USA Is the USA the worst nation to exist since classical times?

[Geelong_Sicko]

Here's a slice of life from Texas with regards to its deregulated, privatised energy sector. This is all kinds of f*cked up.

Texas power plants have no responsibility to provide electricity in emergencies, judges rule

A panel of judges has said that big power companies cannot be held liable for failure to provide electricity during the 2021 blackout. The reason is Texas’ deregulated energy market.

www.kut.org

December 15, 2023

Almost three years since the deadly Texas blackout of 2021, a panel of judges from the First Court of Appeals in Houston has ruled that big power companies cannot be held liable for failure to provide electricity during the crisis. The reason is Texas’ deregulated energy market.

The decision seems likely to protect the companies from lawsuits filed against them after the blackout. It leaves the families of those who died unsure where next to seek justice.

In February of 2021, a massive cold front descended on Texas, bringing days of ice and snow. The weather increased energy demand and reduced supply by freezing up power generators and the state’s natural gas supply chain. This led to a blackout that left millions of Texans without energy for nearly a week.

The state has said almost 250 people died because of the winter storm and blackout, but some analysts call that a serious undercount.

Within days of the storm, Texans affected by the failure of the energy system began filing lawsuits. Some of those suits were brought against power generators whose plants had stopped working in the storm or had run out of fuel to generate electricity.

After years of legal process, a three-judge panel convened to decide on the merits of those lawsuits.

This week, Chief Justice Terry Adams issued the unanimous opinion of that panel that “Texas does not currently recognize a legal duty owed by wholesale power generators to retail customers to provide continuous electricity to the electric grid, and ultimately to the retail customers.”

The opinion states that big power generators “are now statutorily precluded by the legislature from having any direct relationship with retail customers of electricity.”

The Texas energy market​

That legal separation of power generation from transmission and retail electric sales in many parts of Texas resulted from energy market deregulation in the early 2000s. The aim was to reduce energy costs.

Before deregulation, power companies were “vertically integrated.” That means they controlled generators, transmission lines and sold the energy they produced and transported directly to a regional customer base. Parts of Texas, like Austin, with publicly owned utilities still operate under such a system.

But in other parts of the state, deregulation broke up those regional energy monopolies, creating competing energy-generating companies and retail electric providers that buy power wholesale from generators and then re-sell it to residential consumers.

“One consequence of that was, because of the unbundling and the separation, you also don’t have the same duties and obligations [to consumers],” Tré Fischer, a partner with law firm Jackson Walker who represented the power companies told KUT.

“The structure just doesn't allow for that direct relationship and correspondingly a direct obligation to continually supply the electricity even if there's a natural disaster or catastrophic event,” he added...

What absolute evil. Privatisation of key infrastructure essential to modern life (such as energy production here in the above example) should be considered a crime against the People. We are NOT the United States here in Australia. The right to continuing public ownership of these essential utilities need to be enshrined in our Constitution. Those who threaten, or worse, enact legislation to visit the horror of unregulated free market capitalism on the People should lose their savings and their livelihoods.

Maybe life on the streets will make the fan of unregulated private market capitalism more humble.

 

[Spearman]

Texas is, and always been, brazen about their corruption and racism. For the most part, they will continue to vote for local R politicians because they think Ds are "commies, n****** lovers, trannies" etc. That would be the language they would use. They are models for other Americans who don't actually look past the tribalism to the actions the party they and theirs have always voted for, have done to them.
I've known some Texans, all good people. But even the ones who have voted D, they had conservative leanings.
I think politics, like religion, really preys on people's fears. Texans, being southerners, and borderers, have a fear of the dark masses in their cities or invading from Mexico; all fed by media. In discussions on immigration, Texas's location and the numbers that come across is a big thing on their minds, regardless of which way they swing politically.
And you know they fear the large black and brown populations in cities like Houston. That's what the gerrymandering and voter suppression laws are for. And its in the open, like the anti-abortion rulings recently.

