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Democrats are scurrying to make Davis look better in the face of the recall election. The Washington Post, for example, tries to absolve Davis of blame: legally impotent in the face of a great crisis, as they allege. Well, that is not much of an argument to keep him around, is it? Perhaps the writers at the Post have not thought that far ahead.

Specifically, the Washington Post tries to portray California Governor Gray Davis as a helpless pawn in the California energy debacle of 2000 and 2001. Their claim is that he was powerless to fight the twin evils of "deregulation" and "greedy corporations".

Their only problem, of course, is reality. In their own article they show that neither "deregulation" nor "greedy companies" were at fault. In the end, blame lies with the usual suspects in debacles this great: politicians. To show how this was the case, let's start with the first false claim, "deregulation".

The fact is that the California energy markets were not deregulated. The changes were simply a rewriting of regulations that left the state—not consumers—in control of how and when energy would be purchased. Not only that, but the rules were written in such a way that only a socialist could love: the highest bidder won the auction to supply energy, not the lowest bidder. This is the same as a single gas station stating that they would supply gas at $10 per gallon, and immediately forcing all gas stations in the state to sell gas at $10 per gallon. If the Washington Post really wanted to delve into the problem, they would find out how and why that rule was written in such a manner.

In addition to the above lunacy, the state agencies responsible for purchasing power could not buy long term contracts for power. Any economist will tell you that when you limit purchases to only the long term or short term you expose yourself to serious risk on prices. Again, what was the logic behind buying power a mere 24 hours before it was needed? Energy prices frequently spike during periods of high demand. With no long-term contracts to even out prices, California consumers would be subject to wild swings in prices even in the best of times.

The "greedy corporations" lie was exposed when the article noted that Duke Energy said that they tried to sell California 2,000 megawatts of electricity for $50 per megawatt hour, a fraction of the price that California would pay on the spot market. But the regulated state agencies responsible for buying power refused to sign a long term contract. Governor Davis and his gang of regulators all thought that "greedy corporations" were trying to trick them into signing agreements that would lock them into high prices for years. Again, the problem was short-sighted regulators and politicians, not the private sector.

Finally, all corporations involved were playing by the rules (regulations) written, passed and signed by California politicians. No one held a gun to California's head and told them to limit themselves to spot market purchases, agree to pay prices set by the highest bidder and to deny anyone but state agencies the power to purchase energy. Nor were "greedy corporations" or "deregulation" to blame when Davis ordered state agencies to buy huge amounts of power on the spot market (to "prevent blackouts") that later had to be resold for pennies on the dollar when it became obvious that consumers were never going to consume that quantity of power.

Placing blame for the debacle anywhere but at the feet of California politicians is ludicrous.

Once again we have to remind liberals (both politicians and journalists) that deregulation means you have fewer or no regulations, not "different" regulations. If consumers, whether on their own or through local co-ops had been able to compete for electricity, as they do in other states, then suppliers would have fought to have been the lowest cost provider, not the highest cost provider as they did in California.

Hopefully, the next governor of California will be smart enough to bring about real deregulation, and have enough integrity to accept the blame and/or credit for policies (s)he endorses. We can be sure that will never happen as long as Gray Davis and his apologists are around to point fingers at everyone except themselves.

A final question for critics of deregulation: if deregulation and greedy corporations were to blame, then why have no other states or regions had the problems that California had in 2000 and 2001?

Hint: because deregulation and private enterprise were not the problem! Only California had California politicians running things, and only California had problems of that magnitude.

...blame lies with the usual suspects in debacles this great: politicians.

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...the problem was short-sighted regulators and politicians, not the private sector.

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Placing blame for the debacle anywhere but at the feet of California politicians is ludicrous.

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Hopefully, the next governor of California will be smart enough to bring about real deregulation....