and gas, and many of them
> > are elderly, and children... you think he isn't managing a bleeding
> > ulcer? Think again.
> >
>
> Means that suspend the constitution are NOT in his charter.
> Period.
> Or don't you believe in government officials upholding their
> oaths of office? These are not merely "philosophical ideals".
> They are the political and ethical principles we are supposed to
> be governed by. It is precisely in emergencies that such
> fundamental guiding principles are most important.
Where in the Federal or State Constitution does it say that a public
utility has the right to charge it's customer into poverty or operational
collapse. There are laws that also protect consumers from greedy
privateers... The utilities have gone beyond reasonable business. The
act of driving a state in disaster, businesses into bankruptcy, and
citizens into dangerous lack of service... far and away exceeds any
business' right to make a profit. Especially when it is clear that there
is no fair competition (the power producers have been caught red
handed... and regulatory agencies are already looking into charges
of price fixing and collusion), and those companies are dealing with
something that can mean the difference between life and death.
> > > So, to answer your question of what is wrong with this
> > > picture, I say: failure to allow free markets to set prices.
> > > Let the prices rise. That enables alternate energy sources
> > > to come online, supply rises, price drops. Trying to legislate
> > > the price of anything is chasing the wind. As for Bush not
> > > wanting to talk to Davis, I can't blame him. I wouldnt
> > > want to talk to him either. Davis doesnt seem to understand
> > > the concept of ownership. If I *own* something then by
> > > god its MINE and I will use it as I see fit.
> >
> > Spike... there's this wierd place... where economic reality
> > crashed headlong into economic theory. It's the job of our State
> > and Federal government to say... OK children... here's a reality
> > call. It's also their job to make sure that the hienas don't rape the
>
> No, it is not. It is not the job of the government to abrogate
> the rights of the people but to uphold them. They have been
> getting away with raping all of us across the board for over a
> century by waving the needs of the people and ripping away the
> wealth and rights of the people as a cure. It was their
> abrogration of our rightful decision making ability (free market
> without regulation in energy) that largely allowed this mess to
> flower in the first place. To call now for more of the same
> poison as has so sickened us is a fatal mistake.
Corporations aren't the people, and they have no rights afforded
them by the Constitution. Corporations are a legal invention, and
their power is great because they circumvent much of the laws
pertaining to personal accountability.
What I propose is that Goverment insure that people simply get
what they need to live, insure that the business of producing and
delivering energy makes a fair profit, (and we have historical
record we know what a fair profit is...) and that we require that
the people who have planned so poorly now right their wrong.
You can't cure a problem of this magnitude by flicking a switch!
It is not digital. Human lives are at stake... you can't go around
turning cities off because somebody screwed up and didn't get
around to buidling a power plants... having elderly people freeze
to death in their homes... or people killed because the stop
lights were turned off... because somebody wanted to make a
killing in the energy market is simply criminal!
Letting millions of people suffer and damaging the infrastructure
of a critical economic engine justifies doing ANYTHING you
have to do in the short term to get through the crisis. Then, you
look at the cause of the trouble, you plan a sane path to solve
it permanently, and you write on the state capitol building in the
blood of state representatives... I will never screw up like this
ever again 10,000 times! But first, you stop the carnage! This
is not an experiment in economics... not when people die and
millions suffer. None of this had to happen... not a single bit
of it. It would have been so easy to have worked around this.
> > state into rigamortis. We have to survive to learn a lesson. We
> > are valuable to the nation and the world at large. It is one of the
> > key responsibilities of the government to make this adjustment
> > clean, and sane over a workable time frame. To give California
> > the working chance to get to energy self sufficiency without
> > killing off it's porrest third, or bankrupting it's businesses.
> >
>
> We may or may not need some emergency measures but they MUST NOT
> increase the power of government to fuck us up like this or much
> worse in the future. That is crucial and far more of a danger.
> We must see clearly the HUGE and primary role of runaway
> government power in our current troubles instead of blaming
> everyone and anyone who is not as poor or in as bad a shape as
> we. We can't fix this by claiming the Great Lie that our
> problem is the fault of Big Business or the machinations of GW.
> That would be hopelessly inept and disasterous.
>
> WHATEVER YOU DO DO NOT GIVE THE GOVERNMENT MORE POWER AND
> AUTHORITY. Your life and all you hold dear depends on it.
