News

from March 10, 2016

Brendan Trainor

Bernie Sanders, fascist

Young people, or at least young white people, are feeling the Bern. Seventyfour-year-old Sen. Bernie Sanders, self-proclaimed democratic socialist from Vermont, elected as an independent, is energizing the youth of Nevada and America by by his campaign for president. Does Brendan Trainor this mean socialism is the wave of the future? Socialism is defined as government ownership of the means of production. Bernie is not that kind of socialist, although he did spend his honeymoon in the Soviet Union. Sanders’s platform would sharply increase taxes and regulations on the wealthy, restrict their rights to be involved in the political process, unleash a trust-busting attack on their “concentrated wealth,” and generally make their lives miserable because they rigged the economy. Sanders proclaims the money confiscated from “wealthy speculators” would be spent by government bureaucrats to pay for many wonderful things. There would be free health care for all, free college tuition, free food, rent and so much more. No one who owns or runs a company would be able to earn more than four times what the lowliest janitor makes. The minimum wage would double. Unisex bathrooms will fill the land with gender neutral flushing. Feeling the Bern means believing in a state-funded utopia.

Bernie’s socialism is not the outright ownership of the means of production, but rather keeps private property in form, but removes the substance by taking many property rights away. This form of socialism is called fascism. Fascism replaces free-market-production-for consumption with production-for- state-dictated-outcomes. Fascism is not necessarily racist. Japan and Italy were fascist states but not nearly as racist as Germany was. American liberal fascism is outwardly antiracist, publicly condemning discrimination against blacks, Hispanics, women and LGBTAQ. White heterosexual males and Asians, not so much. Liberal domestic fascism appears as a relatively mild soft shoe fascism, cleverly cloaking its coercive nature in PC bromides. Who could be against the children, after all? Shouldn’t life be fair? We just want reasonable, common sense solutions!

Sen. Sanders was in charge of Veterans Administration oversight. He denied the problems with delays in providing veterans the care they needed until the deaths and coverups were publicized. Sanders will never admit long wait times are a systemic problem with governmentprovided health care. He would rather someone else die first.

Bernie says America should be like Denmark. Hillary Clinton shot back that America is not Denmark. But the real issue is that Denmark is no longer Denmark. The Scandinavian countries became semi-socialist in the 1930s and Bernie still believes they are. Northern European countries have greatly deregulated and privatized their economies. If Bernie were honest, he would point to Spain, France, Portugal, Italy and Greece as the most socialist countries in Europe today. They all feature enormous debt, high unemployment and social unrest.

But why look to Europe, when there are two excellent examples right in our backyard? Look to Cuba and Venezuela to see how socialism works. Cuba at least can claim the U.S. embargo helps keep them poor. But America buys billions of barrels of oil from Venezuela. Milton Friedman said that if you put the government in charge of the Sahara desert, in 10 years it would run out of sand. Venezuela under Chavez style socialism proves him right. Venezuela has gone from a wealthy oil producing nation to a country that has literally run out of toilet paper in a little more than a decade.

Hopefully, millennials will see socialism is a failed 20th century idea. The 21st century cries out for liberty instead. Ω

An alternative libertarian view: Why libertarians should love Bernie http://tinyurl. com/hgsqvcb

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Legacy

It’s been a while since we checked in with the National Priorities Project on the cost we’ve paid for the Iraq war so far.

As of the morning of March 7, 2016, Americans have paid $819,267,857,905 for the war. (It is still tolling at a rate of $117,035 an hour.)

Renoites have paid $573,907,492 (and are still paying at a rate of $81 an hour).

Sparks taxpayers have paid $131,645,166 ($18 an hour).

Those who live in Washoe County are up to $131,645,166 ($184 an hour).

Among the residents of U.S. House district 2, which contains most of northern Nevada, the figure is $1,747,387,951 ($249 an hour).

This is for a war, remember, that supposedly ended on Dec. 21, 2011. And the meter is still running at the rates shown here.

