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Politics : High Tolerance Plasticity -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Think4Yourself who wrote (3668)	4/23/2001 10:56:23 AM
From: kodiak_bull	Respond to of 23153

Interesting posts all weekend long on utilities and regulation. Suffice it to say that there is no company and no business environment on earth not subject to some level of regulation. Companies are born via regulation (state constitutional law which gives them (perpetual) life), they are regulated by state and federal securities and fraud laws, tax regimes and general (pollution control) laws, and finally they die via regulation, either through dissolution, merger, liquidation or bankruptcy. Also, there is no logical reason not to regulate every aspect of every business. Why aren't prices at Kmart and Wal-Mart regulated, why should a 7-Eleven get to gouge me on the price of batteries at 11:30 p.m. when I can go to Wal-Mart the next day and get them cheaper? Why should we trust private enterprise and the price system as much as we apparently do? Very simply put: because "deregulation" (as far as we can do it) and the price system (hundreds of millions of folks in the global community giving real time feedback, via cash and credit card transactions) comprise the vital feedback loop for manufacturers and distributors of everything. Central planning doesn't work. 73 years of Bolshevik rule and 35 years of the Chinese Communist Party, the debacle in Cuba and starvation in North Korea, all prove it. Why does California look more, in power terms, like the Philippines than the other 49 states (including Mississippi, doesn't that embarass you Californos?)??? Simple. They disconnected the feedback loop from consumer to power supplier. By law. By regulation. By Central Committee. And JQP is right, the blame spinning is outrageous. Everyone, Bush, FERC, all other Americans, screwed up and owe California except those 34 million or so in state consumers who got discounted electrical power for 2-3 years. And now the cry goes out that California cannot afford to dig its way out of its state power crisis, that it represents too much of the U.S. economy, that this is some sort of Grand Forks flood natural catastrophe where we all need to shoulder the burden. Quel nonsense. When the Rust Belt rusted in the 70s the rest of the country moved on. Cleveland, Detroit, Gary--they were all on their own. It was high fives and high times in the sun belt and the West Coast, and the country didn't suffer as a whole and the country didn't need to send checks to Ohio or Michigan to bail out fading metal bashing companies. Things changed. The midwest is now back and thriving (or so I hear) and shouldn't be called upon to bail out California for its bad law. Naz taking a breather and OSX doing well today. I guess the gloomy view on energy is not playing out just yet. Kb

To: Think4Yourself who wrote (3668)	4/24/2001 12:21:39 AM
From: Zeuspaul	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 23153

If the FERC is at fault then why has everyone, and I do mean everyone, in California been saying there is NO shortage of electricity up until February of this year!!? The signs were crystal clear last summer, and there were strong hints the summer before. Governor Davis has been trying to shield the public from the issue...protector father image....the Gore thing...I will protect you from those evil corporations. He has been a dismal failure in a crisis situation. What people believe doesn't change the fact we are in short supply. The reason Californians are being charged so much more than everyone else is due mostly to the drought The shortage is due to the drought. The high price is due to the market. California buys the same juice as others but at a higher cost....effectively subsidizing regulated contract users. California has to go back to being a regulated contract user. If you can't beat them join them. Unfortunately the Californians need someone to blame for their woes, so nothing is getting done. Most Californians I know blame California. Maybe you are referring to California politicians. It's Bush's fault He didn't create the problem but he can mitigate it. He speaks out of two sides of his mouth. On the one hand he says California's problems are unique to California and must be solved by California. From the other side of his mouth he says we have to drill in Alaska because we have an energy problem witness California. It's the producer's fault They are probably not blameless. The FERC says there has been market manipulation and they seem to be hard to convince. it's FERC's fault It is their job to regulate the market. They claim the market is dysfunctional. They should make it functional. To the extent the market is to blame for high prices and lack of supplies they share the blame. If I were a Californian I would be extremely embarrassed by the behavior of my elected leaders. No problem the state government has proven ineffective. They will probably be replaced with another set of bozos. California is a direct democracy...the issue will go to the voters. The fact that the State of California is incompetent in a crisis doesn't excuse the inaction by the federal government in what can best be described as a regional problem with some roots in the poor energy policies of the feds. The move towards natural gas without adequate supplies is a fault that lies with the feds. It should be the responsibility of the feds to oversee the usage of natural resources that are used on a national scale. Zeuspaul