I'm not talking about giving the government the sweat off of my
behind. I'm talking about taking appropriate emergency action to
forestall a catastrophe. The government already has all the juice
it needs to stop this problem from becoming a true disaster, but
the people in charge want the disaster. They want the deaths.
They want the people to scream and cry, and beg for help. They
want the people to hurt, so that when they say... no problem,
we'll be happy to help you out... just as long as you let us do
anything we please... anytime we please... anywhere we please...
forever and ever... and we'll say anything just give us back our
lights and our warm houses and our jobs... and all it'll cost is a
bit of our humanity and all the money we've got.
I fear the Government. I fear it because it is self interested, and
stupid, and brutish. The one thing that saves us is that it is so
wrapped in layers of red tape that it can only move glacially. I
fear even more, business, which has no moral ground, business
which is avaricious, and born from a society that at some level
thinks people are as desposable as the paper wrappers around
the hamburgers we eat. Where government is slow and stupid,
business is fast and smart. We always withold the right to take
our capitols by storm if they betray our trust. We can always
at least vote the bum out. What do we do about the grey men
in their $1,000 Armani suits, who plan the rape a pillage of a
generation of suckers. Men who's hearts sound beat to the
sound of a cash registers charging up another sale... men who
answer to nobody. I fear this.
> > As far as ownership... there is a thing called imminent domain, a
> > critical concept that says yuo may own something, but if your
>
> Which has been a hole for government goons to suck away our
> substance and our lives from the beginning. It is utterly
> reprehensible.
Imminent domain made things like highways possible. You would
live in a society where one man could hurt countless others for
personal gain, with no recourse save murder? The wild west was
like that and a wild place it was... problem was a lot nasty deeds
got done... I'm not sure that's the answer either...
> > singular benefit, harms the greater public, then you have to be
>
> It is not a "benefit", singular or otherwise, but my very life
> and property. BIG DIFFERENCE. Property is not some boon handed
> out by the omnipotent rulers and subject to their recall. Not
> in a free country. If my having my rights to my own person and
> property is considered a harm to the greater public then the
> "greater public" can go hang. What makes them "greater"?
But that is exactly how it got handed out...
We murdered 20 million native americans, and a half million
spanish american, and god only knows how many blacks, and
chinese, and european immigrants for the right to kill anybody
who steps over the line drawn by a piece of paper, and for
which you rightly paid to own
The government stole it from another government who stole
it, and it got parceled it out to settlers and miners, and it got
passed down to ranchers and farmers, and now you have
it.
Careful
You're standing on a slippery slope... by your words Sadam
Hussein is a champion for personal freedom, and we're the
mosters that invaded his home... when does the right of your
property transcend my right to live and breath? Should your
right of property be allowed to damage, even destroy the
community. We've been arguing against greedy men who
would padlock every idea and charge the people at large
to think, if they could. How is that any different than this?
When I patent one click shopping... this is my property.
Where does your property end, and public good begin?
> > a little less selfish, and we'll work out REASONABLE terms
>
> Selfish? Selfish to have rights? Selfish to say that what I
> have earned I have earned and should be able to dispose of as I
> see fit? "Reasonable"? Is it reasonable when government
> proposes holding a gun pointed at me why they "reason" with me,
> which they can legally do and which is their distinquishing
> characteristic? What is "reasonable" about their mandate that I
> will lose everything and be imprisoned if I disagree with with
> them? That is tyranny.
We are the government... it exists because we say it does, and if
it sucks it does so because we let it. The government isn't looking
to take anything away from the power producers save the right
to commit extortion, and from a purely moral sense, the society
is completely justified in stopping them.
When a company takes upon itself a vital service... ie. one upon
which lives depend... it must be held to a much higher standard
than, let's say HR Block or Baskin and Robins. If I deliver water
to people in the desert and I decide I want all their money... Is
that my right? By the way this isn't just a moot conversation, if you
think the energy situation sucks... the water situation is going to
make it look like a party over the next few years. So should I be
able to cut off the water... knowing full well that the home bound
are going die... that there will be some collateral loss from babies
and children just because they're so damned sensitive to water.
Farms will wither, businesses will collapse, the economy would
fold... Is that really the kind of freedom you're arguing for?
> > to make sure your benefit is weighed fairly against the social
> > harm it may impose. Just like the ranch boss, who dammed the
>
> What benefit? My property is not a "benefit". Have you been
> conditioned my Mother Jones or what?
Hmmmm... benefit... freedom to make a fair profit versus freedom
to charge any price one feel's like, simply because one can, and the
impact that will have on the local community, the country, and the
world. Again... we're talking about a few people in a position to
do great harm to millions, even billions of people. Maybe benefit
is the wrong word...