KNPB stood almost alone

A follow-up to our previous report (“KNPB president chastised,” March 3) about KNPB, Reno’s public broadcasting television station, failing to carry the Feb. 18 Democratic presidential debate, sponsored by the Public Broadcasting System:

PBS ombudsman Larry Getler further reports that “every PBS member, with the exception of KNPB-Reno and Mississippi Public Broadcasting, carried the Democratic debate. Some delayed it until 11 p.m., and some put it on a multi-cast channel, or on only one channel if they are a dual licensee, but they did indeed deliver the program to their viewers in their market, PBS says.” That was a reply to an inquiry from columnist Andrew Barbano. (Incidentally, we previously identified Getler as the Corporation for Public Broadcasting ombudsman. He is the PBS ombudsman.)

In a related matter, Jeff Cotten at KJIV reports that his station is the only one in the state that carried a question-and-answer session at the University of Nevada, Reno that featured Sens. Bernie Sanders and Cory Booker (representing Hillary Clinton). It was broadcast live as it happened. KJIV in Sun Valley is a non-commercial station at 89.1 with a paid staff of one.

Drought deniers drew dry dollars

Nevada ranchers have been collecting drought relief payments while attacking federal officials for saying there is a drought, according to an investigative reporting site.

Last June, ranchers in Lander County drove cattle onto public lands that had been closed because of the drought. The Bureau of Land Management, which administers the land, and caves in almost as often as the Democratic Party, retreated and agreed to reopen the range.

Reveal, a site of the Center for Investigative reporting, said the payment program is for ranchers who say they have been damaged by drought:

“According to records obtained by Reveal, two ranching families at the center of the Battle Mountain protests received $2.2 million from a federal drought disaster relief program.

“Dan Filippini, the protest leader who turned hundreds of cattle loose on the closed range, was paid $338,000 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Livestock Forage Disaster Program in 2014, records show.

“Another $750,000 federal payout went to a trust and corporation associated with the Filippini family, which long has been active in ranching in Nevada.

“Meanwhile, significant payments also went to the family of Battle Mountain cattleman Peter Tomera, who with his wife and sons rode on the Grass March Cowboy Express, a 2014 horseback ride to Washington, D.C., to protest the government drought restrictions. The records show that the government paid $250,000 to a Tomera family trust and another $360,000 to a family corporation.

“An additional $540,000 was paid to other members of the extended Tomera family and to a related corporation, records show.” —Dennis Myers

Net loss

Nevada’s rep continues to take a beating

If Nevada officials hoped the national impact of torpedoing the state’s net by metering policies would die down, Dennis Myers it appears not to be happening. Business and environmental media are folding the Nevada dispute into other stories, and new developments continue to unfold. Some of that coverage has been devastating to economic development in Nevada as other Western states carve out their own renewable niches.

“Nevada just became a much more difficult place to do business.”

OilPrice.com

Last year, the Nevada Public Utilities Commission approved new solar net metering rates that cuts the rate paid to rooftop solar customers for the power they hand back to the grid. The PUC also hiked the monthly charge for customers with rooftop. The changes undercut existing solar users who expected rates to help pay for their rooftop installations and also discourages others from adding rooftop to their homes.

This week, an article in the National Law Review read, “Despite overwhelming support among Nevada voters for the net metering program (about 75 percent, across all parties), Nevada rolled back its net metering program in a dramatic fashion. The fallout was immediate. Elon Musk’s SolarCity fired 550 workers, while two other large solar installers (Vivant and Sunrun) have announced plans to close their Nevada operations. Several lawsuits are pending.”

At OilPrice.com, analyst Nick Cunningham wrote, “Now that solar power is reaching prime time, the fossil fuel industry is doing all that it can to stop its growth. ... Customers switching to solar end up hitting the utility’s bottom line twice by no longer buying as much electricity and upended the utility’s case for costly new power plants and transmission lines. That is why utilities have become much more aggressive in beating back solar. One of the most high-profile cases is in Nevada, where a NV Energy, subsidiary of Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway, convinced the Nevada Public Utilities Commission to abruptly and harshly alter the rules of the game for solar power in the state. ... By the stroke of a pen, Nevada just became a much more difficult place to do business for solar companies. SolarCity’s share price has plummeted by more than 60 percent since the December ruling.”

After the signing of the Paris climate change agreement, CNN’s John Sutter wrote, “World leaders

Rooftop solar was thriving in Nevada until the Nevada Legislature and its Republican majority directed regulators to reassess net metering.

finally get it. That’s why nearly 200 of them signed the Paris Agreement at the UN COP21 climate conference in December. It commits all of us to rapidly move away from fossil fuels and toward cleaner sources of energy like solar and wind. But apparently that collective will to wage a war on climate change hasn’t trickled down to Nevada. Instead, the local utility and officials are injecting uncertainty and doubt into the solar market at exactly the moment when the opposite is needed.”

