Gov. Meyer Vetoes Four Bills. Deb Heffernan cries crocodile tears over one of them:
Governor Matt Meyer has vetoed a bill that was passed unanimously in the General Assembly regarding consumer protections for public utility customers.
The sponsor, Representative Debra Heffernan, D-Bellefonte said House Bill 393 came about to address concerns about unregulated-third-party energy suppliers who promise lower bills, but in many cases customers are left paying more through tricky contracts.
Meyer in his veto message said he supports protecting consumers from deceptive sales practices and surprise increases, but the effect of the legislation would be to discourage competition in the residential market and actually strengthen Delmarva Power’s “monopoly.”
Here’s Heffernan’s plaint:
“It is frustrating on many levels to see this bill make it so far, only to be vetoed at the last possible minute. Throughout the 153rd General Assembly, we did everything in our power to hold Delmarva accountable for their skyrocketing prices. We dug deep, looking more closely at the state’s interconnection procedures and making necessary changes to give residents more autonomy over their energy choices, making sure that Delawareans would not have to pay the costs associated with large-use energy facilities, such as data centers, joining the grid, further regulating utilities to ensure that the only thing customer funds are used for is supplying energy, and other measures.
“To imply that HB 393 was passed in support of any one electric supplier is an insult to the work that my colleagues and I have done, in partnership with a wide range of stakeholders all working toward the goal of bettering the lives of Delaware residents. It is also giving far too much credit to the third-party suppliers, some of whom make their money by preying on desperate families, and who are only able to charge a select few customers less at the expense of overcharging the majority.
Based on her professed love for ‘desperate families’, Heffernan’s statement rings untrue. As Chair of the House Natural Resources Committee, she didn’t give a shit about environmental racism and the ‘desperate families’ who were affected by it, and never gave a shit about, say, the residents of Edgemoor when it came to pushing the Port expansion there. But, I digress. Here’s what Meyer had to say:
Delaware families are already being squeezed by rising electric bills, and the last thing we should do is take away their choices and strengthen Delmarva’s monopoly. I support the goal of HB 393: protecting consumers from deceptive sales practices, surprise rate increases, and unfair contracts. But we have already seen what happened when Maryland adopted these same restrictions: competitors left the residential market and consumers were left with fewer choices. Delaware should learn from that experience, not repeat it. The Public Service Commission can and should put strong consumer protections in place without shutting down competition. Families struggling to pay their bills need to be protected from both predatory practices and monopolies, not either or.”
So. They’ll pass a bill in January addressing Meyer’s concerns, simple as that. The fact that Heffernan will have no say in it can only be viewed as a positive. Perhaps the guy at Pecos Liquors will comp her so that she can drown her sorrows…
Yep. The only thing propping up the stock market is AI:
For a measure of how important A.I. has become for the stock market, consider that the iShares U.S. Technology ETF, an exchange-traded fund that serves as a rough proxy for A.I.-led tech stocks, returned 33.7 percent for this calendar year through Thursday. That compares with 4.1 percent for the ProShares S&P 500 Ex-Technology ETF, which strips out many, but not all, of the tech stocks of the benchmark S&P 500.
Mark Zandi, the chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, told me that A.I. accounted for a hefty chunk of the U.S. economy’s growth this year. The latest government report says real gross domestic product grew at an annual rate of 2.3 percent in the second quarter of this year. Mr. Zandi estimated that 0.6 to 0.7 percentage points — or perhaps 30 percent of the economy’s inflation-adjusted growth this year — came from the A.I. boom, directly or indirectly.
But this may be a precarious economic foundation. (Ya think?)
Concerns about the dangers of the technology have mounted, after reports that rogue A.I. agents hadn’t merely escaped their confines but also appeared to hide their tracks.
Evan Hubinger, an Anthropic safety researcher, estimated the potential threat from A.I. in a post on X, saying he believed the chance that A.I. “could kill all humans” within the next decade was greater than 10 percent.
No wonder leaders of A.I. companies have been calling for a slowdown in the pace of development of the technology until human safety can be assured. “Guardrails” for A.I. are being widely discussed, if not always swiftly put in place.
President Trump has denounced such concerns as a “hoax.” My New York Times colleagues David E. Sanger, Jonathan Swan, Cecilia Kang and Dustin Volz have reported that the president worries that if the A.I. boom falters, the stock market could crash and a recession could quickly follow. (On his watch.)
There’s lots more for those of you with Minors in Economics.
It’s The Data Centers, Stupid:
When Republicans passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act last year, they knew Democrats would hit them for cutting rich people’s taxes, but they never expected a provision titled “Full expensing for certain business property” to blow up in their faces.
Democrats have latched on to the policy as one of several tax breaks in the new law benefiting data centers, and they’re using it for brutal attack ads amid a public opinion nosedive for the projects.
“He took thousands from one of the biggest data center developers in America. Days later, he voted to give them $70 billion in tax breaks,” a narrator gravely intones in a 30-second spot attacking Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.). “Now, Wisconsin families are paying his tab twice: Once for his massive tax giveaway to data centers, then again with higher utility bills.”
On Wednesday, Senate Republicans tried to move a bill called the Ratepayer Protection Act, which asks states to “consider” not raising costs on consumers to accommodate data centers but imposes no actual rules on construction or limits on electricity rate increases. All but four Democrats voted to block it from moving forward, with the rest laughing it off.
“People see that there is a deep integration between these big, billion-dollar tech companies and the Trump administration, and they don’t like it,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) told HuffPost. “That’s why the last bill they’re doing is an attempt to change two years of this corruption story.”
The bill was sponsored by Sen. Jon Husted of Ohio (R), who presided over data center construction in his state as lieutenant governor and is getting hammered for it on the campaign trail. He argued the bill was the best Congress could do right now. (Betcha they can do better with a D Senate and House.)
Trump’s Brain Has Turned To Mush. The Time Interview. High(low)lights:
QUESTION: Why should Americans believe that you respect the free press when you’re restricting access to the White House to some of our colleagues?
I don’t believe in fake news. And I know it’s fake because I know the thing—I don’t mind, you know, if I do something wrong, I don’t mind having a bad story…I’m in the Oval Office. I mean, the public is very smart. If I wasn’t doing a good job, I wouldn’t have won that election by a lot.
On defying a judge’s order:
QUESTION: You don’t think you’re ignoring what he ordered you to do? You don’t think you’re ignoring his order?
TRUMP: No, I’m not. I’m not ignoring his order. I’m just saying that when I don’t have to go out of my way, these people write only bad stories. When they say orders, what order? I’m not even aware.
More on the media:
QUESTION: Can I just ask, why now? You’ve had this contentious relationship with the media for a while. What was the impetus to doing this at this moment in time?
TRUMP: Well, it’s just bad story after bad story…I don’t think anybody should be forced to bear fake news, constantly bad stories, because I’ve done great things….So at a certain point, you say, “What’s the purpose of like this crazy Kaitlan Collins?” She’s a very average person. She’s the most unhappy young person I’ve ever seen.
Those excerpts courtesy of Daily Kos.
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