How about this... how much freedom should we allow a critical
service provider? How about the average citizen? If for instance the
property you have is a gun... should you have the freedom to shoot
it's bullets anywhere, anytime you feel like? Such freedom existed
in this country within living memory. Of course, murder was as
common as ranching, lynchings were common as Sunday picnics,
and the guilty and innocent died by the thousands in what is now
recorded as America's most violent era. Is that the kind of freedom
you're proposing?
> > stream to wipe out those down the valley, so he could destroy
> > them and take their property... there are certain acts that may
> > be a function of ownership, that still qualify perfectly as unlawful
> > and immoral acts.
> >
>
> Sure, sure. But claiming my property and wealth is in fact
> mine, is not at all immoral. It is essential to any morality
> that deserves the name. Misuse of property to harm others
> directly is criminal and has nothing to do with government
> seizure in general as you seem to be proposing. Do not conflate
> these two. You cannot do so if you are honest and think it
> through carefully.
But is it any less immoral to deny a critical service, because you
want to gouge your customers? Should that not be illegal, and are
we not right back at the start again with the Government cracking
on the greedy basturds for doing public harm? These arguments
are ciruclar... one of us should put handle on it so we can label
an origin.
> > Using a critical resource to extort people has always been
> > considered an immoral and illegal act under most jurisdictions.
> >
>
> Anything can be claimed to be a "critical resource" and any
> price that those who wish that resource cannot pay can be
> claimed to be "extortion". But this does not make it so or
> justify the seizure of these goods by others.
I would say gas, oil, or electric during a cold winter can be
pretty much defined as an essential resource. I would say that
bascic utilities are critical resources... I would say that one can
make a superb arguement that anything that held from public
by a limited or controling source, that ultimately results in the
death of significant numbers of people, can be classified as
a critical resource.
I'd say that excludes beenie babies and the sony walkman...
> Any hoodlum can claim the state extorts his labor to earn the
> money to experience his pleasures and feed and clothe himself
> and that he has the right to forcefully seize what he needs
> and/or wants from these "extortionists". We quite properly
> throw such creatures in jail. What makes it different when the
> hoodlum is a Governor and calls for the wholesale seizure of
> entire industries to be run by the state? Is this to be
> considered moral and the way of righteousness just because it is
> government?
Because Davis isn't asking for the power companies to give the
power free... he's asking them to charge a fair price that does
not cause the collapse of the state's infrastructure, endangers
people's lives, or bankrupt the state utility.
It isn't Davis who is robbing the utilities... it is the utilities who
are working as a monopoly to rob the citizens of California.
It's one thing for lazy man to feel it is unfair to have to work... it
is another thing entirely for an industrious people, to be denied
the basic services needed to function on a daily basis, because
the price has been set so astromically high that it begins to break
down the very infrastructure of a states economy. Davis is not
being unreasonable when he asks for the utilities to stop this
immoral punishment. It is the utilities that are in the wrong, and
if there is any justice they will punished for abusing their trust
to those they serve.
> > > Davis wants to order cities that have their own municipal
> > > power generation facilities to participate in the rolling
> > > blackouts while running their generators full bore and selling
> > > their power at cost to the state. I hope those cities have the
> > > intestinal fortitude to tell that commie so-called governor to
> > > go to hell without an air conditioner.
> >
> > Again what would you have him do... turn the state of. Destroy
> > the state's economy? All to appease the greed and power
> > hungry? If you were governor what would you do?
> >
>
> Greed and power hunger? Try those who are living off of their
> own prudent preparation for just such emergencies. Or doesn't
> foresight have any other rewards except being labeled a foe of
> all that is right and having your careful preprations undone and
> seized by the all-mighty State?
I was talking about the utilities... They are the greedy power hungry
folks I was refering to. I still have ask the question... what do you
expect Davis to do? He's been handed a disaster that just won't go
away... and he has to come up with 100 stop gap measures to keep
the state from going into the dumper. He was elected to make things
work...
Not tell his constituent "Hey you stupid assholes, look at the mess
you made... hell I'm outta here, you can forward my mail to Dallas!"
Even if that's exactly how he feels... he can say it can't even let the
thought show on his face...
He's got to do something. What would you suggest? Let the state
fold! He can't do that... legally he can't do that. All he has at his
disposal is scambling to find any and every way that he can keep
things going... that's his job... Realistically speaking?