 

[FredLeDeux]

Texas is, and always been, brazen about their corruption and racism. For the most part, they will continue to vote for local R politicians because they think Ds are "commies, n****** lovers, trannies" etc. That would be the language they would use. They are models for other Americans who don't actually look past the tribalism to the actions the party they and theirs have always voted for, have done to them.
I've known some Texans, all good people. But even the ones who have voted D, they had conservative leanings.
I think politics, like religion, really preys on people's fears. Texans, being southerners, and borderers, have a fear of the dark masses in their cities or invading from Mexico; all fed by media. In discussions on immigration, Texas's location and the numbers that come across is a big thing on their minds, regardless of which way they swing politically.
And you know they fear the large black and brown populations in cities like Houston. That's what the gerrymandering and voter suppression laws are for. And its in the open, like the anti-abortion rulings recently.

There are two ways you can upset a Texan (try them, they work)
1. Tell them their unofficial State song praises a half-caste whore who distracted the Mexican general while the Texan slavers snuck up through a swamp
2. Tell them the Alamo "heroes" (losers) were fighting to preserve slavery in Texas and the Mexicans were fighting to abolish it

 

[Seeds]

Here's a slice of life from Texas with regards to its deregulated, privatised energy sector. This is all kinds of f*cked up.



What absolute evil. Privatisation of key infrastructure essential to modern life (such as energy production here in the above example) should be considered a crime against the People. We are NOT the United States here in Australia. The right to continuing public ownership of these essential utilities need to be enshrined in our Constitution. Those who threaten, or worse, enact legislation to visit the horror of unregulated free market capitalism on the People should lose their savings and their livelihoods.

Maybe life on the streets will make the fan of unregulated private market capitalism more humble.

Its not that simple. While privatisation and deregulation has definately caused massive problems when it has been poorly implemented, overregulation has caused other major problems as well.

there also been times where public ownership and/or high regulation have resulted in ridiculously high costs and lack of innovation. When airlines were effectively publicaly controlled they were run so poorly run that only rich people could afford flights. a more recent example is the taxi industry which became so overregulated that innovation was impossible. The automated share riding passenger transport industry had to start from scratch from start ups with little capital when it should have evolved directly from the taxi industry itself and much more quickly. And lets not even look at australias public health system where people are waiting years for basic operations, wait times to see consultants are just at unacceptable levels for a modern society and rural regions cant attract doctors because the strict public wage system doesnt incentivise doctors to move rurally. And then there is the housing market where overegulation on what can be built or renovated has led to ridiculously high construction costs that has greatly impacted the expansion of housing supply. there is a balance between regulation and deregulation that gets the best outcomes and most importantly we need regulation that provides the right incentives and not poor incentives.

Regulation that makesures operators are providing the services in a timely and effective manner that most helps people at costs people can afford and in a way that doesnt prevent innovation when new technologies become available.

 

[Geelong_Sicko]

Oh there's definitely some middle ground to be found, Seeds. I agree a State-run monopoly won't feel the need to innovate and improve if its the only game in town. Mandatory KPIs could give the monopoly some impetus in that regard. The State is nothing without the People, and so ideally it is the State that should serve its constituents, not the People who end up slaving for the State which is unfortunately what has happened with so many centralised economies in the past.

Middle ground is the key.

 

[Blue1980]

I agree with a fair bit of this,

None of this is to say that the Soviet Union, China etc are/were the good guys.

There aren’t goodies and baddies, it’s self interest generally.

For example US helping Ukraine is the right moral stance, but one that fits into their self interest, they aren’t doing it out of some moral crusade.

This can be clearly seen with them letting Israel do whatever they want, because as explained in the video they’re a client state of the US.

 

[Seeds]

Here's a slice of life from Texas with regards to its deregulated, privatised energy sector. This is all kinds of f*cked up.



