re: "when all the Clinton regulators were kicked out and replaced by energy industry lobbyist and cronies"....
I guess that it doesn't matter that currently, 3 of the 5 FERC commissioners were appointed by President Clinton. Further, I belive that the two FERC Commissioners appointed by President Bush, weren't approved by the Senate and sworn in till late May/early June (the FERC Chairman, was appointed as a Commissioner by President Clinton, and made Chairman by President Bush - as he was the only Republican on the board, at the time). The first vote by GWB's FERC Commissioners was probably the Western rate mitigation plan in June.
re:"When did energy price gouging/spikes begin? As soon as Cheney was chosen for the veep spot"
There were power alerts through out last summer in California (the first being May 22-I believe). California probably spent a third of the summer of 2000 under some level of emergency power alert. If I remember correctly, PG&E, SCE, and SDG&E were losing close to $2B a month, from July (maybe June) 00 to January 01. The California PUC knew there was a problem with the wholesale price of power, and granted SDG&E a major price increase early last summer-it was rolled back on order of the State Legislature (rate hikes aren't popular ever, but unthinkable during an election year). If the legislature spiked the PUC's grant of a rate hike to SDG&E (in probably the most Republican part of the State), why would the PUC even bother with a rate increase for SCE and PG&E (under the Deregulation plan, only SDG&E met the requirements, that allowed a rate hike anyway).
The California Electricity Crisis of 2000-2001, was an example of well known (and accounted for -Constitutionally) weakness of Democracy and Republican forms of government. That it takes so long to make a decision to fix or correct a problem (So Cal Edison's bailout is a perfect example. The Legislature still hasn't finished with Gov. Davis' bail out plan, and its run by Democrats). This is why Governors and Presidents are given the power to declare a state of emergency and seize power. This is what Governor Davis did when SCE and PG&E were no longer able to purchase power for customers.
p.s. I think that eitherEnron, Duke or Reliant (can't remember which right now) offered to sell power at $50 per MWhr last summer (the catch being they wanted a long term contract). |
