Republicans & Conservatives: Archives

I see no reason why the UN should be in the US at all.

BTW. I never did get a response on the 8 BILLION DOLLARS the US stole from the Iraqi Treasury soon after taking Baghdad.

Hear anything about that, Eric?

I agree with Aldous

“UN out of the US, US out of the UN”

Eric-
Do something useful for our defense. Go investigate Pentagon waste, Defense Contractor Corporate welfare. Help make the defense you’re counting on to protect us more efficient. Help get the money to the troops to maintain their vehicles, to pay them the money they deserve, and stop this government from paying for a bunch of weapon systems that won’t perform in the real world. Stop beating up on the UN, when we’re having trouble keeping our real defenses up and running properly.

No. Eric is right. The UN is a waste of time. Did we need the UN to invade Iraq? NO!!! Do we need the UN to help us in Iraq? NO!!! Do we need international help to fight terrorism? NO!!! Our brave young Republican men and women are more than willing to volunteer to serve in the Military. I know they have not been showing up lately but that’s just temporary!!! The flood is coming and then we will spread Freedom to all oppressed oil-producing countries everywhere!!!

The UN does a good job in its specialized organizations, mostly Geneva based. The General Assembly is kind of a bad joke, where despots and potentates get to pretend to be democratic. The Security Council doesn’t really work because it is designed not to work except in the extraordinary circumstance of compete consensus.

But the UN can be useful, if you don’t expect it to do what it is not capable of doing. The UN cannot establish peace, nor can it discipline any member that doesn’t want to accept discipline. It can help maintain and monitor peace once established (usually by the U.S. or its allies) and it does serve as a place where international organizations and leaders can meet.

We should be careful giving the UN too much money and recognize that it is not truly representative of the world community. But with those caveats, we should use the UN.

Aldous

We don’t respond to the things you make up because no good comes from it. It is the same reason I don’t listen to Al Franken. The only time I can recall a really fruitful discussion was when we talked about fighter plane sales. You seemed to have some insights there.

I just want to know if the U.S. government is going to reimburse my state the 30 billion dollars they were defrauded by Enron and others when Bush and FERC refused their responsibility under the law to stop electric profiteering when they were asked. (Yes, it’s the law. The law says that electricity is a public good, and there will be no price gouging, and it is the responsibility of FERC to stop price gouging when asked. Well we asked. They said no, and ta-da we uncover the worst corporate rape of a state in the history of the world… no I’m not exagerrating. Not even close).

So, where’s my 30 billion dollars? By the way, my state accounts for 1/5th of the U.S. economy and we are still making cuts to our budget unlike the other states (in large part due to being price gouged).

So, Eric, where’s my state’s 30 billion dollars? In addition, my state doesn’t recieve back 25 billion dollars in taxes it sends to the feds every year. Can I have some of that too? I hear Wyoming is doing great by the Department of Homeland Security. It sure is good to know those Wyoming people are secure. Long Beach Harbor, one of the largest ports in the world, doesn’t have enough money to inspect its shipments.

You want to talk about corruption that is having a major impact on our economy and our future? Let’s do.

Julia

You can change the subject, but you can’t blame Bush. ENRON collapsed in Bush time; it was built to this collapse during the Clinton Administration. ENRON hit its high point when Clinton was still in office and troubles began.

The Federal investigation of ENRON and the prosecution of its officials began under Bush. That is true. The discovered the crime that had been set up during the 1990s, but they were not there when it started. You can’t blame the cop who catches the crook.

I do not know how we morphed from UN waste to defense spending. I guess the connection is that we should be depending on UN forces to protect us rather than our own troops. In defense of the US military (once again), there are steps being taken to close obsolete bases, but what a cry from senators & congressmen, “not in my state”. If our use of companies or backing companies is called corporate welfare, then what is paying for bases in states where they are not needed or obsolete? Would that be called state welfare? Everyone wants to complain about national debt or deficit spending, but no one wants to make cuts, on either side.

The UN is a complete waste of time & money. They depend on the US to fund them & stab us in the back every chance they get. It is a complete joke to have an organization overlooking the human rights & peace of the world, when the ones controlling come from countries that do not know the meaning of human rights.

Those controlling the UN are elitists with the mentality of the left. That is why the left will go down defending them. Their goals & ideology are to suppress the United States, monetarily & militarily. They believe & support redistribution of wealth & absolutely despise the fact that we are a superpower. Clinton’s Secretary of State, Madeline Albright, stated that very thing, that we should not be the world’s only superpower. Why shouldn’t we be?

Perplexed

aldous,

8 BILLION DOLLARS the US stole from the Iraqi Treasury soon after taking Baghdad.

Did they they tell you who shot JFK too?

It’s been difficult to keep up lately. I didn’t read your comment about that. I wouldn’t give too much credence to ranting of your far left news sources. I mean didn’t Bush actually plan the 9/11 attacks?

Stephen,

Stop beating up on the UN, when we’re having trouble keeping our real defenses up and running properly.

I have no problem pointing out corruption in our own defense system, Stephen. But there is no comparison to be made between the two in terms of the outright criminality being perpetrated at the UN. It seems to be a pattern of the left to ignore the failings of such institutions while making up charges against the other. Look at Aldous’s quote above. Do you believe we invaded Iraq so that we could steal cash from the Iraqi treasury?

For that matter did we invade Iraq for oil?

stop this government from paying for a bunch of weapon systems that won’t perform in the real world

Some of the weapon system that the left has opposed on the very same grounds are one we are using today. Like the F-16, the B-2 stealth bomber… In fact there are democrats in congress today on record as wanting to completely gut defense spending in the name of social services. The reality is that the only Federal budget items that have actually been reduced since 1990 has been defence. Everything else has been slowing down of increases.

The UN deserves scrutiny. Why won’t the left even acknowledge that a problem exists?

Jack-
Clinton isn’t blameless, but left to himself he wouldn’t have instituted the Changes that led to Enron. Clinton jumped on the bandwagon of Republican Deregulation.

To give you an indication of how “fox guarding the henhouse” this was, Harvey Pitt, Bush’s choice for SEC chairman, pushed for the exact same accounting deregulations that allowed Arthur Andersen and Enron to get creative with their financing as a lobbyist. I guess what goes around comes around.

It’s the same story, time and time again: people deregulate, competitive competitive forces race to the bottom, then ask for more deregulation.

We shouldn’t try to shape market forces by legislation, but we should deal with the problems and malfeasances that occur within the marketplace. We should have enough law and order in our marketplaces to where success in business is what it looks like, rather than an artifact of fraud and deceptive accounting. People should be able to trust the signs the market gives them as to the fundamentals, and whose doing the best.

The Conservatives have portrayed liberals as business hating malcontents who want to make sure that businessfolk aren’t making a profit. Truth is, though, we’re every bit as greedy as any conservative. We want to get rich just like anybody else. We see a lawless atmosphere where fraud and deception rule as a significant barrier to that. We see a system that dumps the greatest burdens on the lower classes without appropriate rewards as a barrier to that.

I think Eric’s call to refuse to pay for the new UN building is pretty shallow, considering the waste that is going into this war, and into the Pentagon. If he really wants to do something for this country, he can look into the corruption that’s harming our soldiers.

John Kerry is one of those democrats. Well, anyway he voted against before he voted for, after he voted against. Or something like that.

Perplexed

So Stephen, I guess you would rather help prop up corrupt U.N. leaders than help prop up the good decent people of Iraq. That says alot. It is absolutely beyond the pale that anyone opposes this war against a breed of animal that shoots school children in the back and has no qualms whatsoever of killing unsuspecting innocent people anywhere in the world. Anybody with that mindset ought to be ashamed of themselves for their selfishness and myopia. And I don’t even want a reply back that the U.S. is just as guilty because that is just a falsehood perpetrated by those with an I.Q. that wouldn’t measure up to be a respectable earthquake and a complete lack of understanding of history. These animals have been assaulting decent people for decades and attacking their own people for centuries and the extreme irony of this war is that if the world community were 100% united against these serial killers, this war would be over and we would be having more normal mundane discussions like that of the U.N. Aldous, Stephen do you see yourself anywhere in here because that mentality disgusts me.

Perhaps we could be like Canada & have a token force of 40-50 year old men as our military.

The waste would be if we were attacked again & had no defence.

What “corruption is harming our soldiers”? I see more harm done to them by accusations against their performance.

