I swear to god.
I hope these useless motherfuckers from Enron die a slow and agonizing death.
We all knew this was going on, and we all screamed about it last year, we all knew that this deregulation of the power industry in California(pdf) was a BAD IDEA but those incompetent morons in the California legislature and that mouthbreather in the governor’s mansion didn’t do a damn thing about it.
You know what makes me so goddamn angry? “Kenny Boy” is such a close friend of “President” Bush, and Enron has bought so many members of Congress (You know, those people who are supposed to represent us in government?) not a damn thing will happen to him.
Me, and thousands of my fellow Californians will be paying for his hubris for DECADES, and he is going to walk.
Grrr.
If you’re interested, there’s lots more Enron info here, and here.
*whew*
Sorry. Got off on a bit of a rant there.
Hey, it happens.
129 thoughts on “Now I’m pissed”
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Wil, you run for Governor. Come on, take a stand and fix it! 🙂
*ding*
Spuds is smarter than most of the government officials.
*ding*
Spuds has a devoted following who miiiiight buy him some sushi if they had the chance, and weren’t mercilessly made fun of in the process.
*ding*
Spuds does all this whilst sitting on the toilet. Imagine what he could do in a real chair.
Wil, you’re absolutely right about these bastards. They should be strung up by the testicles and shipped to Afghanistan.
SPimpernel, you rock! Thanks for a great post and some dandy links.
[bandwagon]
Spudnuts, you da man!
[/bandwagon]
😉
~j
Did anyone else notice that the price gouging shenanigans started just a week after the supreme court negated the constitution and apointed a
shadow president?
I saw on the corporate owned news(tm) channels
that it was all due to the tree hugging deregulating fairies and their oh so festive christmas lights.
let me bash a few really stupid lies that the trillionaires would have you believe:
If you give a rich man money he will give a poor man a job.
Bullshit he will send it to a bank in allied country and pay no tax on it while earning interest.
#2 I am wealthy and you work for the minimum wage
because you are hopeless sinner and GOD loves me more!
Bullshit! I dont recall one chapter or verse where
that was in the Bible,do you?
#3 Liberals are anti-military and Anti-coorporation.
B.S! It is just that the rightwingers are pro military contractor,notice that our fighting men
only got the summary 7% raise they get anually
not the relief that our AWOL in the national guard
prez promised.Also note that the bush empire owns
substantial holdings in the major defense contractors.(Go go gadget star wars!:)
These are just a few.how many more can you think of? Discuss!
Spud,
You set up the paypal site and I bet you a dollar you’ll make a dollar.
(of course, there’s no way I can lose this one.)
KJB said:
>> Spuds is smarter than most of the government officials.
We are so fucked.
>>Wil, you’re absolutely right about these bastards. They should be strung up by the testicles and shipped to Afghanistan.
I like the testicles part, but shipping them to Afghanistan… I guess it depends on who finds them first. Hopefully the innocent civilians that we’ve been bombing to hell and starving the rest will find them and eat them. But they could manage to make connections with ex-Taliban people (Afghanistan is currently ruled by various crime bosses, since there’s no peace-keeping force policing anything; some Al-Qaida and Taliban types have surely hooked up with these gangs). In which case they’d be treated just swell I imagine.
Some questions keep arising in my aching head: is it coincidence that our government trained the Al Qaida leadership? That our government has given millions in aid to the oppressive Taliban, somewhat-allies of Al Qaida, as long as they suppressed opium production in War Against Drugs(TM)? That a group of representatives of American oil interests were in discussions with Taliban officials mere days before 9/11 about constructing oil pipelines through Afghanistan? That our own Vice-President is CEO of a major oil company that was almost certainly represented at these meetings, and that he, Cheney, has refused to hand over minutes from these meetings? Is it coincidence that the Bush and Bin Laden families (the latter of which is huge, and should not be connected so easily with the doings of one crazed family member) have been investment buddies for decades? And that the day after 9/11, no planes were allowed to fly in the US, except for one – by Dubya’s order, a US government plane which flew about the country picking up Bin Laden family members, for their own protection supposedly, and allowing them to leave the country, before they could be questioned.
Kenny Boy, who suddenly became “that Mr. Lay” had an office in the Dubya White House. Michael Moore did some excellent research on his odd position there, as basically an unofficial cabinet member with veto power over potential appointments unfriendly to what he was doing – and this was long before any of the Enron scandal blew up. With all this crap being shot about, and it all having to do with the oil industry, and the private interests of our elected leaders, and the corporations which elected them… it’s not hard to get suspicious and realize that, even though we might not have the details we’d like, some major poo has been going down. And still, ordinary people in the U.S. will be the ones unwittingly stuck holding the plunger.
For tons about Enron, definitely read Michael Moore’s book “Stupid White Men,” as well as his website, which others here have mentioned.
Is there a big difference between the Democrats and Republicans? In my mind the rhetoric of the Democrats is more lefty, but their actions are generally all the same; heck, Gore is a great example – his senatorial environmental record is among the worst, and under Clinton, they friggin’ wrecked environmental laws even more than Reagan/Bush. They’re all bought and paid for by the same corporations. Maybe the Republicans are more brazen in trying to get away with such massive bs, while Clinton was more slick and only got nailed for lovin’ da oralizing.