Last week, Warren Buffett—who owns the monopoly power utility NV Energy, which requested the Public Utilities Commission action that gutting net metering in the state—told CNBC that Tesla CEO Elon Musk had contacted him directly.

“Well, he would like the million people to subsidize the 17,000 [solar customers] just like the rest of Nevada is subsidizing his battery plant,” he said.

However, there is no evidence that, under the net metering rules that were voided by the PUC, solar customers were being subsidized by other customers. The only nonindustry study—done by the staff of the PUC—found otherwise.

An online petition is headed, “Tell Warren Buffett: Stop Your War On Rooftop Solar.” And Credo, a telecommunications company, is sending messages to Buffett for its subscribers who request it, calling on him to stop interfering with rooftop.

PriceofOil.org used an interesting bit of punctuation: “The battle over solar has been intense in Nevada, where NV Energy, subsidiary of Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway, managed to ‘convince’ the Nevada Public Utilities Commission to radically alter the rules for solar, which could decimate the solar industry in the state. The Commission imposed some of the most extreme solar rate hikes in the U.S. on both new and existing solar customers. Some residents may see their electricity bills increase by a whopping by [sic] 300 percent above what they would have been if they had not installed solar. SolarCity, America’s largest solar provider, has since announced it is pulling out of Nevada, as has another solar company, Sunrun which is now suing the state. SolarCity’s share price has taken a hammering since the new rules were announced in December.”

The quotes around convince seem to be a way of hinting at the

notion—pushed more explicitly by some of the solar companies who left the state—that there was something improper about the PUC’s action that involved Gov. Brian Sandoval, two of whose political advisors are also utility lobbyists.

Greenpeace made the claim still more explicit, charging the governor with being corrupt. An article by Cassady Sharp posted on the Greenpeace website carried the headline, “What a Bought Politician in Nevada Means for the 2016 Presidential Race.”

The article does not support the headline charge, but the word “bought” does appear twice more on the page. The article basically recycles the claim of the solar companies that Sandoval is compromised by his association with the two lobbyists.

Greenpeace lets the state legislators—who directed the PUC to act—off the hook entirely. It also does not report that the regulators serve fixed terms to insulate them from political pressure. It further failed to report that Sandoval has publicly disagreed with the PUC, at least on grandfathering in existing solar users: “While I have respected the commission and its deliberations by not influencing its process, the PUC did not reach the outcome I had hoped for. I remained optimistic that the commission would find a solution that considered the economic consequences to existing rooftop solar owners.”

In related news: • The Oregon Legislature has voted to ban coal generated power by 2035 and to require its largest utilities to use renewable for at least half of their power generation by 2040. Pat Remick of the National Resources Defense Council said, “Combined with Oregon’s existing hydroelectric base, that means the state will be on track for an electricity system that’s 70 to 90 percent carbon-free by that date.” • Political action committees— No Solar Tax PAC (pro-rooftop solar) and Citizens for Solar and Energy Fairness (anti-rooftop solar) are operating for and against ballot measures. One, a referendum, is designed to restore Nevada’s previous net metering rules. A second ballot petition seeks to break up the NV Energy monopoly. That one in an initiative petition. • Near Tonopah, a solar facility was made operational. Crescent Dunes SolarReserve uses thermal energy, stored in the form of molten salt, capturing heat from a steerable mirror array that can be used for power at night. It is generating 100 megawatts, according to the company, which hopes the method will become widely used. Ω

Finishing touches

Workers with an air hose raise billows of dust on the new Virginia Street Bridge. A ceremony for the opening of the bridge is planned for April 12. Mar. 20, 2016 4 pm Mar. 22, 2016 7:30 pm

Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts

MUSSORGSKY Night on Bald Mountain (arr. Rimsky-Korsakov) GRIEG Piano Concerto in A Minor, op. 16 RAVEL Mother Goose–Five Children’s Pieces: Suite STRAVINSKY The Firebird: Suite (1919 version)

Ray Ushikubo, Piano