Governments the world over have spent the last century-plus rigidly insisting that they can do…well, everything better than We the Peoples can. That private citizens, engaged in voluntary interactions amongst themselves – will only blow it. That government is required to run things – to ensure nothing goes sideways.
As the last century-plus has incessantly demonstrated – these governments couldn’t have been more wrong. The world allowed its governments to inexorably increase their roles – and everything they touched lurched wholly sideways.
We’ve certainly seen that here in the United States. Governments at all levels grew and grew – and things kept getting worse and worse. The federal government thought it could spend our money better than we can. And it is now $20 trillion in debt – while funding a series of “Feed the Pig” commercials lecturing us about the importance of saving.
The Feds thought they should get into the Individual Retirement Account (IRA) and medical insurance businesses. And now Social Security and Medicare are nearly $300 trillion short. Meanwhile, the Dow Jones just hit a record-high 20,000. And the Feds launched Obamacare – another assault on private medical insurance.
Did DC also decide to get into the energy business? Of course it did. And as with all things, it didn’t pick winners and losers – it picked losers at the expense of winners. Government long ago decided that actual sources of energy – coal, oil, natural gas – are evil. And subjected them to massive taxes and crushing regulations.
And decided to use the money they stole taxed away to prop up “green energy” – solar, wind, bio – which is actually neither green nor energy. In nigh every instance, “green energy” is worse for the environment – and produces next to no actual energy. And because it is energy-free “energy” – it can’t turn a profit. So it is perpetually suckling the government teat.
Thankfully-now-ex-President Barack Obama insisted that $80 billion for “green energy” be included in the disastrous $787 billion 2009 “Stimulus.” How’d that go? 80% of the coin went to Obama donors – who then almost immediately thereafter when bankrupt.
Yet somehow, governments everywhere learn…nothing. They remain steadfastly impervious to facts. Behold New York State – commandeering micro-control of nigh the entirety of its energy sector: “Governor Andrew Cuomo announced a unilateral mass expansion of government – in the name of fighting global warming…oops, I mean climate change: ‘The state’s Public Service Commission (PSC)…passed a new set of standards that by 2030 is supposed to ensure that half of New York’s energy needs are met by renewable methods, ranging from solar and wind, as well as hydro and nuclear power.’”
Get that? Half of the entire state’s energy – from fake energy. We’re all sure that’ll happen, right? But wait – included is nuclear. Which is actual energy – and clean at that. Except: “Cuomo, Inc. (will) shutdown…two Indian Point nuclear power plants…’The two reactors…provide about 25 percent of the electricity needed by New York City.’”
Thereby further exponentially increasing New York’s mandated reliance on fake energy. Which is a completely unreachable goal: “As of 2015, New York only generated 11% of its energy via renewables. A tally it has taken them decades – and tens of billions of subsidy dollars – to attain. And now they have mandated a nearly 500% increase – in only fifteen years. Predicated, again, upon energy sources that require massive, ongoing government cash infusions – and in most instances take more energy to produce than they provide.”
And how will Cuomo, Inc and his Empire State pay for all of this hot-and-cold-running rainbow? By fleecing the taxpayers, of course: “(T)he Public Service Commission (PSC) also included a new (energy) tax worth $8 billion.”
Get that? The unelected PSC unilaterally raised taxes by $8 billion – without any participation by the people’s elected officials in the state legislature. That’s not obnoxious at all.
And where is that massive, massively-fleeced coin going? In true Obama fashion – to a well-heeled Cuomo crony: “(The tax) money will go to (nuclear power) plant owner Exelon, a Chicago-based Fortune 100 company with annual revenues of over $34 billion.”
Sounds to me like the entire New York energy sector is about to go sideways. As inevitably happens whenever any government decides to get involved in anything to this degree. Because when government anywhere decides to be the first-last-and-only – We the Peoples inexorably end up with nothing. (See: Venezuela. And Cuba. And….)
New York needs to reverse course – by totally reversing Cuomo, Inc’s terrible fake energy plan. And reorient its efforts towards private sector, actual energy sources. Allow the people and their markets to decide – rather than the Albany government cabal.
The only thing the New York government should be doing at this point – is passing legislation to ensure that what Cuomo, Inc just did can never happen again.