Someone mentioned mock-shock at the thought that we train terrorists here in the US… hey, we’re the only country in the world to ever be officially accused of and condemned for terrorism by the United Nations. The United States government is the single greatest terrorist organization on the planet by far, by our own definition of terrorism. We’ve been killing innocent Afghanis (as well as some not-so-innocent ones) and creating conditions to basically make thousands into starving refugees that are trapped in their own borders, at the mercy of horrible weather/lack of shelter and food/merciless gangs. Meanwhile the Pentagon insanely announces they’re hoping to begin an invasion of Iraq this summer. It’s a lot like a big movie franchise: the US public liked the first one so much (gauged by supposedly high numbers for Bush’s approval ratings), let’s do another! It only costs $30 billion a day. Think of how much expendable military wares we’ll be able to order from Lockheed Martin. With all the stock we own in them, we’ll be billionaires ourselves soon!
Unless we’re dead of course – how amazing that the Pentagon, center of military intelligence (insert classic well-worn funny here), rules against the element of surprise and announces well in advance the impending invasion of Iraq. If I was the leader of Iraq, I’d consider it as: hm, well they seem set on invading, what to do? Guess I might as well attack! Gee, think we’ll get any more terrorist attacks in the near future?
My advice: become a shut-in. Wear a gas mask 24/7. Shoot on sight all mail carriers that attempt to deliver you things. Board up your windows! Hide in the bathtub with a loaded rifle pointed at the door, and take No-Doz so you don’t have to sleep! When the men in white show up, remember! They are potentially food!
Oh man… did I go off on a rant again? Sorry.
More swearing! Less politics!
That’s all I have to say.
Well, actually, I was going to say something about Wil being the new Eminem, but on hindsight I’m glad I didn’t.
The real problem was that it was RE-regulation, and not truly DE-regulation.
Oh… and while I didn’t vote for Bush (http://www.harrybrowne2000.org/) he really did win the election. Even if Gore had had his way, and all the hanging, dimpled, beaten, maimed, and riduculed ‘chads’ had been counted, Bush still would have won the election – even the most Liberal of newspapers’ studies said so. He may not be a very GOOD President, but he is President.
Hey Bob, what about all the illegally / wrongfully removed names from the voter rolls [nation wide]. Plus, I always (innocently) considered elections to be about “one man, one vote”. Leave it to good ol’ GW to remind us against that delusion. Hopefully, next time Blacks will be allowed to vote – and guaranteed, the elderly Jews will bring their magnifying glasses to the polls next time.
>>Oh… and while I didn’t vote for Bush he really did win the election… even the most Liberal of newspapers’ studies said so.
Liberal papers like the Washington Post, NY Times, Newsweek etc.? They said otherwise – if all votes were counted, Gore would have won. Even if you count the totally suspect Bush votes (which were indeed counted, against Florida state law) that were mailed in without the proper signatures originally requesting the absentee voting cards. Even if you ignore the many people who were intimidated away from even voting.
Katherine Harris and the Supreme Court handed the election to Bush. The Bush camp knew they might lose if the recount was allowed to continue; only the power of the Court could save him. Bush didn’t win the popular vote, and he shouldn’t have won the electoral vote if things were done fairly. But there were a whole variety of unfair factors in play in Florida, the crucial one being that Bush had the connections.
Wil —
The problem lies not with Enron in this case, but with the clowns in the legislature that set up the deregulation scheme. They put caps on how much the companies could charge. As costs of production went up, they were stuck charging the consumer the same rate. They were fucked from the beginning.
If anyone in the California Legislature knew anything about market economics, they could have predicted the debacle.
I’m not saying that Enron is not guilty of anything — by all means, they’re scumbags. But in this case, I’d point the finger (the middle one) at Grey Davis and the Legislature. What fucktards.
If you don’t like what Enron did in California, go dig up what they’ve been doing in India. Raised the price of energy so much on a state contract (I forget which state) that it was cheaper for the state to generate its own energy AND pay exorbitant fees to Enron for the privelege of NOT buying their energy. WOW.
Dan Gillmor’s current column addresses this issue quite well:
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/business/columnists/dan_gillmor/3218620.htm
“For all this, it’s vital to remember that the fleecing of California in 2000 and 2001 didn’t just happen because of some corporate malfeasance and federal nonfeasance, no matter how much we might like to think so. California itself bears much of the responsibility, starting with the bogus but ballyhooed deregulation.”
For yet another business/government scandal in California, see this link:
http://216.26.163.62/2002/mc05_08.html
Down Here on the Gulf Coast Power is Cheap, We drill for Oil around Here.
You dont mind burning up the fuel out there but dont want to drill for it in your own back yard.
If you worked in a marble factory, wouldnt your kids have plenty of marbles?
