The Next President is...

[jazzdude]

It's not hypocrisy if you're not doing something that you said others shouldn't be doing. California has had rolling blackouts for decades, as far back as I can remember. Texas had them once during a once in a generation storm. Not much of a parallel.
 
Words matter.
 
And I actually just listened to Crenshaw's podcast on the power crisis. The fact that wind turbines freeze is not the problem. The fact that they get preferential selling priority on the grid is.
 
For all the ceaseless babbling about renewable energies and the green new deal, no one on the left seems interested in discussing exactly how renewable energy would have made the Texas power crisis better. Spoiler alert, it wouldn't.

You're right, renewable energy would not have fixed Texas' current problem.

You know what would? Regulating the power industry to handle extreme events with historical precedence. Just because it's once in a lifetime doesn't mean it's should be a surprise when it happens, that's why we study history and keep records. What Texas did was ignore history (including recent outages due to cold in 2011) to minimize short term costs.

Even preferential selling priority for wind power is good and very rational from a grid design standpoint: wind power can not be easily stored with current technologies, so it's use it or lose it. Unlike fossil fuels or nuclear power generation, where you can store the energy in the fuel itself by not consuming the fuel. So you *actively* manage the grid to take advantage of the strengths and benefits of each power source.

Even if Texas had zero renewable energy sources, they'd still be in the situation they are now, because they failed to make infrastructure investments.

And yes, California has problems too, and needs to address them.

[Breckey]

1 hour ago, Lord Ratner said:

It's not hypocrisy if you're not doing something that you said others shouldn't be doing. California has had rolling blackouts for decades, as far back as I can remember. Texas had them once during a once in a generation storm. Not much of a parallel.

This same thing happened 10 years ago and no changes were made.

Texas grid fails to weatherize, repeats mistake feds cited 10 years ago (houstonchronicle.com)

[SurelySerious]

4 minutes ago, jazzdude said:

 

You're right, renewable energy would not have fixed Texas' current problem.

You know what would? Regulating the power industry to handle extreme events with historical precedence. Just because it's once in a lifetime doesn't mean it's should be a surprise when it happens, that's why we study history and keep records. What Texas did was ignore history (including recent outages due to cold in 2011) to minimize short term costs.

Even preferential selling priority for wind power is good and very rational from a grid design standpoint: wind power can not be easily stored with current technologies, so it's use it or lose it. Unlike fossil fuels or nuclear power generation, where you can store the energy in the fuel itself by not consuming the fuel. So you *actively* manage the grid to take advantage of the strengths and benefits of each power source.

Even if Texas had zero renewable energy sources, they'd still be in the situation they are now, because they failed to make infrastructure investments.

And yes, California has problems too, and needs to address them.

 

These are all good considerations. One of their nuclear plants had a sensor freeze and shut it off from the grid; colder parts of the country have nuclear plants that continue to run during winter weather, so it seems cost-saving infrastructure shortcuts were taken in design which was the real limfac. 

[Lord Ratner]

35 minutes ago, jazzdude said:

 

It's it wrong he's being criticized? Nope. Does he deserve it? Irrelevant question, he's a public figure, and people are going to chuck spears if his actions don't align with their beliefs. Doesn't mean he has to respond.

The notion of "valuing the American family" is vague to begin with. We'd have to define and agree on what valuing family means, because there are lots of different meanings for it, based on how you were raised, religion, culture, location, etc.

How do you feel about people that manage to find a way to dodge deployments at the last minute? Arguably, that's the right thing to do for their family. Conversely, does that also mean someone that goes on a deployment does not value their family?

What about AF generals telling pilots to go ahead and quit because you're replaceable...I mean, that was true until it wasn't, but doesn't mean it's a good leadership policy to say that publicly.

Plus, Cruz could've done both (take care of his family, while giving at least the appearance of working), and pulled his family up to DC.

Symbolism and symbolic acts are important within societies/communities; it reflects what is valued in that society/community.

Look at graduation ceremonies-there's no reason to do them except for the symbolic act of receiving a piece of paper and being publicly recognized for earning that piece of paper. But that paper does not grant you any knowledge you don't already have, nor any new skill. And your family/friends likely would've already been involved in your work towards earning that piece of paper, so it's not me information to them.

We can have and should expect both, leaders who value their family, but also understands the importance of symbolic acts in public leadership and governance.

Optics also matter, since there's already a general sense of distrust in government and that our elected leaders are in a different class than the common person.

 

Mostly false parallels here.