Perplexed

Eric Simonson:

Actually. It was the Coalition Provisional Authorities Inspector General who did the audit on the missing money. You know the CPA don’t you? Paul Bremer’s outfit? The guy who got the Freedom Medal?

Really, Eric. You need to find out about these things. You do know all this was reported to Congress, right? Just because Fox News does not report it does not mean it did not happen.

Julia,

So, Eric, where’s my state’s 30 billion dollars?

Well Julia, do you mean the 30 billion dollars that Gray Davis incurred buying energy at highly inflated prices during a ‘crisis’, or 30 billion dollars just from general overcharging under the system that democrats setup? I am assuming that you are talking about California, my state as well.

I can say that had this democratically controlled state actually privatized the energy industry and not setup some new convoluted regulation system and called it privatization the entire energy crisis would not have been. For instance, after privatization it was still near impossible to increase the supply of California produced electricity. It’s as if Democrats just don’t understand the simple equation of supply and demand unless there is one coercive provider- i.e. government monopoly.

Why were we at the mercy of out-of-state energy producers Julia? Could it possibly be that the oh-so-beautiful people of California couldn’t stand the thought of allowing another power generation plant despoiling our great land? Or that building hydro-electric dams are now unthinkable and verboten? The primary factor responsible for the blackouts and brownouts were retail price controls and the insane regulations set up by your friends in the capital.

Does it strike you as odd in any way that in one year 14 power plants were suddenly approved for construction when in the previous decade virtually none were? We are in much the same situation with freeways. Californian are so enthralled with ‘sustainability’ and ‘no-growth’ that we are making the problem far worse.

It takes two to tango. Don’t get me wrong, I do blame Enron et al for their immoral and illegal actions, and I want them to go to jail - and have their ill gotten gains confiscated, but you cannot leave out of the blame those who actually created the situation in California and walked us right into it.

Hi Eric:

I’m one of those liberals who are usually in favor of helping the UN. I do not want the UN to waste money, but I think America should exercise more leadership in the UN.

Let’s compare what’s happening at the UN and what’s happening at the U.S.

I, as a Democrat, do not like anything Bush is doing, whether it comes to the war in Iraq, the economy, faith-based activities, attacks on unions and workers, and so on. Does that mean I should not support our government? This would be ridiculous. I try to change the government, so one day my ideas may prevail. Meanwhile I try to be a good citizen of the U.S.

The U.S. was at the forefront in the establishment of the UN as a means of making the world a more pleasant and peaceful place. Now, you and many others perceive problems with the UN. So do I, for that matter. Does this mean US should get rid of the UN? NO. I firmly believe that the UN is in such bad straits because US did not exercise leadership.

Why can’t the US exercise global leadership - and thereby get the world to reduce terrorism? Let’s not sit on the sidelines and complain. Let’s lead. The first step in this direction is to appoint a non-Bolton as an ambassador.

Paul:

Should we appoint another do nothing liberal to the UN who agrees with current UN policy? I’m sure we could appoint someone who hates the US as much as the Euro’s. That is a sure way to lead.

Oh wait, I have the solution. Let’s just all sit around the campfire & sing while holding hands. I’m sure the terrorists would love that & maybe they would detonate a bomb in the middle of the circle.

Perplexed

Paul

The UN just got out of hand. It was set up for a different world (actually an ideal world that didn’t exist) and it was not able to adapt.

The UN General assembly is a bad joke. Consider the human rights commission. More than 30 percent of the commission membership is the worst human-rights abusers — China, Cuba, Sudan and Zimbabwe. The Libyans used to be the chairmen. I know that some of you are warming up your fingers to blame America for human rights, but we all know that U.S. “abuses” are nothing compared to those mentioned above.

That is why the U.S. wants to help the UN reform.

Stephen

You just can’t distribute the credit and blame like that. Clinton was a good president for the economy because he was generally pro-business. Dems talk about all the economic growth that occurred, but maybe they don’t understand the reasons. There are occasionally bad things that happen with any strategy. ENRON was one and the Republican Congress and President Bush took steps to correct the conditions that caused it. ENRON type problems crop up from time to time and are handled. In an economy as large as ours, we can get big scandals. If I had the choice between an over cautious strategy that prevented ENRON (and prevented most of the growth of the 1990s) or one that risked ENRON and gave me the growth, I would have no trouble deciding which road to take. Neither did Clinton, and in this he was correct.

P.S. A lot of people left holding ENRON stock had it coming. Everybody knows you should diversify. In 1999 people couldn’t get their greedy little hands on ENRON fast enough and people were buying into ENRON well into 2001. A couple of sayings fit here: “A fool and his money are soon parted” and “You can’t cheat an honest man.” I would modify the latter. It is possible to cheat an honest man, but it is hard to cheat someone who is not greedy. Most scams involve deals that are too good to be true and people jump into them with both feet so that they won’t loose their opportunity.

Poor Eric. Your Friends Enron and other Energy Corporations defrauded California. More Spin from you again.

Jack,

“A couple of sayings fit here: ?A fool and his money are soon parted? and ?You can’t cheat an honest man.?

A fool and his money were lucky to get together in the first place.

Another old saying applies.
“If it is too good to be true….”

Enron was a sham to begin with. This was a company with no assets. The greedy amoung us will take what they can get and run.

Oh, and BTW the deregulation started with Reagan, I mean lets give credit where credit is due.

Jay,

“So Stephen, I guess you would rather help prop up corrupt U.N. leaders than help prop up the good decent people of Iraq.”

The UN was set up to help spread democracy throughout the whole world, not just one country. Corrupt leaders or not, the UN has done much good in the world over the years.
Let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater.

perplexed,

“Clinton?s Secretary of State, Madeline Albright, stated that very thing, that we should not be the world?s only superpower. Why shouldn?t we be?”

Perception is everything.

Eric,

What is the funtion of the UN ?

I understand it to be peace keeping and aiding areas/countrys with poverty and illness?

Most of those problems are in turd world countrys. Wouldn’t it be better to move the bilding closer to their work?

Forget Donald Trump, move them close to the action and get “Aligabar the mud-hut builder” to champion the project.

Basicly the UN hasn’t had any sucess storys lately, I think its because they are too far from their work.

Think of the savings? The COL would be much cheaper, unlimited free parking, and a steady supply of children to rape and abuse.

Koffee Cannin would have a short commute to work, and his son with the big teeth is sure to find a nitch close by.

Sounds like a win,win, to me.

jack, in re your comment that the people who owned enron stock “had it coming”, I guess you fail to realize that the PG&E employments who lost all their retirement savings were in a company retirement portfolio that invested their money in company stock and then was frozen before the massive sell-off of stock occured. And while their bosses minimized their losses by selling high, the employees were forced to watch as their 150K in savings was reduced to $100. Yeah, they “had it coming”.

eric,
I suggest you read page 8-10 of this report:
http://econweb.tamu.edu/puller/Econ426Docs/wolak_senate_testimony.pdf

First of all, there was no scarcity of electricity during the blackout. Scarcity was FABRICATED.

Once again I will restate my earlier point: It does not matter if it’s the state’s fault that the price-gouging happens. FERC is supposed to stop it. By law it must:
1) Ensure that wholesale rates are just and reasonable

2) If they are not, take action to make them just and reasonable
” “Whenever the Commission, after a hearing had up its own motion or upon complaint, shall find that any rate, charge, or classification, demand, observed, charged or collected by any public utility for transmission or sale subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission, or that any rule, regulation, practice, or contract affected such rate, charge, or classification is unjust, unreasonable, unduly discriminatory or preferential, the Commission shall determine the just and reasonable rate, charge, classification rule, rule, regulation, practice or contract to be thereafter observed and in force, and shall fix the same by order.” (Federal Power Act)

3. Order refunds for rates in exccess of just and reasonable levels.

Notes: Just and reasonable rates (according to this act) recover production costs, including a return to capital

FERC didn’t do this. And I’m sure you remember Bush and Cheney’s response (or lack of it) to the whole FERC debacle. That’s not fantasy or spin, it’s a fact. I can source it all day long.

Sure, the California legislature screwed up. It’s like a naked woman walking into the bar. She walks in and gets gang raped. She is screaming to the 5 police officers standing and watching “Help me!” The police officers say ” You’re the moron who came in here naked.”

So, where’s our 30 billion dollars? We’re required by law to get it back. Where is it?

Really, if you live here in California, I’m astonished that you wouldn’t want to learn the truth of this. Because it’s having a direct impact on us right now. Right down to whether or not you have enough police officers in your district.