Unfortunately, Enron has done a few things lately that would cause for suspicion of MASS LUNACY among other things. For instance, their corporate management decided it would be “cost effective” to make all of its employees trade their 401K for Enron stock. Employees were insured that they’d make more money once the stocks went up however most of those employees were “let go” before they had the chance to get back even half of what was traded. From what I seem to recall there are a few law suits being filed but nothing is for certain. I have a feeling that Enron will eventually sink into its own (giggle) “debts” and before too long there will be no need for concern with the company getting what it deserves. Their largest and most critical pains will more than likely be self inflicted anyway (Karma isn’t a very forgiving soul especially with those who tempt her more than once.)
~*
Oh! and Xorro… Dude… Lay off fairies! OK? =) Love those winged creatures! (I know what you meant.)
I want to respond to the often-heard complaint “oh, it wasn’t *real* deregulation, *real* deregulation would have gotten us all milk and cookies.”The price caps were included in the deregulation plan by request of the power companies themselves, as part of a temporary transition to open pricing. They were intended as a floor, to guarantee a continuous level of profit, since they were afraid of their margins disappearing entirely in the newly competitive environment. In effect, they were a contract with the people of California to provide energy at a certain price. The fact that it there will always be a distribution bottleneck in energy at various strategic points is the fact that an Enron can then manipulate the ensuing energy markets.
Public energy has a very good history of being efficient and affordable. Los Angeles does not have a history of expensive power or blackouts – indeed, the lights stayed on in those parts of the state that had local public power. Free markets work great for consumer electronics and in other markets of desireable non-essentials with few externalities and without controllable bottlenecks, where delivery of service is less time urgent. One of the many elements that is always left out by the “free market will solve it all” crowd is time. Time to respond to increases in demand, time between investment and profit, time for all the irregularities to work out. (Plus the fact that a rational agent in a market has a geometrically decreasing interest in long-term profits versus short-term profits, if they can achieve any liquidity – this is why an unregulated market will not protect the environment.) There’s a couple Keynes quotes that are appropriate: “markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent,” and “in the long run, we’re all dead.”
1) Dereg was only a bad idea becuase the pols in California only went part way. They dereg’d the wholesale side, but wouldn’t let the market determine consumer prices.
2) Enron may be guilty, but what does Bush have to do with it? Clinton certainly gave them more favors than the Bush Admin (the India deal, etc.) Seems to me the Enron collapse thing went public in large part to the Bush Admin’s position on the issue. And the California debacle was not primarilly on Jorge’s watch.
3) “President”? The major news outlets in the country concluded that Bush won FLorida. And lest you forget, tens of thousands of people were shown to have voted in BOTH New York and Florida in 2000 — the vast, vast majority from Democratic strongholds.
Wil, I agree with you that the Enron boys probably need top get strung up. I agree that CA was reamed by it’s own Governor and legislature — GOP and DEM alike.
But hey, keep your eye on the ball. When you start dragging your other perceived “bogeymen” into the mix, you make your argument a whole lot weaker.
All that being said, the Blog is always a good read. Keep it up.
Hi, David Johnson – you sound like a nice enough chap, but you’re just wrong about the Calif. dereg. In fact, the “limit” on consumer prices was an agreement made by the power companies to provide power at that rate. Essentially, it was a contract, for a fixed amount of time. Just like it’s possible in virtually any private contract, their costs rose (due to Enron’s kibbitzing, largely) after the ink was signed. What happened was that Enron engineered good old-fashioned price-fixing with a high-tech twist – which is something that even Adam Smith warned against.
Wil, I liked you as Wesley Crusher and as a person you seem very bright. But I know you’ve been through the Hollywood system, and it’s not exactly an unbiased arena to work in, politically. So I forgive you for sounding “left-of-center” on a number of things, especially when it comes to energy policy and environmentalism.
I do like the fact that you seem more independent-minded (saying you won’t vote for Davis), but saying you won’t give Bill Simon a chance is pretty much a waste of your vote. Third parties are useless, in my opinion. I think Bush has done better than the media thought he could.
Can’t wait to see you in Nemesis!
Your conservative Trekker fan, Jacob
melodyca, you moron. Californians did not vote for energy deregulation. Corporations used their puppets (politicians) to pass it through the legislature and good ol’ former Gov. Pete Wilson signed it into law. The thanks go to our corporate masters and their puppets (the Democratic and Republican parties).
You are not alone.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/
“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety”
Benjamin Franklin
Nice Post.
It is the same story in Ontario Canada which is following in California’s footsteps.
You can get the latest Canadian information on a site’s Ontario Hydro electricity page
http://www.geocities.com/torontotenants/ontariohydro.html
To date I have proposed, and must be asserted during the time (1946-63) of President Truman, ab uptly aborted. My unique successes as a situation of great urgency, we do, protectionist system of sovereign nation-state economies from that I sincerely respect your life will be transformed. FOREV!
The crux of the matter to be secure against global tyranny of the original intention of many of the planet into a general, global economic breakdown – crisis, affectin every single time. I’ve worked hard and struggled all the similar things I’ve thrown in the name to the world has now entered the terminal phase of that presently doomed world economy.
Mark V. Shaney