What absolute evil. Privatisation of key infrastructure essential to modern life (such as energy production here in the above example) should be considered a crime against the People. We are NOT the United States here in Australia. The right to continuing public ownership of these essential utilities need to be enshrined in our Constitution. Those who threaten, or worse, enact legislation to visit the horror of unregulated free market capitalism on the People should lose their savings and their livelihoods.

Maybe life on the streets will make the fan of unregulated private market capitalism more humble.

Privatisation of the generators wasnt what caused the blackouts. A lack of regulation and incentives to ensure there was sufficient excess capacity and incentives to generate was the problem. Its the government body co-ordinating the power systems whose responsbility it should be to ensure power is supplied to meet demand. Not individual generators.

the blame lays with the texas government.

blackouts exist in countries where power generators are publically owned by the way. public ownership is not a sufficient solution on its own to supply shortages

 

[Freomaniac]

Perpetrators and benefactors of the worst holocaust/genocide in recorded history.
Manifest Destiny is the inspiration for Lebensraum.

Chattel slavery. The worst form of slavery with 600,000 being bred like farm animals led to around 10 million people being dehumanised.

Haiti, the US fought against the slave revolt. Helping France enforce Haiti pay back the debts of their slave owners, now blown out to 21 bil.

Cuba, the US is continual interfering with and supportive of organised crime controlling it.

Stealing land from Mexico. While a European settler-colonial nation, genetically it is obvious that it is a majority first nations people. Who now are treated as foreigners in lands around the border.

Philipines. Imperialist conquering replete war crimes.

Latin America. Using covert and not so covert forces for the benefit of their elites to rob these nations of their natural resources. This, along with the war on drugs, has built long term political instability and many military-based fascist governments. Any attempt at socialism leads to a coup or aggressive financial/trade acts of war.

The middle-east. Also been operating with neo-colonialism in a similar way to Latin America.
Supports Israel, which would have been reigned in if it wasn't for their misuse of the UN veto.
Supporting Saudis who are the home and funding of Wahabism, which is perhaps the only human political philosophy worse than fascism.

Africa. Supported apartheid and other horror shows.

Vietnam.

Iraq.

Afghanistan.

War on terror - yet supporting Saudis.

Climate change.

Through all of their genocide and imperialism have gathered more wealth than any nation in history, yet have wealth distribution resembling a tinpot authoritarian nation.

World wide they have fought hard to interfere with any nation that seeks to distribute wealth and power fairly.

So many worry about China. However, we've been living through this nightmare. China is nothing to worry about in comparison.

Agreed on all points....

Any country that has Justin Beiber and Kim Kardashian as important figures needs to be nuked lol

 

[spinynorman]

Agreed on all points....

Any country that has Justin Beiber and Kim Kardashian as important figures needs to be nuked lol

A bit rough on Canada.

 

[Spearman]

was wondering how the hell immigration became such a hot topic in recent years, and heard some reports of how the GOP used to feel about it...
Just seems like one of those issues that has been chosen to be the sledgehammer after politicos saw how the French got off on it, and the Aussies, and some other countries right wingers.
Here are two reports from 2016 and 2017
This 1980 debate between Bush and Reagan sounds much different than today

This video of Ronald Reagan shows how much the Republican Party has changed on immigration

 

[ferball]

Should have posted this in here originally.

 

[leon123]

Its not that simple. While privatisation and deregulation has definately caused massive problems when it has been poorly implemented, overregulation has caused other major problems as well.

there also been times where public ownership and/or high regulation have resulted in ridiculously high costs and lack of innovation. When airlines were effectively publicaly controlled they were run so poorly run that only rich people could afford flights. a more recent example is the taxi industry which became so overregulated that innovation was impossible. The automated share riding passenger transport industry had to start from scratch from start ups with little capital when it should have evolved directly from the taxi industry itself and much more quickly. And lets not even look at australias public health system where people are waiting years for basic operations, wait times to see consultants are just at unacceptable levels for a modern society and rural regions cant attract doctors because the strict public wage system doesnt incentivise doctors to move rurally. And then there is the housing market where overegulation on what can be built or renovated has led to ridiculously high construction costs that has greatly impacted the expansion of housing supply. there is a balance between regulation and deregulation that gets the best outcomes and most importantly we need regulation that provides the right incentives and not poor incentives.