It is absolutely wrong that he's being criticized. He is a federal official that has *nothing* to do with the power crisis in Texas, and other than getting an emergency declared, which he did, he's useless.

 

When exactly would you like our politicians to spend time with their families? When they're needed most, or when they are not? Ted Cruz is not the leader of Texas. If Abbott had run away to Mexico we'd have a very different conversation.

 

Dodging a deployment? That's your parallel? Do better. No one had to be there in Ted's absence, hell the reduced power usage from his family leaving marginally *helps* the crisis. 

 

Generals telling people to quit? What on Earth does that have to do with anything? 

 

Acting like "giving the appearance of working" is somehow a virtue is *exactly* the problem I'm identifying.

 

If you want a military analogy that actually applies, how about the generals that expect their staff to stay at the office till 8pm even when they could get some of that work done at home, with their families? How do we feel about that?

 

Saying that "symbolism matters" implies that *all* symbolism matters. It does not. A graduation ceremony recognizes a particular accomplishment of individuals to the people who care. If I forced you to go to my cousin's graduation, would the symbolism matter to you then?

 

We can and should expect our leaders to be where they are needed, when they are needed. We should stop pretending like our government officials are supposed to be superhuman public servants. 

 

For the people, *by* the people. Regular citizens engaging in the practice of self governance. We need to stop holding them to a higher standard than we hold ourselves to. 

 

This is just a case of people not liking the person first, and finding reasons second. It was nonsense when conservatives did it to Obama for golfing, it's nonsense now.

Edited February 19, 2021 by Lord Ratner

[Lord Ratner]

11 minutes ago, jazzdude said:

 

You're right, renewable energy would not have fixed Texas' current problem.

You know what would? Regulating the power industry to handle extreme events with historical precedence. Just because it's once in a lifetime doesn't mean it's should be a surprise when it happens, that's why we study history and keep records. What Texas did was ignore history (including recent outages due to cold in 2011) to minimize short term costs.

Even preferential selling priority for wind power is good and very rational from a grid design standpoint: wind power can not be easily stored with current technologies, so it's use it or lose it. Unlike fossil fuels or nuclear power generation, where you can store the energy in the fuel itself by not consuming the fuel. So you *actively* manage the grid to take advantage of the strengths and benefits of each power source.

Even if Texas had zero renewable energy sources, they'd still be in the situation they are now, because they failed to make infrastructure investments.

And yes, California has problems too, and needs to address them.

 

That's all well and good, except the most regulated parts the the country still have grid failures. 

 

This is where conservatives start talking themselves into knots. Do I want my power costs to go up so I can avoid a blackout every one or two decades? No thanks. I'll spend a few hundred bucks on a generator.

 

Obviously ERCOT fucked up. But the measure of a fuck up is not how far it is from the perfect hypothetical. It's how far it is from other functioning systems. By that measure, not much to see here.

 

We don't need government regulation to weather proof a nuclear reactor sensor that government wouldn't have caught beforehand anyways. That sensor will never freeze again, no red tape required.

 

The beautiful thing about government is they can blame failures (that government also failed to recognize) on a lack of government. Then they claim the addition of government, not the usual process of identifying a new problem and solving it, was what prevented a reoccurrence.

[ViperMan]

9 minutes ago, Lord Ratner said:

It is absolutely wrong that he's being criticized. He is a federal official that has *nothing* to do with the power crisis in Texas, and other than getting an emergency declared, which he did, he's useless.

When exactly would you like our politicians to spend time with their families? When they're needed most, or when they are not? Ted Cruz is not the leader of Texas. If Abbott had run away to Mexico we'd have a very different conversation.

Yep. It's misdirected fire. Invalid at pickle. And this is coming from someone who thinks Ted Cruz is basically a schmuck.

[Swamp Yankee]

4 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

It's not hypocrisy if you're not doing something that you said others shouldn't be doing. California has had rolling blackouts for decades, as far back as I can remember. Texas had them once during a once in a generation storm. Not much of a parallel.

 

Words matter.

 

And I actually just listened to Crenshaw's podcast on the power crisis. The fact that wind turbines freeze is not the problem. The fact that they get preferential selling priority on the grid is.

 

For all the ceaseless babbling about renewable energies and the green new deal, no one on the left seems interested in discussing exactly how renewable energy would have made the Texas power crisis better. Spoiler alert, it wouldn't.