As for the UN: the 1.5 billion price tag does seem like a boondoggle (Although Trump’s past mistakes makes him the last person I’d trust on that). We should always be vigilant against corruption, wherever it is. That being said, this project is a small part of what the U.N. outlays. And I believe, with time, I could prove that their spending habits are far less laced with graft and corruption than ours. And that they achieve more with each dollar they spend (internationally) than we do. For instance. I believe they spent $5 billion nation building Bosnia with some marked success. We’ve spent how much in Iraq and Afghanistan? With far less markers. It has to do with the fact that they have an organization in place for creating new mundane things like an Organization for hospital equipment procurement and disbursement.

There’s corruption in every program. You try to keep monetary losses to corruption at 5%. How much UN money goes towards graft, and how much towards solutions? Contrariwise, how about us?

Julia

Everyone has the responsibility to diversify. I understand that people might be forced to invest only in their company’s stock, but they know that when they go in and should also invest in other things on the side.

The figure you mention is 150k draining to only $100, but that fails to account for the changing values of the stocks. 150K of ENRON stock in December of 2000, was probably built on an investment of about 10K over the past decade. It was only worth 150K because of the unnatural appreciation caused by what we all agree was illegal. We can’t both decry the deceit and figure our profits based on it. People have the tendency to look to the highest possible value of any asset they own as the “real price”. You hear people say things like, “sure I could only sell my house for $200K, but it was worth $300K.” They usually don’t say, “I sold my house for $200K but it was really worth only $100K, which is what I paid plus inflation.” Of course the real price is what someone will pay for it – no more and no less.

This is not a rhetorical question, since I don’t know the answer. Do you know how much investment the average employee made to his/her retirement account? Let’s make a reasonable assumption. Since most people contribute about 5% to their 401K and average wages are around $50,000 (adjusted to today), in the roughly ten years ENRON was flying high you would expect an investment of about $25,000 per well paid worker. That is not nothing, but it is a lot less than the figures being thrown around. A smart employee would also have an IRA where he would have no ENRON stock at all.

jack, I’ll fully admit that I’m looking at a small sample of those hit, but the worst example is the employees at PG&E. They had invested in PG&E stock which was solid. Then Enron purchased PG&E, and the stock transferred to Enron stock. Then Enron froze their retirement accounts. Then Enron’s stock plummeted. And the value of all of those retirement plans went down about 99%.

So you have people investing over the long term in PG&E, then getting essentially junk stock in place of their high rated stock, then losing everything.

Of course, the other wrinkle is that these retirement plans were managed by the companies themselves who often promise a certain rate of return, and hence don’t allow the employees to chose what to invest in. Anyway,, I just think your “asking for it” comment was a little too strong. Sometimes people have less control over their lives than we think.

Julia

Your point is valid. You are too nice sometimes. One the blog we are supposed to be provocative.

Just a few things to say:

First, I like you Beagle. I had a good laugh at your last post, even if no one else appreciated it. You are someone after my own heart.

Julia:

“And I’m sure you remember Bush and Cheney’s response (or lack of it) to the whole FERC debacle.”

Let’s face the truth for a moment. California is a thorn in the side of the Republican Party. Between California & the east coast, every liberal, left wing, crazy idea is given birth. You might say California is the birthplace of the spawn of Satan, & I feel sorry for any conservative trying to make headway in that state. I’ve said all that, to say this, why should President Bush help California? If I were president, I would remind California about state’s rights.

By the way, how many times could Donald Trump buy all of us? I would adventure to say, he has made & lost & made again more than we can imagine.

Perplexed

Perplexed,

“I?ve said all that, to say this, why should President Bush help California? If I were president, I would remind California about state?s rights.”

I guess I’d have to remind you that California is the Worlds 7th largest economy. That most of the winter produce in this country comes from California. That a good percentage of American Areospace is in California.
Leave it to a politician to bite the hand that feeds him.

Any other questions?

And how much of the other state’s economies rely on California? Where do you think all those Texas oilmen make their money? California collapses… so does Texas.

Rocky & Julia:

So you believe California should get preferential treatment? Are the American citizens of California more important than say Indiana?

The old saying “you make your own bed” fits here. If Californians are not bright enough to elect a government that will solve their state’s problems, then why should the rest of us? And especially, why should President Bush waste his time bailing out a state that is so ingrate they would turn right around and as you said “bit the hand of those feeding them”. Are you saying, if President Bush had bailed out California from the problems your elected democrats got you into, then all would be at peace & the liberals & left wing of the state would stop slandering him?

Perplexed

Jay-
You guess like a blind person shoots.

I have written over a hundred entries for this blog, and in none of them have I advocated that we cun and run. Go and check if you’ve got doubts about what I write, and what I believe.

I am angry that the Bush administration chose to fight a pre-emptive war in Iraq, without a real threat to justify. I think that’s put us back decades in the war against terrorism, and sapped our resources to do anything else. If anybody out there, soldier, sailor, tinker or tailor thinks that means I don’t support them 100%, or that I don’t support finishing this war off right, they are mistaken.

It would have been sad to leave the people of Iraq under Saddam, but the freedom of other nations does not come before the safety of ours. Freedom for others is a close second, but it always should be second, when our nation’s welfare is on the line. We can’t save anybody if we can’t save ourselves.

Do I support the terrorists? Go back and read my entries. No. I support human rights for these people to the extent that it allows us to nail them to the wall for the whole world to see. I don’t want us so damn afraid of the terrorists that we fulfill their victory by becoming sadists and skulkers like them.

Do I think we’re guilty as a nation for certain things? Historically, maybe. Our nation did not always project it’s power humanely in the past. That’s a cold hard fact. But should the average American have to suffer for that? No. A person’s actions are their own. We can all look back and see the right and the wrong of what our forebears did, and understand that no action takes place in a vacuum.

It is our support for fascist and monarchical regimes that have made us a target for terrorism, but there were many ways in which these people could have protested America’s actions. It is their fault that they flew a couple of jets into the WTC and the Pentagon, not ours. The problems of our policies in the past do not necessitate such radical, sadistic and lethal reprisal.

Nor does our invasion justify the daily murder of Iraqi civilians by former regime elements and terrorists. Nor do our soldiers deserve death, merely for marching on our CINC’s orders to do what they were called up and enlisted to do. The terrorist and the insurgents deserve defeat, and Iraqis deserve a free country, now that we’ve gone down and messed the place up for them.

What I advocate is that we put enough soldiers in theatre that we can get the place stabilized, and provide a peaceful platform from which to create the new Iraq. As it is, though, we’re having to juggle chainsaws while walking on coals because our president thought it would be too pessimistic to plan for non-ideal eventualities.

Unfortunately, it seems, your people have decided that it was more important that we protect the President’s image than get the job done. You guys are more concerned about whether a reporter was biased, than whether there was a real problem with armor for the vehicles in Iraq. Your folks are more interested in what political damage the protestors are doing to the president, than whether our nation went to war on honest premises. When given a choice between dealing with practical realities and saving political face , your poeple have chosen to do the latter with frustrating regularity.

What do we tell our soldiers when parade grounds get maintained and pork gets appropriated instead of their body armor, vehicle armor, and communications equipment? How do we maintain a working army when defense contractors making unnecessary projects are getting the money that should go to funding the repairs and maintenance that keep vehicles American soldiers are actually using in good shape?

Support the Soldiers? Let me tell you what disgusts me: that your people are prepared to defend this administration to the hilt on matters of war, but won’t do the simple shit it takes to keep that army in good working order. What disgusts me is that you ponder the morale problems of bad press for a war, and never consider that the war itself could affect morale negatively. Our soldiers will not have a morale problem if you guys get our point and start cooperating with us to win this damned war!

It will also be much easier to fight this war and support if we’re all on the same page, not fighting over basic facts. This administration’s chickenshit attitude towards talking about it’s mistakes in this war has made impossible to discuss what we need to do without getting into a brain-numbing political fight about it.

This U.N. thing is a joke in comparison to the actual trouble we’re in. Seeing as how we got into a hell of a mess disregarding their authority, we are the last people with any room to offer help on how to help them clean house.

