The great tax cut myth. In one of his last acts as President, George Bush set the wheels of energy deregulation in motion nationwide when he approved the Energy Policy Act. It aimed to break utility power monopolies across the country by opening up control over the transmission lines that deliver power, while effectively deregulating the price of wholesale electricity. But the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission left the details of how to deregulate the retail side up to the individual states. California, then mired in its worst recession since World War II, rushed to get into the deregulation mix.
Critics say they're trying to turn out the lights on democracy.
You had problems with worker compensation laws, and taxes and energy prices were too high. The state went about reforming it all. Federal policy makers were pushing it, but other states didn't do it as quickly as we did. The PUC and the Wilson administration were pushing it forward. The PUC took upon itself the task of setting up California's deregulation structure.