You've got to be kidding me.  Words do matter.  This is a textbook example of hypocrisy.  Cruz ridiculed California's  energy planning and his state was equally unprepared.  How many times it happened in one state versus another is immaterial.  Even Cruz himself acknowledges this. 

I've listened very closely to Dan Crenshaw in particular as I think (thought) that he has the potential to be a great President.  He focused on wind turbine icing as if it is an inevitable problem and a major factor in the grid collapse.  Icing is easily addressed.  In my view he's trying to score some easy, though inaccurate, points with his base.

I encourage you to be objective rather than just reflexively supporting "your guy" as the first instinct.  Politicians don't deserve blind loyalty.   Hence why I'm an independent.  Politicians have to earn every one of my votes.  

 

 

[17D_guy]

3 hours ago, ViperMan said:

Yep. It's misdirected fire. Invalid at pickle. And this is coming from someone who thinks Ted Cruz is basically a schmuck.

 

3 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

That's all well and good, except the most regulated parts the the country still have grid failures. 

 

This is where conservatives start talking themselves into knots. Do I want my power costs to go up so I can avoid a blackout every one or two decades? No thanks. I'll spend a few hundred bucks on a generator.

 

Obviously ERCOT fucked up. But the measure of a fuck up is not how far it is from the perfect hypothetical. It's how far it is from other functioning systems. By that measure, not much to see here.

 

We don't need government regulation to weather proof a nuclear reactor sensor that government wouldn't have caught beforehand anyways. That sensor will never freeze again, no red tape required.

 

The beautiful thing about government is they can blame failures (that government also failed to recognize) on a lack of government. Then they claim the addition of government, not the usual process of identifying a new problem and solving it, was what prevented a reoccurrence.

It's good to see you've figured out how to log out of one account and back in with the other so quickly. 

Politicians could learn from you.

[17D_guy]

49 minutes ago, Swamp Yankee said:

You've got to be kidding me.  Words do matter.  This is a textbook example of hypocrisy.  Cruz ridiculed California's  energy planning and his state was equally unprepared.  How many times it happened in one state versus another is immaterial.  Even Cruz himself acknowledges this. 

I've listened very closely to Dan Crenshaw in particular as I think (thought) that he has the potential to be a great President.  He focused on wind turbine icing as if it is an inevitable problem and a major factor in the grid collapse.  Icing is easily addressed.  In my view he's trying to score some easy, though inaccurate, points with his base.

I encourage you to be objective rather than just reflexively supporting "your guy" as the first instinct.  Politicians don't deserve blind loyalty.   Hence why I'm an independent.  Politicians have to earn every one of my votes. 

Plus, the fact he lied again about how long he was going to be gone, and said it was his kids fault.
 

Quote

Ted Cruz is not the leader of Texas

Oh, good. I thought he was a US Senator or some other kind of leader. Tons of those in TX.  Not like he could organize help in his neighborhood/city (instead of planning to flee for a week while leaving the dog), or raise some funds to help those who'll have massive bills coming, or home repairs.

Nope, only thing he could do as "just a normal guy with a pretty bland, do nothing job."

Quote

No thanks. I'll spend a few hundred bucks on a generator.

Pray tell what you're going to do when you run out of gas.

Yep, nothing could be done in this situation. Just gotta deregulate more, and disconnect from the power grid...more?  Didn't work for El Paso at all.

[ViperMan]

18 minutes ago, 17D_guy said:

It's good to see you've figured out how to log out of one account and back in with the other so quickly.

🖕

Not Lord Ratner, but I do like his style. Whatever.

[kaputt]

On the California vs Texas energy deals:

As someone who has lived in both states, they are not even comparable. California has rolling blackouts every single summer for predictable and annual heat waves. You literally have to factor the power going out into your summer planning here. Texas had an energy issue for a once in 80-100 year cold snap.  
 

Could Texas have been better prepared? Absolutely. Has Cruz made a fool of himself during this, yes. Is comparing the Texas snow storm power issue to the decades of power grid mismanagement in California fair? Not really. 

 

Edited February 20, 2021 by kaputt
Typos

[Pooter]

3 hours ago, kaputt said:

On the California vs Texas energy deals:

As someone who has lived in both states, they are not even comparable. California has rolling blackouts every single summer for predictable and annual heat waves. You literally have to factor the power going out into your summer planning here. Texas had an energy issue for a once in 80-100 year cold snap.  
 

Could Texas have been better prepared? Absolutely. Has Cruz made a fool of himself during this, yes. Is comparing the Texas snow storm power issue to the decades of power grid mismanagement in California fair? Not really. 