Perplexed-
Accusations against their performance? See above. Jeez louise. you can’t defend the war on the merits, so you hide behind the soldiers by saying criticizing the president’s plan discourages them. So we should put our soldiers through even worse crap so that we can keep their spirits up? Last I heard, soldiers were a pretty tough heart, with fairly strong willpower. I highly doubt that the criticism of a few stateside liberals is going to convince them that all is lost. I do think, however, they will appreciate efforts on the part of the civilian leadership to do what it takes to win the war, to get some kind of resolution in sight, a purpose they can work through the day looking forward to.

What killed us in Vietnam is that even when failure is rare or nonexistent, people cannot stand for long to struggle everyday of their lives, yet not have those struggles count towards something.

Eric-
There was no real power shortage. Documentary evidence shows that Enron’s manipulations of power grids and generators were what created the brownouts and the rate hikes, not any lack of generating capacity.

The primary factor in the California energy crisis was Enron itself. All else being equal, the power would have flowed. California’s approach was working, despite it not following your theoretical framework for how the system should work.

Jack-
I can, and I will. Clinton was a good president for the economy in that he was willing to use the sticks at the same time he used the carrots. Unfortunately, like others would say, he bargained away the loaf of bread to keep the slice.

The Bush administration’s approach, unfortunately, was not to repair the regulatory framework for keeping the businesses honest about their finances, nor repairing the separation between investment banks and stock brokers, but instead a difficult to enforce paperwork bonanza.

A lot of people left holding ENRON stock had it coming.

Reminds me of that line from the Clint Eastwood movie Unforgiven: We all got it coming.

Nihilistic movie quotes aside, many people holding that stock were not seasoned investors, but people merely trying to do what your people tell them to do: live the capitalist dream. This wasn’t some run on the stock by investors, this was the collapse of a company that was made to look very profitable, and therefore very attractive to investors, by means of fraud and creative accounting. Blaming the victims here is hardly pinning the blame on the right folks.

Stephen

Making money over the medium and long term in the stock market is not hard. The short term is a gamble. But even if it is not hard, it does take some thought and a modicum of intelligence. The closest thing in the world to a free lunch is diversification. The only trouble with diversification is that it will prevent rapid (and usually unsustainable) gains, as well as similar losses. During the greedy times of the 1990s, some people thought such conservative (small c) strategies were for chumps. They were seduced the sirens’ call of easy money. There is not much we can or should do about this.

The market is efficient because it rewards good decisions. The other side is that it punishes bad ones.

This is off topic, I know. There is an interesting dilemma in modern societies. Most of our institutions and systems are designed by and for people of greater than average intelligence. Unfortunately, half the population falls below average. What do you do? If you set up a system that a 80 IQ person can understand, it won’t be much use to most other people and probably won’t work very well for society. Do you restrict the choices made by the lower half or do you restrict the options of the upper half?

Aldous,

Isn’t it about time to tell all the Republicans to join armed forces again? (Let’s see, that would be the 73rd time you’ve written that) The joke is way old, think of a new one…please…

Perplexed,

No, I’m not asking for preferential treatment. I’m asking for the law that was enacted in 1935 to be enforced.

As for legislators being stupid, that’s why the 1935 law was created, to save the nation from itself.

If Mississippi legislates stupid de-regulation, then I would expect the government to follow the law and make sure wholesale rates remain just and reasonable.

It’s the law. It’s a good law. It was created for good reasons that remain sound to this day.

The government that Californians are represented by is the federal government, of which FERC is the legal body that controls wholesale energy prices. Period. If we had the legal rights to handle this in California we would. But we don’t. So don’t tell me we should have solved it ourselves when I just cited to you the law that clearly shows that FERC is the legal regulatory body of wholesale rates in the United States.

Again. I expect our state to be treated fairly under the law. Or is my state not allowed to be protected equally under the laws of this nation?

Stephen, again we disagree completely. This is the right war at the right time in the right area and our military is prepared, battle ready and winning. We have as many people in the “theater” as was requested by the generals running this operation, not by those who pretend to know more. 14 of the 18 provinces in Iraq are peaceful indicating that maybe the military is performing better than you think they are and that we haven’t “messed” the place up for them. Our “invasion” of Iraq is also NOT the reason innocent people are dying at the hands of these sub-humans, they have been doing that for decades and GW is finally the first world leader that has ever had the cajones to do something about this cancer on civilization. This battle will not be won through appeasement, understanding, containment, or approaching it from a law enforcement perspective, this is a battle that requires a zero tolerance approach. Kerry stated that he would work toward the day that terrorism was nuisance, meaning that some deaths at the hands of terrorism every year is to be expected, that approach stems from weakness and fear and would only serve to perpetuate the problem. You made a good point about being on the same page, well I will say it again, if the civilized world was united with us in this battle, this war would be over right now. So I will ask of you to get on our page and let’s win this now, otherwise our children will deal with a much larger threat. Secondly, the UN has NO POWER over the U.S., they are nothing more than a bunch of corrupt cowards and I would disregard their authority at every turn. Finally, we are in no “trouble”, have mistakes been made, yes, but what war has ever been waged mistake free. Considering the unprecedented opposition to this conflict, I will submit that this effort is going extremely well. A free and peaceful Afghanistan, a freely elected representative council in Iraq drafting thier first ever constitution, other Arab countries participating in the training of the new Iraqi army, millions of Iraqi’s voting for the future of their country, women attending school, 14 of 18 peaceful provinces, it sure doesn’t sound like the “quagmire” the left would want you to believe. Stephen, we are winning this war and it will continue to take resolve, patience, and courage much of which the left has no concept of, but rest assured, the neocons will protect you.

Perplexed,

Its obvious I don’t care much for the UN.

Joking aside, if we go beyond the FACT that they do little sucessfully in the origional intent of why they were formed, They have stated goals to totally ban the private ownership of firearms worldwide!
They even have a statue made of bent and twisted guns in the lobby.

I wouldn’t pay 12 cents to rebuild that snakepit In MY country!

I think we should take up a collection so that Aldous can buy a clue.

aldous,

Actually. It was the Coalition Provisional Authorities Inspector General who did the audit on the missing money. You know the CPA don’t you? Paul Bremer’s outfit? The guy who got the Freedom Medal?

Really, Eric. You need to find out about these things. You do know all this was reported to Congress, right? Just because Fox News does not report it does not mean it did not happen.

You still haven’t given me any information much less evidence of anything. I do recall several video reports of trucks full of cash being looted from Bahgdad banks. Saddam emptied the banks as I recall— of all their cash. Along with transporting tons of explosives and probably WMD as well while we dithered around trying to get the bribed UN to follow through on it’s own resolutions.

Treasury and State Department officials said yesterday that investigators were attempting to recover an estimated $1 billion in cash seized from the Iraqi Central Bank in Baghdad on Saddam’s instructions in the hours leading up to the U.S. attack on Iraq.

The size of the bank heist, which reportedly involved enough $100 bills to fill three tractor-trailers, was an indication of the challenges facing investigators as they seek to track down billions of dollars in ill-gotten Iraqi assets scattered around the world. Much of the money was raised through illegal oil smuggling operations to circumvent United Nations sanctions that were imposed in the wake of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in August 1990. pittsburghlive.com

Do you think we might find any missing cash at the UN?

Paul,

Why can’t the US exercise global leadership - and thereby get the world to reduce terrorism? Let’s not sit on the sidelines and complain. Let’s lead. The first step in this direction is to appoint a non-Bolton as an ambassador.

Do you mean leadership as in calling the UN to take action against tyranny, or leadership as in just making pronouncements that you never intend to follow through on?

What you fail to admit is that Bush is excercising leadership. He has been the one who has tried to rouse the world to follow. It was Bush that went to the UN to get them to follow through on their stated principles (as opposed to their actual actions). If you’ll notice it was the UN who was receiving kickbacks and bribes from Saddam and who couldn’t bear to have him deposed and consequently have the Oil-for-Food program shut down. A conflict of interest I would say. Except we didn’t know about that at the time did we?

Why don’t you and the left get on board and follow through on the promises of peace and actually help unite the country instead of doing everything possible to split it apart?

Let’s assume the UN had the kind of leadership you would support. John Kerry perhaps. What, exactly, would be different? No one would call the UN to account for these things because the institution is just ‘too important’. There would be no action taken besides pronouncements and the prodigious printing of paper. The UN accomplishes nothing because it’s ultimate goal is not to solve the problems of the world but merely to feed off of them and enhance their own power and importance.

Julia,

First of all, there was no scarcity of electricity during the blackout. Scarcity was FABRICATED.

