Queen Hillary:blackouts, politics, and the fastest mouth in the East.

[Zeno]

From a report by MSNBC:


CLINTON LAMBASTS ADMINISTRATION
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) laid some of the blame at the feet of the Bush administration. “This country cannot afford to have sporadic electrical service, these kinds of outages that roll across America,” the Democratic New York senator said to MSNBC’s Lester Holt.
“I believe the federal government has a responsibility to see this doesn’t happen,” Clinton said, blaming Bush administration efforts at energy deregulation.
In all, tens of millions of people were without power as the effects rippled across the enormous Eastern Interconnected System power grid. The failure knocked out several major power utilities, including the entire Consolidated Edison network that supplies much of New York State.



Queen Hillary, the master Historian, Electrical engineer, Technician, Scientist, Manager, and Political Tactician (well, the last one fits). I cannot wait until she begins her power surge into the White House - Her last narcissitic grasp at immortality, masterdom, demagoguery, and megalomania. It will be a ripping good show. Be sure to take notes.

Le Misanthrope

[brad]

well according to my limited understanding the deregulation of the power industry was responsible for last summers CA rolling blackouts.

having said that hitlery is pure evil /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[adios]

California Power Problems (http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=168)

C'mon Brad.

Billary was clearly pandering with her statement.

[brad]

well yes/no.

instead of regulating it correctly,

they

incorrectly relied on free market to prop up their dumb decisions.

[brad]

http://www.gregpalast.com/printerfriendly.cfm?artid=257

palast is pretty solid

[MMMMMM]

Palast exemplifies what I consider editorialized journalism.

I read about a third of his book The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and was aghast at how incapable the man seems to be of simply reporting without editorializing. Probably every page contained some appeal to emotionalism or some slant. So too does the introductory paragraph in the link you provided (as far as I've gotten yet).

Shame on him and all his ilk.

Just the facts, please ma'am--just the facts. Discussions of the facts to be held later.

[Boris]

C'mon Tom. Do you really think there is a shortage of electricity generation capacity in this country? I read the article and I would argue that Sowell doesn't have a very good grasp of basic economic principals, Industrial Organization or the interaction of law and economics.

[adios]

"C'mon Tom. Do you really think there is a shortage of electricity generation capacity in this country?"

No but I think if you limit the price i.e. impose a price ceiling so that suppliers can't make sufficient return you'll create a shortage.

Two of Sowell's stated "facts:"

Fact number one: You cannot go on obstructing the building of electric power generating plants for years on end without eventually running out of enough electricity to supply your growing population and your growing industries. It has been more than a decade since the last power plant was built in California.

Fact number two: You cannot force California public utilities to charge consumers less for electricity from out of state than the utilities have to pay to get it, without reaching the point where the utilities' deficits exceed the money they have on hand to pay their bills.

To be honest I'm not sure about what the current generating capacity is of California power plants is but it would seem logical that they would be a point where existing capacity wouldn't meet the needs. I think fact number two is a prescription for a shortage. Did Sowell get these "facts" wrong?

I would think that if there were excess capacity in electric power producing capability, deregulation should drive the prices of electricity down. Anyway looks like de-regulation is indeed going to get the blame (at least by politicians) for this power outage. Don't know if that is valid or not. In reviewing the recent "natural gas shortage", when natural gas got up to about $7 per million BTU's huge supply came on the market and natural gas went down the to the recent slightly less than $5 level.

[Boris]

The electricity generation capacity of California is a red herring. The capability exists for Calforinia to buy and transport electricity generated outside the state. Sowell argues that the crisis was caused by a supply shortage created by the goddam enviros and liberals. The relevant question is where can the electricity be produced most efficiently? California is maxed on hydro generating capacity and doesn't have any coal. The only other option is nuclear. Since Washington has several (6-7?) nuclear plants that have been mothballed, maybe the enviros got this one right. Maybe there isn't a need to build more generating capacity in California.

I can't argue with fact number two. IMO, it was the underlying market structure that caused the California outages and not an overall shortage of generating capacity. This market structure problem will be difficult to solve. I do beleive that the huge economies of scale in electricity delivery require that the gov't impose some sort of price regulation. The question is how does a California commission require an out of state company to produce and deliver at a set price? If you can guarantee a reasonable number of independant suppliers there shouldn't be a problem. Enron was found guilty of cornering the electricity market. Don't know if there's any truth to it though.