 

Shack. This isn't an us vs. them debate because the situations aren't even remotely the same. I lived in Del Rio for five years and saw probably three snow flurries in that time. 6 inches of snow and a week of single digit deep freeze is absolutely unthinkable for most of the state. 
 

Meanwhile, California's power grid shits the bed most summers due to completely standard hot weather.  If there were routine rolling blackouts in Texas in the summer, the situations would be analogous, but that isn't a thing.

 

I'd love to see what would happen to LA if they got six inches of snow.. likely hundreds if not thousands of deaths, complete grid failure, and almost certainly a few decades worth of shitty climate change documentaries.

[Lord Ratner]

5 hours ago, 17D_guy said:

 

It's good to see you've figured out how to log out of one account and back in with the other so quickly. 

Politicians could learn from you.

Huh? Is my sarcasm detector inop or did you suddenly become an idiot?

[Prosuper]

2 hours ago, Pooter said:

Shack. This isn't an us vs. them debate because the situations aren't even remotely the same. I lived in Del Rio for five years and saw probably three snow flurries in that time. 6 inches of snow and a week of single digit deep freeze is absolutely unthinkable for most of the state. 
 

Meanwhile, California's power grid shits the bed most summers due to completely standard hot weather.  If there were routine rolling blackouts in Texas in the summer, the situations would be analogous, but that isn't a thing.

 

I'd love to see what would happen to LA if they got six inches of snow.. likely hundreds if not thousands of deaths, complete grid failure, and almost certainly a few decades worth of shitty climate change documentaries.

In Oklahoma we had cold like this back in 83 but not the snow, we had rolling blackouts for one day and businesses shutdown exterior lighting. This is our first time that I can remember us having snow on top of snow followed by a week long cold snap. Usually we have a big snow at night and by the afternoon most of it melted, that didn't happen. I believe in the future and changing weather patterns this will be a regular occurrence, I notice it when we do compass swings on the 135's at PDM, the magnetic north pole changes so much lately we are continuing moving the noses of the jets more in a northeast direction to accomplish it. I believe Mag North is now somewhere in Siberia plus the Fukishima earthquake changed the axis where the KTIK main runway changed its numbers from 17/35 to 18/36. The Earth is changing.

[M2]

If The Media Had Investigated Cuomo’s COVID Response The Way They Did Cruz’s Cancun Trip, Thousands Of New Yorkers Could Still Be Alive

[ClearedHot]

45 minutes ago, M2 said:

If The Media Had Investigated Cuomo’s COVID Response The Way They Did Cruz’s Cancun Trip, Thousands Of New Yorkers Could Still Be Alive

A Fucking MEN!

Liberal media needs a reason to NOT report on Cuomo so they focus on Ted going on vacation.  You want to talk about lies...thankfully DOJ and the FBI are investigating the joke that is the NY Governor and his staff.  Over at the joke that is CNN Brother Fredo Cuomo has been absolutely silent about a controversy that may have caused 1,000 unnecessary deaths.  

[Tank]

49 minutes ago, ClearedHot said:

A Fucking MEN!

Liberal media needs a reason to NOT report on Cuomo so they focus on Ted going on vacation.  You want to talk about lies...thankfully DOJ and the FBI are investigating the joke that is the NY Governor and his staff.  Over at the joke that is CNN Brother Fredo Cuomo has been absolutely silent about a controversy that may have caused 1,000 unnecessary deaths.  

 

 

[Swamp Yankee]

3 hours ago, ClearedHot said:

A ing MEN!

Liberal media needs a reason to NOT report on Cuomo so they focus on Ted going on vacation.  You want to talk about lies...thankfully DOJ and the FBI are investigating the joke that is the NY Governor and his staff.  Over at the joke that is CNN Brother Fredo Cuomo has been absolutely silent about a controversy that may have caused 1,000 unnecessary deaths.  

The liberal mainstream media largely excused Cuomo and the conservative mainstream media largely excused Cruz. I'm not saying their sins are equally mortal but those are the immediate examples.  

We've got two sides of the mainstream media now with roughly equal viewer/reader/listenerships.  Conflating mainstream media with liberal is passe.  That might be a good thing although the two sides are getting further apart.   They want us to choose R or D and obediently stay in our little boxes. 

Edited February 20, 2021 by Swamp Yankee

[ClearedHot]

24 minutes ago, Swamp Yankee said:

The liberal mainstream media largely excused Cuomo and the conservative mainstream media largely excused Cruz. I'm not saying their sins are equally mortal but those are the immediate examples.  