Fabricated yes. That’s what the effect of price controls and a ‘market system’ setup by state legislators generally results in. No matter when or where it’s been tried, price controls do not result in a surplus of anything. That is in fact my whole point about the california ‘re-regulation’.

The effort to make this some kind of proof that the UN isn’t wasting billions of dollars is a sad misdirection.

State power managers ordered rolling blackouts across California for a second straight day Tuesday, cutting off more than 125,000 customers as demand for electricity again exceeded supply…

…The same factors that collided to strap California’s power supply on Monday hit again, officials with the Independent System Operator said. Those include reduced electricity imports from the Pacific Northwest, numerous power plants offline for repairs and less power provided by cash-strapped alternative-energy plants. sfgate.com

This is what is problematic with your argument against the FERC. You say the FERC is charged with making sure that rates are ‘just and reasonable’, that they must step in and make the rates ‘just and reasonable’, but what exactly is ‘just and reasonable’? It makes as much sense as the ‘livable wage’. I think that I should be making at least $60 to $80 dollars an hour. That would be just and reasonable. But there are more factors involved than what I want.

When the government begins manipulating markets and setting the prices of things there is no end to the need to continue that manipulation. The end result is never good. The law of unintended consequences comes round in full force.

That is why your willingness to completely let off the hook the very same people who create the problem in the first place completely astounds me.

And I believe, with time, I could prove that their spending habits are far less laced with graft and corruption than ours. And that they achieve more with each dollar they spend (internationally) than we do. For instance. I believe they spent $5 billion nation building Bosnia with some marked success. We’ve spent how much in Iraq and Afghanistan? With far less markers. It has to do with the fact that they have an organization in place for creating new mundane things like an Organization for hospital equipment procurement and disbursement.

So let me summarize. As a progressive:

1) You DO always presume that the US is second rate and more corrupt than any other country/organization?
2) The creation of a bureacracy with a long bureaucratic title so dazzles your mind that actual results doesn’t matter.

Jack-
In abstract, the market economy is the best possible, but it is not a fire and forget sort of affair. The self correcting mechanisms of the market require knowledge of what to correct against, and the opportunity to act on that understanding. Deprive market participants of that, and you deprive the market of its ability to correct such errors. That’s what makes the deregulation problems of the 1990’s of such concern. They were all failures of the system to maintain the flow of information, and the investor’s ability to make the changes they need to make in a timely fashion.

Jay-
We didn’t get our reason for pre-empting Saddam right, and that reason was all that justified our doing this pre-emptively.

The command in Iraq is not free from political considerations. Nobody is going to flush their career down the toilet by asking the commander in chief to send more troops he’s made it clear he doesn’t want them there.

Take invasion out of the quotation marks. We went into Iraq uninvited with an army of tens of thousands of soldiers. That’s called an invasion last time I checked.

Also, last time I checked, we’re dealing with hundreds of Iraqi casualties a weak, in violence that just keeps on intensifying. If you call that winning, I’m sad. We can and should be doing better than this, but we can’t expect the soldiers to win this war without good leadership from up the chain of command.

You can pile the talking points, right on top of one another, but that doesn’t change how badly this war has been botched. Deny it all you want, but what the Democrats want is victory. We just wish we could be winning someplace where our victory would mean more than a tie game.

Eric-
The power was scarce because it was made scarce. Socialist economy or capitalist, the effect is the same when you turn off the generator. Power gets scarcer. They have these guys on audiotape telling folks to come up with reasons to shut off generators.

This was extortion and fraud, not the downfall of socialism.

Eric,

as Stephen just said. The power was scarce because it was made scarce. Again, please read my link. It is the same issue that is going on with the gas refineries in California today. Shell is shutting down refineries, (purchasing and closing them), in order to limit production and drive up prices. It’s called a monopoly.

As for FERC’s responsibility in the California crisis, they orchestrated part of the de-regulation. They laid the foundation for it. They also allowed the de-regulation to become law. So they have equal responsibility for the creation of the bad de-regulation. But do I have a complete willingness to let my legislators off the hook? No. I don’t. That’s why I don’t vote for the idiots who enacted that bad legislation. I am, however, mollified that California has hired Frank Wolak and is following his advice on the appropriate way to regulate the market now (which is what they should have done before. NOT taken the power companies advice).

So, again, no, I do not let our legislators completely off the hook. You tinker with economics on the advice of business owners (and not objective economists), and you shouldn’t expect to stay elected.

But FERC (AGAIN) is legally obligated to protect states.

As for your question of what is just and reasonable, let me (again) re-post to you to what the federal law says that means: “Just and reasonable rates recover production costs, including a return to capital.” That means about $80 per, instead of the $300-500 per we were charged. FERC has the formula. It’s straightforward. They failed to enact it. That’s a violation of their requirements under the law.

You may not think that it’s right for the government to impose rates for wholesale electricity prices. You may think its a bad idea. However, it’s the law. It’s been the law for 70 years. Your opinion is merely an opinion. Not the law.

Also the cap in rates is a temporary emergency measure. It’s like preventing price gouging after a hurricane.

As for the UN:

If you read my post, you would see that I clearly stated that this does not excuse the UN from corruption. I merely stated that corruption is a fact of life, and that no organization is free of it. You are right to point out this boondoggle. I am merely pointing out that I think the U.N., as a whole, operates succesfully.

For example, I do not think California should get rid of its entire government because they screw up (far in excess of the example you provided.)

As for your comment about me being bedazzled by titles and that results don’t matter, I actually used that specific example because I researched it. I compared our performance on health and electricity in Iraq as compared to the U.N.s Result: We’ve spent approximiately 25 times the amount the U.N. has with about 95% less to show for our money.

In fact, I’ve been emailing back and forth to the U.N. and to the U.S. administrators in these two fields, and the difference is amazing. Just the amount of detail and research the U.N. has is unbeleivable.

Organization wise, the U.N. has consistently been better than the U.S. I still can’t figure out who is in charge on the U.S. end. I don’t think they know themselves. I know for a fact that none of the Iraqis know (but they know the head contacts on the U.N. side).

So, no, I don’t think that the U.S. is always more corrupt. We are less corrupt than Brazil, for instance. But as compared to the U.N., the U.N. has done better on several markers.

Stephen, how do you define victory? Please shed some light on what the Democrat plan is because either I missed it or it doesn’t exist. From your previous posts, I am assuming victory is relegating terrorism to a lwan enforcement issue, well that is pretty much of the state were are in now. The Iraqi security forces and army are improving every day and within the year will begin transitioning with the Americans and the allies to assume control. Once that happens, terrorism will become THEIR law enforcement issue, not ours, and that is how it will ultimately be defeated. Again, they will win this war not us. Re: invasion, this is just a difference on how we view the world. Personally, I would have “invaded” Iraq years ago. That country has been the “uncontrollable child” of this planet for far too long and the world community and the decent people of that country deserve better. What this planet needs are more people of courage and conviction who are willing to do whatever it takes to better mankind and to end tragedies when they see them. That is why the U.N. is such a joke. Where are the people of courage and conviction in the U.N. when places like Sudan, Somalia, and Dufar are in such desperate of those people, be damned with politics. They are more worried about their positions, power and money rather doing the right thing. This is how I view Iraq, that this is the right thing to do be damned with politics. GW has been crucified and his reputation will never recover, but I doubt that he gives a damn because he knows that in the end the Iraqi people, the future of the middle east and future of the world will be better off for it. I read that the terrorists just killed a bride and wounded the groom of two good Iraqi’s looking to build a new future. That is infuriating and proves again to me that we must fight them wherever, whenever, and for however long it takes until they realize that that behaviour is unacceptable to the world community. That is victory, that is leadership and that is what people of courage and conviction do, and that is what is being done. The tide is turning and, by staying the course, when GW leaves office our presence in Iraq and terrorism will be almost non-existent.

Jay,

“The tide is turning and, by staying the course, when GW leaves office our presence in Iraq and terrorism will be almost non-existent.”

Please somebody give me a shot, I think I’m going into a diabetic coma.
Who’s been blowing sunshine up your skirt?
The tide is turning?
Every day more and more “insurgents” are killing more and more Iraqis, with more and more powerful car bombs.
You demand that Stephen cite sources, yet you cite none. Where the heck do you get your information?