Regulation that makesures operators are providing the services in a timely and effective manner that most helps people at costs people can afford and in a way that doesnt prevent innovation when new technologies become available.

very difficult to privatise a monopolistic/oligopolistic type industry such as power, water production/distribution - that is also an essential service.

Banking, telecommunications, airlines - which can effectively be competitive ie private market very easy with appropriate regulation.

so the message above is yes it can work depending the composition of the industry and no, depending on the composition.

I have massively simplified, but thats the crux of it

 

[Carringbush2010]

Should have posted this in here originally.

Imagine if this guy was a Russian or Chinese criticizing communism, he'd be dead.

 

[ferball]

Imagine if this guy was a Russian or Chinese criticizing communism, he'd be dead.

Russia and China don't practise Communism. They're both capitalist economies and have been for this entire century.

But imagine if you actually listened to his comments instead of hiding from them with comments like that.

 

[barreness]

Imagine if this guy was a Russian or Chinese criticizing communism, he'd be dead.

Wait until you hear about this Y2K bug, supposed to hit in a decade ish

 

[barreness]

Russia and China don't practise Communism. They're both capitalist economies and have been for this entire century.

But imagine if you actually listened to his comments instead of hiding from them with comments like that.

Russia yeh, oligarchic capitalism like most of the west

China state capitalism. So according to Lenin this is a required step on the road to socialism, Mao thought he could skip a few of the steps and that didn't turn out so well. Does mean China can do a lot more within the financial system, corps have to cede to govt control, a lot more centrally controlled

Think a lot of people misunderstand Communism, It's the step after capitalism has industrialized your society, Marx was a classical economist after all.

Current Capitalism has been ruined by the failed neoclassical theorists. I think this is the major political divide in the west; Technocrats who are wrong and Populists who are fascist flogs

 

[Carringbush2010]

Russia and China don't practise Communism. They're both capitalist economies and have been for this entire century.

But imagine if you actually listened to his comments instead of hiding from them with comments like that.

What you've posted is not news, every dog and its leash knows the deplorable acts of the US in that video.

Seeing how there'll always be a dominant global policeman, what would be your preferred alternative?

 

[ferball]

What you've posted is not news, every dog and its leash knows the deplorable acts of the US in that video.

Seeing how there'll always be a dominant global policeman, what would be your preferred alternative?

Us. We've got Uranium.

 

[ferball]

Well that was just being flippant.

I'd prefer there wasn't one.

If you say there'll always be one you're trapping yourself into that belief system. Reality is there's only been one for thirty years and they ****ed it up royally. Before that there was no globally dominant power like the US over the last 35 years.

 

[Carringbush2010]

Us. We've got Uranium.

And how do you propose we become this dominant global policeman?

 

[Carringbush2010]

Well that was just being flippant.

I'd prefer there wasn't one.

If you say there'll always be one you're trapping yourself into that belief system. Reality is there's only been one for thirty years and they ****ed it up royally. Before that there was no globally dominant power like the US over the last 35 years.

You can delete this post if you like, but I've already copied it.

 

[ferball]

You can delete this post if you like, but I've already copied it.

What power solely dominated the world before 1990? Atlantis doesn't count.

 

[ferball]

And how do you propose we become this dominant global policeman?

By selling precursor chemicals.

 

[Carringbush2010]

What power solely dominated the world before 1990? Atlantis doesn't count.

Seriously? Have you ever heard of the british empire?

 

[Carringbush2010]

By selling precursor chemicals.

Going by that logic, no other nation will oppose us on our journey to just waltz in and declare ourselves as the dominant global policeman.

I'd stop digging now if I were you.