> Mark my words. If this state does any such thing I am out of
> here. I will not live or work in or for such a regime. I will
> vote with my feet.
That would be too bad. As bad as things are losing one more
bright passionate soul capable of making a difference is really the
last thing that California needs. Stupid things will be done to try
to save us from the disaster we wroght ourselves. Part of that
will include demanding that the utilities play fair. To date they
haven't been and utimately they will suffer for their dirty deeds.
You hurt people bad enough they remember, and look for low
and nasty ways to return the favor in the dark of night. I would
really not want to be affiliated with the power industry over the
next five years.
That said, it doesn't change the fact that we have to address this
issue now and in a meaningful and productive fashion. I say we
need to make sure this never happens again in my lifetime, and I
plan on being around a long long time.
> > > > As long as there is more profit in being stupid, why would'nt
> > > > you ever expect the people in power to do all they can to kill
> > > > the smart. It's just good business.
> > >
> > > Thats right, and they are free to spend their resources to try
> > > to kill the smart. Of course if it is *really* smart, all the oil
> > > money in the world cannot keep it dead, and their spending
> > > money on trying to kill alternatives only makes the oil more
> > > expensive and less competitive.
> >
> > Depends how you play the game... Nobody talks about the
> > Carthaginians any more... tell me who the oil companies are
> > currentl competing with... Each other? That's a laugh. So many
> > promising technologies, so many intesting ideas, and yet real
> > significant promise in converting over to renewable or virtually
> > unlimited energy sources in 40 years. Why is that?
> >
>
> Because they are not as renewable or unlimited or as economical
> as you believe. If you think they are then do yourself and the
> world a great service and get fabulously rich in the process by
> starting your own company to exploit this supposed suppressed
> cornucopia. Otherwise this sounds like crank-talk.
I'd be happy to roll out the numbers for an methanol/ethanol
economy... but it's never going to happen in this environment...
Methanol is to energy, what open source is to software. It can be
made anywhere including your home... It can't be centralized, it
can't be monopolized, it can't be hoarded, or witheld, or made
difficult to acquire. In short the fossil fuel folks wouldn't touch it
with somebody elses 10 foot stick.
Unlike software however, the boys who play here have a lock on
the game. They have the sales outlets, the distribution, the whole
whole enchilada from drilling to government kickback. Who in
their right mind is going to give you half a trillion dollars to build
a company that provides methanol, and convince the auto folks
to build cars that burn it, and convert power plants, and factories
across the country to become methanol burners.
You see, methanol is an environmentally sound fuel to base a
chemically powered economy on. It has almost no down sides...
The only problem is that you'd need something large enough,
and monolithic enough to force the entire country to change over
to a new fuel. You know, like a government. Of course that'd be
using government against the existing fossil fuel guys... in fact, it
would threaten to put them out of business. You wouldn't want
the government stepping into the energy business, would you?
> > > On a lighter note, I have been tracking the payback time for
> > > solar panels on the roof. If it doesnt pay back in less than about
> > > 10 years or so, it is not an attractive investment. But if power
> > > prices rise only a modest amount, solar panels become a good
> > > investment, even without tax incentives, consequently the
> > > industry will blossom like a field of Taxifornia poppies after
> > > a spring rain. Stand by Anne Marie, we shall see capitalism
> > > in action. {8-] spike
> >
> > Sadly, I think you're right... I think we'll see dirty tricks, and a
> > host of manipulations that delay or prevent alternative energy
> > sources for decades yet to come. I think that the fossil fuel
> > folks are so powerful, so intrenched, that it's going to take at
> > least the remainder of this century to break them, and get them
> > out of our way. Unless people of real vision, take them on
> > sooner. That will prove initially very ugly. We will see.
>
> Huh? You totally missed the point in order to cling to your
> own. You know better.
Not at all... I got his point, and my point... and I'm even going to
make a whole new point. Just as we aren't free, and there is no
Capitalism or for that matter Socialism... but some wierd dance
that falls on a spectrum of realities and changes from day to day
depending on what new laws got passed this week... I am fearful
that we are caught up in structures that run at cross purpose. I
think we need to step outside the old structures, and begin to
build something new, powerful, and unlike anything from the past.
I'd like some input as to what utopia might look like... anyone
got an idea?
> - samantha
Thanks for all the heat and sparks Samantha... I just love it when
a bright, passionate person fires off a salvo of interesting ideas.
Marie
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 08:07:59 MST