“What this planet needs are more people of courage and conviction who are willing to do whatever it takes to better mankind and to end tragedies when they see them. That is why the U.N. is such a joke. Where are the people of courage and conviction in the U.N. when places like Sudan, Somalia, and Dufar are in such desperate of those people, be damned with politics”

The UN is only as weak or as strong as it’s members, but your neo-conmen don’t get that. Where is the outrage from the rest of the members?
You can’t blame that on the UN, only on the world we live in.

Jay,

The central issue in Iraq, is what does it mean to “win”. Do you remember when Lebanon was in chaos? Did anyone know how to “win” then? And is Lebanon utopia today? What are the markers that moved Lebanon from chaos towards the faltering steps of (somewhat) lawful independence?

For me, a “win” in Iraq, is to see a functioning, law-abiding Iraq, whose people don’t live in fear from “might makes right”.

Imagine the U.S. had fallen into chaos. Now imagine you brought your daughter to an emergency clinic because she was badly hurt. The emergency clinic explains they have no equipment or drugs to treat your daughter with b/c there is no one in charge of providing equipment or supplies to the hospital. They explain that this process is being put on hold until the “chaos settles down.” But it’s been two years since the chaos started.

It’s not that there COULDN’T be an organization, it’s that there is a lack of large-scale planning and implementation at the administrative level. There are 15 chiefs and no one saying who is in charge. So decisions dont’ get made, and people wait and die on the hospital floor.

The U.N. and the World Bank are used to doing these things. But they can’t do them without a central authorization system. If they are the authorities,, then they can act. But they’re not. We have demanded that only we and Iraqis have that central authority, and yet we don’t make it clear to the Iraqis or the individuals in our own system, which one of them has that authority, then the result is that no one does anything, because no one is certain who can be the final say on these big decisions. In addition, we keep changing the authorities out every 4 months. And those authorities seem to be more political ideologists than problem-solvers. (i.e. “While I have no experience in the logistics of this, I have big ideas about how macro-economics works”)

Hence: two years on, no one knows who is in charge of getting vital drugs and basic equipment (like IVs) to hospitals. There’s no sytem in place. And people wait.

In the end, I believe, soldiers cannot win unless their counterparts in civilian management do well. The civilian side is a mess. The soldier side is operating at half-force (There aren’t enough armored vehicles for our soldiers to operate in, so what do you think the Iraqi recruits are driving around in? And if our soldiers are having such a hard time operating, how well do you think the recruits are doing with their 3rd class hand-offs?)

It’s frightening to me. I still have hope it will work. But it feels like we’re in a high-stakes gamble with a disjointed plan. Right now the idea seems to be “Haphazardly train Iraqis to take over security, but without providing them the necesarry tools they need in order to do that. And have Iraqis form a new government, but don’t give them authority or tools to operate on the emergencies that exist right now. And figure out how to deal with those emergencies as they come up on a case by case basis. Perhaps the NGOs can help. Or maybe the U.N. or the World Bank, or some other countries… hey, is there anyone here who can coordinate that? Who wants to be in charge of coordinating? Why aren’t these other people more organized? Why aren’t they helping properly?”

Rocky, The U.N. is a representative body of “the world we live in” so if the U.N. is not outraged then who will be, also Dufar is a perfect example of why the U.N. was established in the first place and they have done very little to resolve that crisis. Everyday insurgents kill more innocent people, true, and everyday the Iraqi security forces and Army get stronger and one day in the not too distant future, those forces will be able to protect their own country. It astounds me how little faith you have in decent people and the amount confidence you place in serial killers. The terrorists (I don’t like to call them that because it somehow legitimizes them) or serial killers are desperate and are doing everything they can to break the back of the world community (yours is already broken). The London bombings can be attributed in part to Spain, because of Spain’s weakness the serial killers are now attempting that strategy in London. London will stand strong and the tide is turning but it won’t be a quick turn as has been pointed out on numerous occasions. Secondly, I never asked for Stephen to “cite” sources, I am only curious as to how someone on the left would attempt to resolve this issue. IMHO, these serial killers only understand violence and death and we must fight fire with fire.

Julia, we agree, a “win” is a law-abiding Iraq and the decent people of Iraq will win this war not us, but we need to set them up for success. Once the Iraqi security forces and Army are up to strength and numbers, they will begin to rapidly turn the tide and turn this into their own law enforcement issue. Once the decent people of Iraq learn how, and have the equipment, to protect their own country, terrorism will begin a slow death. I wholeheartedly believe that every law-abiding decent person on this planet wants to eradicate terrorism, and the way to do that is to have patience, resolve and conviction because that is the only language they understand. We have tried to ignore them, appease them and reason with them many times over the last three decades to no avail. It is time now that decent people stand up and declare a zero tolerance approach and end this once and for all. Re: your Lebanon analogy, which is pretty good though it pales in comparison to this problem, it was the good people of Lebanon that helped to extinguish that problem as will the good people of Iraq ultimately resolve theirs. Re: your civilian side of the issue concern which I share, I can only say that I too want the rebuilding and re-supplying of that country accelerated, but that also depends on cooperation of other nations and the serial killers. I have great respect for our all voluntary military and the generals that run it and I will defer to them just how safely and on what timeline things can get done. Our military is comprised of the some of the best people on the planet (my family included) and I trust that they are just as concerned as we are. A self-fulfilling prophecy is when you convince yourself that something can or cannot get done. If the serial killers succeed in convincing us that this can’t get done (which many already believe) then it can’t get done. But America was built on the conviction of anything is possible, it’s a shame that so many people that live here now don’t have that trait.

Jay,

“I am only curious as to how someone on the left would attempt to resolve this issue. IMHO, these serial killers only understand violence and death and we must fight fire with fire.”

You are talking out of both sides of your mouth.
In one breath you berate Democrats, specificly Kerry, for not having a plan and for wanting to have this be a “law enforcement issue”. Those were your words.
In the next breath you call the insurgents “serial killers”, which would make it a law enforcement issue.

So, which is it?

Calling these guys animals and demonizing them does nothing to win the battle against them, and in fact, shows that they have grabbed a place in your pyche, which is what their intention was in the first place.

These sub-humans are animals Rocky and they don’t deserve to breathe the same air we do. Killing them at every opportunity will win this battle and nothing short of that. Kerry doesn’t understand that. It is true that his approach was to fight this from a law enforcement perspective which will only serve to perpetuate the problem. We must take the battle to them, demonstrate that our will and resolve is much stronger than theirs and then ultimately turn this over to the decent people of Iraq to finish it off. Young muslims will stop subscribing to the terorist movement only when they realize that the world community is not on their side and the only thing they can expect is a sure death. Approaching this with any less resolve will only serve to keep the door of opportunity open to the terrorist. They must realize, and they are begining to realize, that they are no match against the many good decent people of this world.

1. The US drops it membership in the UN.
2. We kick the UN out of the US.
3. The UN collapses because it it no longer recieves money from the US>
4. We all live happly ever after.

Julia,
Why don’t you ask Gray Davis for all the money back that he stole from you in the outrageous taxes he enacted while he was governer of your state.

Stephen,

The self correcting mechanisms of the market require knowledge of what to correct against, and the opportunity to act on that understanding. Deprive market participants of that, and you deprive the market of its ability to correct such errors. That’s what makes the deregulation problems of the 1990’s of such concern. They were all failures of the system to maintain the flow of information, and the investor’s ability to make the changes they need to make in a timely fashion.

You have a contradictory view of what ‘self-correcting’ actually means. The information of the market does indeed require work on the part of participants. It does not hold however that they all will have perfect knowledge of it all the time. Nor does it mean that if they do not have perfect knowledge that it is a ‘system failure’. Certainly, they will have better information in a free market rather than an over regulated one.

The idea you partially give credit to is that free markets work better than controlled markets. But after (apparently) conceding that, you go on to say that deregulation obscures the flow of information? How so?

What it boils down to is control. Do you want one entity in control, or many equal entities? Regulation, and by regulation I mean laws intended to punish theft and fraud, (you seem to miss that point entirely whenever we talk about this), — regulation beyond that is what obscures and distorts the flow of information in a market.

…what the Democrats want is victory…

…over Bush. But not in Iraq. The proof of this is what would happen if Democrats were actually in charge. We would be pulling out of Iraq, Stephen and you know it.

The power was scarce because it was made scarce. Socialist economy or capitalist, the effect is the same when you turn off the generator. Power gets scarcer. They have these guys on audiotape telling folks to come up with reasons to shut off generators.

This was extortion and fraud, not the downfall of socialism.

