Oh, me, oh, my. Here is another big scandal. Idiot that I am, it is not my role to go ho-hum, but to get tossed about by every wind of doctrine. If one can read it in a newspaper, one must get excited. To trigger my excitement, one need only say they have obtained emails. The rest is downhill.
In the latest acquisition of emails, we learn that Duke Energy’s lobbyists had had communications with regulators. And, shocker of shockers, the big business was well-connected and in negotiations to minimize damage to its bottom line. This, I am told, is news of a vast conspiracy. Without that help, silly me that I am, I’d be trying to assess relevancy from real-world, small-scale experience where lawyers on both sides of a case consort and conspire with each other.
What’s more, the big thing is the exclusion of citizen input. Now, please understand, I am criticized just about daily for not appreciating that all citizens – you know those who cannot even tell you who the vice president is in “man on the street” interviews – are all widely published Ph.D.’s in the fields of chemistry and biology. Therefore, what a pot-smoking, eighteen-year-old hippie says is ten thousand times more valuable than anything I could ever think. Tell my alma mater all those critical thinking courses in science and technology are bogus. If a citizen holds a vial of muddy water up in a public meeting, the obvious conclusion, Sherlock, is that it is contaminated with PCB’s. I get it, OK? We’ve already died a million deaths correctly predicted by the alarmists.
Maybe the dumbest thing in my brain is the assumption that regulations are imposed to quench competition. Oh, yes, the big-wig power-mongers know they can get all those Ph.D. citizens in a frenzy by saying all factories must invest in multi-million-dollar products to protect the environment. Shame on me for supposing the vendor of the big, green systems is a big political contributor looking for government help drumming up business – or that the big multinationals know they can undercut little startups by requiring compliance with laws from which they can exempt themselves, at least until they can buy them out.
Corporations have “life cycles.” They get large enough that people can’t trust, rely on, and pitch in for each other. They decide they need rules, regulations, and procedures. They burn out their creative energies processing paper, but they find they can get help from the government if they process more paperwork. They become irrelevant and can’t keep up with smaller creative engines. They turn to government for support. They find it is easier to support their lifestyles by investing in lobbyists and political campaigns than to play the risky R&D game. Lobbyists and PR people use words like “children” and “furry little animals” to capture the heartstrings of emotional voters so legislators will support their anti-competition bills. Young people wanting to help the planet fall for the lies and go crazy spouting the propaganda they’ve been fed about children and furry little animals. Then, low-information bloggers like me will freak out – Wait. Was that a coal-ash-fed, three-eyed fish that just walked past the window?