We've got two sides of the mainstream media now with roughly equal viewer/reader/listenerships.  Conflating mainstream media with liberal is passe.  That might be a good thing although the two sides are getting further apart.   They want us to choose R or D and obediently stay in our little boxes. 

The sins are not even in the universe.  Ted Cruz went on vacation during a snow and ice storm.  As a senator not much he could do more than symbolic gestures.  Optics bad, yes but he didn't kill anyone.  Cuomo is DIRECTLY responsible for many deaths, withheld information from the Justice Department and lied about.  Come on man.

When dividing the "sides" of the media at least be relative and honest.  On the conservative side of televised media you have one player FoxNews (although newsmax is growing an audience).  On the liberal side is the VAST majority of CNN/MCNBC/CBS/ABC/NBC.  It is David versus Goliath which is why Foxnews gets higher ratings than all of the left wingnut networks combined.

[FLEA]

34 minutes ago, Swamp Yankee said:

The liberal mainstream media largely excused Cuomo and the conservative mainstream media largely excused Cruz. I'm not saying their sins are equally mortal but those are the immediate examples.  

We've got two sides of the mainstream media now with roughly equal viewer/reader/listenerships.  Conflating mainstream media with liberal is passe.  That might be a good thing although the two sides are getting further apart.   They want us to choose R or D and obediently stay in our little boxes. 

This actually isnt' true. At least FOX, I know for sure, was all over Cruz for several days and even ran a side by side headline heavily critical over Cruz and Cuomo both on their main website. 

The conflict of interest with the Cuomo family at CNN is certainly concerning to its reporting though. 

[ecugringo]

Still not sure why it's news that Cruz went to Mexico? Who cares?  What was he going to do to make TX warmer and get power back?

This is no different than Trump/Obama golfing all the time.  I can do my job from the links so long as I have reception.  Its  just the optics.

[Tank]

11 minutes ago, ecugringo said:

Still not sure why it's news that Cruz went to Mexico? Who cares?  What was he going to do to make TX warmer and get power back?

This is no different than Trump/Obama golfing all the time.  I can do my job from the links so long as I have reception.  Its  just the optics.

Because the news of Cruz going to Mexico covers up the Cuomo COVID nursing home fiasco in NYC on CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, etc...  

As long as they keep talking about how bad Cruz and the GOP are, most people who really don’t follow current events will forget about Cuomo.  

[Lord Ratner]

50 minutes ago, Tank said:

Because the news of Cruz going to Mexico covers up the Cuomo COVID nursing home fiasco in NYC on CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, etc...  

As long as they keep talking about how bad Cruz and the GOP are, most people who really don’t follow current events will forget about Cuomo.  

The only reason Cuomo is in the news at all is because competing progressives (DeBlasio, mainly) smell blood and want his job.

[Swamp Yankee]

On 2/20/2021 at 2:05 PM, FLEA said:

This actually isnt' true. At least FOX, I know for sure, was all over Cruz for several days and even ran a side by side headline heavily critical over Cruz and Cuomo both on their main website. 

The conflict of interest with the Cuomo family at CNN is certainly concerning to its reporting though. 

Definitely conflict of interest at CNN (duh).  However, the NY Times, NPR, Wash Post, and networks for what that's worth have hammered Cuomo pretty hard. 

[Swamp Yankee]

On 2/20/2021 at 1:58 PM, ClearedHot said:

The sins are not even in the universe.  Ted Cruz went on vacation during a snow and ice storm.  As a senator not much he could do more than symbolic gestures.  Optics bad, yes but he didn't kill anyone.  Cuomo is DIRECTLY responsible for many deaths, withheld information from the Justice Department and lied about.  Come on man.

When dividing the "sides" of the media at least be relative and honest.  On the conservative side of televised media you have one player FoxNews (although newsmax is growing an audience).  On the liberal side is the VAST majority of CNN/MCNBC/CBS/ABC/NBC.  It is David versus Goliath which is why Foxnews gets higher ratings than all of the left wingnut networks combined.

There are also a large number of additional conservative outlets available: OAN, Newsmax, Blaze, WSJ editorial, Rebel News WorldNetDaily, and of course much of talk radio.  Listener/reader/viewership is another matter; but that's up to each outlet - if they suck at their job less people will partake.  However, the outlets exist for consumers to consume.  

Edited February 22, 2021 by Swamp Yankee