Even by the admission of the expert Julia cited there was a shortage of energy outside of the state. You cannot get by the fact that the system was setup by Democrats who have been in the majority in this state for a long long time. No one can say with a straight face that this was a ‘market failure’.

Unfortunately, this is what normally happens when the government steps in to ‘fix things’. They screw it up and then predictably try to balme it on corporations and capitalism so that they can ‘fix it’ some more. Usually, with a more socialist bent.

Eric, let me quote from the article itself, so people don’t misinterpret from your comments:

“As is becoming increasingly clear as more information becomes publicly available about the behavior of market participants in the California market during the period May 2000 to June 2001,
there was never a shortage of generation capacity to serve consumers in California and the rest of the West. Instead, the observed scarcity electricity of during the crisis period was caused by market participants creating an artificial shortage of electricity that would enable them to sell the electricity they did provide at substantially higher prices.”

“Market participants did not need to coordinate their behavior to create this artificial shortage of electricity that allowed them to set extremely high electricity prices during the period May 2000 to June 2001. Because of water availability for hydroelectric production in the Pacific Northwest during the summer of 2000, market participants found this behavior unilaterally profit-maximizing given the actions of other suppliers in the West. Evidence of this significant decline in import availability is that the average hourly quantity of imports into California during the latter part of the summer of 2000 was roughly half the average hourly value of imports during the same time period in 1999, despite average electricity prices during the latter part of the summer of 2000 more than 5 times higher than average prices during the latter part of the summer of 1999. To understand the importance of import availability to performance of the California market, it is important to recall that, historically, California has obtained roughly one-quarter of its electricity needs from imports. Owners of fossil-fuel generation facilities serving the California market recognized that higher profits were possible by pursuing a strategy of withholding capacity from the market either by refusing to offer their units to the market, declaring their units unavailable to operate, or by bidding prices vastly in excess of the average variable cost of supplying electricity from their generation units. This withholding behavior by fossil-fuel generation owners during the period May 2000 to June 2001 is documented in the studies referred to earlier in my testimony. Further evidence consistent with this withholding behavior is the unprecedented quantity of generation capacity unavailable to serve California during the period June 2000 to June 2001. For example, during the seven-month period November 1, 2000 to May 31, 2001, the average daily quantity of generation capacity forced or scheduled off-line in California was in excess of 10,000 megawatts (MW).4 This figure is slightly less than one-quarter of the total amount of generating capacity in California. The combination of low import availability and extraordinary high levels of generation capacity off-line in California allowed in-state suppliers to bid the capacity they did make available at extremely high prices and still have their bids accepted. Because the vast majority of imports from the Pacific Northwest are from hydroelectric facilities, the quantity of imports available to California was not likely to change until water conditions in Pacific Northwest improved. Water levels in Pacific Northwest during the last quarter of 2000 and first quarter of 2001 were extremely low and forecast to be as low or lower during the spring and summer of 2001. Consequently, it was reasonable for suppliers to expect that their withholding strategy would be extremely profitable through, at least, the autumn of 2001, because of forecast low water levels (and import availability) in the Pacific Northwest during this time period.”

So let me say it with a straight face: This was market failure.

My problem with the California legislature, is that you have to plan ahead for people to act illegally. The de-regulation scheme was flawed in that respect. If people operated lawfully, and didn’t game the system to create false scarcity, then it would have worked fine. But you have to know that people are going to do that.

There was not “shortage of energy” outside of the state. The drought lowered the supply enough that we only had a 10% buffer instead of a 20% buffer, and a lean buffer can be gamed.

The solution, Eric, would be government intervention: the building of power plants. That’s not a free market. That’s one conglomerate glutting the market with power. (Just like subsidizing our farmers).

Right now, the gasoline refineries are set up so that California has a tiny gas buffer. The few groups that own refineries are shutting them down permanently to create more scarcity so they can get more profit. Sure, it’s perfectly fair under the free market. But what would be best for the state is for the government to build and own its own refineries so that the businesses can’t game the system (But that’s communism!)

So let me say again with a straight face: This is market failure.

Eric, I have admitted that the California government needs to take responsibility for not being more careful. I have provided you a link which shows that the federal government has as much responsibility in creating the bad regulation that allowed corporations to game the system. I hold them responsible too. I also hold responsible the corporate profiteers who put a 45% profit for their company ahead of the financial stability of the economic integrity of the State of California. And the profiteers who broke the law by telling power plants to shut down their generators during an energy crisis.

Yet your response indicates that you only hold the legislature to blame. Even when I have provided you a non-partisan paper that defines exactlly what the problem is. This isn’t about winning an argument, this is about the real reasons we lost 30 billion dollars. FERC changed the system 10 years ago to allow certain electric companies to charge “market prices”. It would only allow companies who couldn’t excercies “market power” to be able to charge those prices. Then California de-regulated. But FERC was supposed to police these companies to make sure they didn’t have the ability to game the system. However, in California, these companies did have the ability to game the system. So they did. California asked FERC to stop them, as it was required to do. And FERC didn’t. And FERC says that it’s California’s fault that it gave these companies the ability to excercise “market power”, when it is FERC’s obligation to make sure that companies who can excercise market power are not allowed to charge market prices.

But, please continue. I think you were explaining how it was a fact that it’s all the democrats fault?

Julia,

The following is the very first statement, ‘Diagnosing the California Energy Crisis,’ (pg2) of the Stanford University Professor, Frank Wolak, which you are quoting as proof this is a ‘market failure’.

At the outset, I would like to emphasize that the California electricity crisis was not a market failure, a but a regulatory failure.

What do you think he meant by that?

So let me say it with a straight face: This was market failure.

Now, your argument in response to a post about UN corruption was to say that Bush?, or corporations?, or corporate interest?, or several specific corporations?, stole 30 billion dollars from California. I assume that because in liberal ideology corporations are evil profiteers, who, like ravening wolves cannot help themselves from eating the baby in the backyard, they must be heavily regulated. Economic activity cannot be left to free people I guess.

I just want to know if the U.S. government is going to reimburse my state the 30 billion dollars they were defrauded by Enron and others when Bush and FERC refused their responsibility under the law to stop electric profiteering when they were asked.

Are you saying that Enron shut down power plants? Or might Enron’s actions be a separate issue?

There was not “shortage of energy” outside of the state. The drought lowered the supply enough that we only had a 10% buffer instead of a 20% buffer, and a lean buffer can be gamed.

Does ‘less supply’ mean the same as a shortage? Perhaps not exactly. Does it mean that there was ‘less supply’? Do you understand what the basic theory of supply and demand means? Less supply equals higher value. Did they shut down power plants, thereby foregoing higher profits so that they could drive up the price even higher? Perhaps they did. I don’t really know actually. They say that they were doing maintenence on power plants during less than peak months, but then that is used as evidence that there was no ‘peak’ power shortage and that they therefore did it only to drive up the price.

But then there is also the demand. Do you know if the demand for electricy has increased or decreased over the years as the state has not allowed new power plants to be built?

The fact still remains that the whole convoluted system where the State buys all our power and then let’s PG&E bill us, wierd, it’s just all too much for me to fathom. But then that’s usually what happens when the government tries to be all the all knowing market.

Don’t worry though, Julia, I think I will research this and come back to tell you what you should believe about this. Don’t worry. ;)

The solution, Eric, would be government intervention: the building of power plants. That’s not a free market. That’s one conglomerate glutting the market with power. (Just like subsidizing our farmers).

Partial government intervention didn’t have the intended effect? Of course the favored solution would be total government intervention. Your arguments don’t wash Julia. This is not about free markets because there hasn’t been a free market in energy production or delivery.

The whole reason why free markets work is because there isn’t any one person or group predicting for the rest of how the market should be working at any given time. That is, the market information that Stephen believes is obscured by deregulation is made by members of the market. It’s a distributed system, like peer-to-peer networks. No one supercomputer could possibly do what millions of individual desktops could do at anyone time.

I agree with John Kerry’s position on the war on terror when it comes to Government regulating business, it’s a law enforcement matter. After a crime is committed, it is the government’s job to punish the wrongdoer. You know— innocent until proven guilty. Crime first, then prosecution.

Of course the left holds a different view.

Jay,

“They must realize, and they are begining to realize, that they are no match against the many good decent people of this world.”

No offence meant, but I hope that you are confortable in your “black and white” world.

The fundamentalists that we fight don’t care what you or I, or anyone else belives. We are the great Satan to them, and they will never understand the differences.
Until we acheive the hearts and minds thing, that is the way it will stay.

