Deinonychus antirrhopus

Gray Davis: Bald Faced Liar

In a speech the other day at UCLA Davis told an outright lie to his audience,

Let's first talk about energy. I know many of you feel that I was too slow to act during the energy crisis.

I got your message and I accept that criticism. I played the hand I was dealt as best I could. I inherited the energy deregulation scheme which put all of us at the mercy of the big energy producers.

We got no help from the federal government. In fact, when I was fighting Enron and the other energy companies, these same companies were sitting down with Vice President Cheney to draft a national energy strategy.

Actually, when the crisis reached noticable proportions, the year was 2000 and President Clinton was...well President, Al Gore and George Bush were still slugging it out one the campaign trail, and the month was August. The crisis reached international proportions in November and December and Clinton was still President and Bush was the President elect.

While there may have been meetings between Bush, Cheney and various energy company executives there would not and could not have been any policy changes at the federal level unitl February, 2 or so months away.

The help at the federal level that Davis talks about came under Bush's Presidency and whatever the results of the meetings between energy executives and Cheney, they had yet to take effect.

Three years ago, I refused to give in to the pressure to raise rates astronomically. Everyone I talked to said "raise rates, raise rates, raise rates." I would not do it. And I also couldn't let our homes, our businesses, our schools go dark. So I went to work, bought power, built new plants, encouraged conservation for the good people of this state and encouraged the use of clean energy.

And in the end the rates went up an astronomical amount and due to the utter ineptitude by Davis, they will likely stay high to pay for the over priced long term contracts he bought. If he had raised rates there would have been an immediate demand response from large power customers, and later from smaller customers. The problems of shortages would have largely alleviated and the state wouldn't have had to enter into the long term contracts.

My friends, last Friday, 50 million Americans lost electricity for 29 hours. In California, not a single light has gone out in the last two years.

Is this one a lie? Well I guess that depends on what he means by lights going out. In CA there was at least one Stage two emergency where interruptible firms had their service interrupted.

I'm not looking for praise. We made our share of mistakes. And, like you, I wish I had known then all I know now. But my friends, if any of the Republicans in this recall campaign criticized the way we dealt with the energy crisis, you ask them specifically what they would have done to keep the lights on.

How about allow the retail rate to fluctuate as market conditions warrant? Gee, that was easy.

Call me old fashion, and I am. Call me old fashion, but I believe when an election is over, the people have spoken and it's time to get to work and do the public's business.

What an arrogant ass. Sure the people spoke, of course you were saying the budget was going to be $12 billion, but it then blossoms into a $38 billion deficit.

Here's a little history. The California State Controller, Kathleen Connell, warned early on in 2002 that the deficit was looking like it was going to be $8 billion. Davis, through one of his creatures, Steve Maviglio, throws some dirt on her,

"Kathleen Connell has proved herself wrong in projecting just about everything about the state's financial situation," he told the Los Angeles Times. "We expect this pattern to continue." The controller, whose job entails writing checks to cover state expenses, said the budget that Davis proposed this month overestimates the amount of tax money flowing to Sacramento by about $1.4 billion, and underestimates an array of costs, including those for public schools.

In a way, Maviglio was right in that Connell was wrong. She was wildly too optimistic. Davis ended up running up a huge deficit.

Here is Connell's take on the budget Davis just signed. There is this article as well from the Reason Public Policy Institute. It points out that any state government spending that exceeds 6.2% of personal incomes is unsustainable, and that if Davis had frozen spending at that level when he came into office we'd have no deficit.

Now, let me crystal clear here. Pegging spending to 6.2% of personal income does not mean that speding is held constant. As personal income goes up, so does spending. And personal income does indeed tend to go up.

The recall in the state must go forward, and Davis should be kicked out of office for being grossly incompetent and an outright liar.

Posted by Steve at August 20, 2003 01:36 PM