Commentary
Institute for New Economic Thinking: Energy
Texas's electricity market "reforms" made the current crisis inevitable.
Lenin, who was a better economist than Rick Perry, once defined communism as "soviet power plus electrification of the whole country." Competing with Stalin, the New Deal built dams and strung power lines in America's backcountry. Lyndon Johnson, then a young congressman, got Roosevelt to help build the Mansfield Dam, which brought public power to the Texas hill country, and another, the Tom Miller dam, which brought it to the city of Austin.