I find it humorous that Bush (pre-usurpation) was a pretty good friend of Kenneth Lay until someone got busted. Right wingers look up “Harken Energy” or the Aloha Oil Co. Who do you think taught Mr. Lay how to screw stockholders and consumers?

Eric, I am embarassed! I wish you could see how much I’m laughing right now. Yes, Frank Wolak did say that. And, you know, I do agree with his assessments, although I do view this as a failure at the market and regulatory levels (personally). So, you got me.

But I think if you continue to look into it, that you’ll see what I’m talking about. Yes, Enron employees did call power plants and physically tell them to shut their plants down so they could leverage the spot markets for higher prices. That actually did happen.

As for California’s demand on electricity, I think you’d be surprised there too. California’s demand over the last ten years has actually not increased that much because of the energy efficiency reforms they’ve enacted here. It’s the same reason we have less smog, although people burn more gas.

Anyway, as I said earlier, I’m not letting the U.N. get by (even though I think their corruption is low, as a whole). That being said, I do apologize for derailing the topic. It bugs me when people do that, and I apologize for doing it to your post.

Anyway more later, gotta turn in.

Nice debate!

Here’s California’s energy consumption and reserve:
http://www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/PEAK_DEMAND_AND_RESERVE.PDF

http://www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/us_percapita_electricity.html

http://www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/index.html#demand

Also, Wolak was referring to regulatory failure at FERC, not California.

As for “free market” systems, I think we both know that the market is incredibly complex, and, without our SEC regulatory boards, people would be harmed a lot more often. Wolak’s ideas are good, and they’re all about respecting the market, and making sure it will work for you and not against you (Because it is amoral. It’s not a magical place that assures you of the best price.)

There’s a story from 9/11, after the towers fell, about a firefighter going into a Starbucks to grab water for the guys who were working at Ground Zero. There was a bucket full of bottled water sitting in front of the counter. The prices had been jacked up to something like $10 a bottle. The firefighter said he’d pay the normal price $1.50, and the employee refused. “Free market”.

That’s what the system will do to you. The problem with electricity, is that it’s directly tied to economic success. You’ve got to, as a state, organize yourself so the market won’t take advantage of you. You have to plan ahead for the times when it will be easy for profiteers to gouge you.

So when I say “market failure” what I mean is, “The time when the market benefits the sellers so that they can rake in profits of a 1000%, at the suffering of others” Frank Wolak’s point is that the market is simply a system, and excessive profits are not a failure of that system. It depends on your perspective, I think.

When you say that the California system of purchasing is convoluted, you’re right. But the federal government required California to operate in a certain manner. California, during the crisis, tried to purchase in a smarter manner, and FERC prevented it from doing so. So there’s a lot more complexity there than you’re acknowledging.

Anyway, I’d appreciate it if you read more about it. I’d suggest reading articles that have come out in 2004 or more recently, because a lot of the “facts” in the old articles have been completely debunked. Then I’d compare the facts from individuals in the Enron documentary, to whatever FERC apologist articles you read, and you can decide who is telling the truth.

This is what I did, and the result was that I didn’t buy Gray Davis’s version of events or Dick Cheney’s version. When I looked at the raw data, and the raw facts, and then compared it to what people were saying at the time, and what people are saying now, it was Frank Wolak who appeared to get it right every time.

I did not know who Frank Wolak was, or draw my opinions from his writings. I studied the issue, drew my conclusions, then found Frank Wolak’s papers, and I said “Wow, this guy got it right when it was happening.”

To get back on subject:
As for the U.N., here is their response to your claims that they are a boondoggle:

http://www.un.org/geninfo/ir/ch5/ch5.htm
Quote:
While some achievements of the UN family are well known, many of them, which benefit people everywhere, are often taken for granted:

* The UN and its agencies have improved the health of millions – immunizing the world’s children, fighting malaria and parasitic disease, providing safe drinking water and protecting consumers’ health. As a result, longevity and life expectancy have increased worldwide.

* More international law has been developed through the UN in the past five decades than in the entire previous history of humankind.

* UN relief agencies together provide aid and protection to some 25.7 million refugees and displaced persons worldwide.

* The UN in 1948 formulated the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – an historic proclamation of the rights and freedoms to which all men and women are entitled. More than 80 UN treaties protect and promote specific human rights.

* The UN and its agencies, including the World Bank and the UN Development Programme (UNDP), are the premier vehicles for furthering development in poorer countries, providing assistance worth more than $30 billion a year.

* The UN has helped strengthen the democratic process by assisting elections in nearly 80 countries.

* UNDP is the UN system’s principal provider of advice, advocacy and grant support for development. With an annual expenditure of about $1 billion, UNDP supports many development projects worldwide.

* UN appeals raise over $1 billion a year for emergency assistance to people affected by war and natural disaster. In 2001 alone, 19 inter-agency appeals raised more than $1.4 billion to assist 44 million people in 19 countries and regions.

* The World Food Programme – the world’s largest food-aid organization – provides about one third of the world’s food aid each year.

* The UN was a promoter of the great movement of decolonization, which led to the independence of more than 80 nations.

* Smallpox was eradicated from the world through a campaign coordinated by the World Health Organization (WHO). Another WHO campaign, launched in 1988, aims to eliminate polio worldwide by 2005. In 1998, polio struck some 1,000 people per day in 125 countries. By 2001, there were only 537 cases for the entire year and the disease had been eliminated from all but 10 countries.

* Every year, up to 3 million children’s lives are saved by immunization, but almost 3 million more die from preventable diseases. UNICEF, WHO, the World Bank group, private foundations, the pharmaceutical industry and governments have joined in a Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization that aims to reduce that figure to zero.
—————————-

As for the building project, as an American remember:
1) We are loaning, not gifting the money.
2) The money is going to go to a construction project in New York City which is going to put a lot of money into the pocket of American workers, and boost the economy of New York, which still has fallout from 9/11
3) Let’s compare the renovation cost of the U.N. building to the renovation of the Truman Presidential library which was 2.8 billion. (which was raised through donations, so apparently the history of Truman is more important to us, than a working symbol of international solidarity)
4) And let’s not forget that the U.N. has to drastically upgrade the security of its building since it is in New York, and since it is the U.N.

On the U.N. perspective of things, however, a loan that they have to pay 90 million a year on, may not be the best. Purchasing a building may be a cheaper alternative, but it would certainly have to be outside of New York to be cheaper. And New York is certainly the ideal place to give a feeling of international solidarity with the United States. But if we are talking in terms of frugality, it’s not frugal.

The U.N. has done some good things, and some bad things.

How about the Oil-For-Food scandal.
Will the truth about that ever be known ?

But, the question is: Does the U.N. provide any net benefit to society ?

Personally, I think the U.N. has way too corrupt and irresponsible, and the money could be spent in much better ways.

d.a.n.,

Like renovating the Truman Library?

Also, a net benefit would be the eradicatin of polio in the Americas. (Central and South).

Also, another point on why it would be good for us to LOAN money for a U.N. building in New York:

* U.S. companies are consistently the largest sellers of goods and services to the UN. In 2001, companies from the United States earned $216 million through procurement done by UN Headquarters in New York – more than 25 per cent of total procurement.

**

So: 1.5 billion LOAN, payable back to us at about 90 million a year, plus setting up a building where our companies can get $216 million in contracts, and we’re arguing against this?

It’s definitely good for us!

What’s wrong with the building they have now ?
What’s up with the “Champagne taste” on a “beer pocket book” ?
They don’t need a new building.
That money would be better spent helping people.

And, why does the U.N. have to be in the U.S.
Can’t they move it somewhere else?
Iraq perhaps?

It was built in 1945, is filled with asbestos, and has been deemed hazardous by the state of New York.

As far as I understand, it’s still a very valuable peice of property, and if they upgrade it, they’ll still be able to make their money (plus some) if they sell it.

They have two major physical presences, one here, and one in Switzerland (I think it’s Switzerland… can’t remember). By having a presence in New York, they are accessible to an international group of people. Also, it makes it simple for Americans to get access to the U.N. procurement process, and to meet on big decisions. It’s convenient for members of other countries to travel there as well.

So, it’s not an idiotic idea. And, long term, it’s really a smart location for them. If they can figure out how to afford it, I’d agree that it’s the place they should be.

You have to think about the amount of money we spend on our embassies, and the reason we think it’s worthwhile to run those embassies. It’s the same logic.