Newt Gingrich speaks up for Stan Wise in PSC race
The re-election campaign of state Public Service Commissioner Stan Wise on Monday made public a robo-call that former U.S. House speaker Newt Gingrich has recorded on Wise’s behalf. The two are old Cobb County friends.
And for his friend, Gingrich describes Wise’s Republican opponent, Pam Davidson, as a West Coast flower child:
”Hello, this is Newt Gingrich. I’m still humbled to have won Georgia on Super Tuesday, and today I’m asking you to vote for my good friend Stan Wise, who’s seeking another term on the Georgia Public Service Commission. His steady hand at the PSC has helped build a reliable energy system without shifting costs to future generations. The last thing we need in Georgia are the failed, liberal California energy programs of his opponent that lead to blackouts, Solyndra, and skyrocketing rates. Please vote for Stan Wise in the Republican primary.”
Presumably, “without shifting costs to future generations” is the tested phraseology for the advance payments that Georgia Power ratepayers are making on costs associated with two new nuclear plants now under construction. Speaking of which, did you see this weekend piece by my AJC colleague Kristi Swartz?
Despite promises from the nuclear industry to regulators and consumers that they learned from mistakes of the past, the nation’s first two nuclear reactor projects built from scratch in 30 years are headed toward hundreds of millions of dollars in cost overruns and months, if not years, of delays.
The impact of the early delays and budget increases at Georgia Power’s Plant Vogtle and South Carolina Electric & Gas’s Plant Summer will have on future nuclear projects is unclear.
Utilities’ officials say the Georgia and South Carolina projects face extra public and private scrutiny because they are the first approved and their design will serve as prototypes for future plants.
The challenges include more than $800 million in overruns and a dispute over who should pay for them. The disputes are between the consortium of utility companies building Plant Vogtle and the project’s main design and construction contractors, Westinghouse and The Shaw Group. Georgia Power, as the lead in the consortium building the plant, is responsible for $400 million of that amount, the contractors say. In South Carolina, SCE&G has asked to recoup from its customers $283 million, which include a $138 million settlement with Shaw and Westinghouse.
Customers could end up paying for any cost overruns at Vogtle if the charges are ultimately approved by Georgia’s Public Service Commission.
- By Jim Galloway, Political Insider
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70 comments Add your comment
Attack Dog
July 17th, 2012
5:27 am
1. I don’t know which is funnier. Newt winning Georgia, or him endorsing someone. 2. I’m proud that the Dixiecrats in Georgia are not stupping as low as their counterparts in other states using robo-call to suppress the vote. Oh, I forgot that this is just their primary. 3. The GA Power is a left wing MSM fabrication. We all know that private enterprise is so efficient and effective that things like cost overruns and project delays only happen when the public sector does things.
Buckhead Boy
July 17th, 2012
5:37 am
Just be thankful that the “speaker” on this phone call disclosed his name, as the Republicans now have voted in lock-step to protect secret “speech”. Tonight they again obstructed in the Senate by blocking a majority vote for the Disclose Act by filibuster. They prefer, “This ’speech’ is brought to you by some non-natural or natural person whose identity cannot be disclosed because you might hold the ’speaker’ accountable or be adversely influenced by knowing who he is.”
Morning Reads For Tuesday July 17 — Peach Pundit
July 17th, 2012
7:00 am
[...] to blame but themselves for the public’s reluctance to support TSPLOST. – Newt Gingrich did a robocall yesterday for PSC Commissioner Stan Wise. – Speaker Ralston was in Athens and talked about healthcare. Torres [...]
Eustis
July 17th, 2012
7:54 am
Don’t fret over Vogtle. That little $1-2 million overrun will be $5-10 million before it’s over.
honested
July 17th, 2012
7:57 am
Attack Dog,
You bring up the most important point, the PSC has a job to prevent ‘free market abuses’ by the monopoly utilities.
When the candidates are usually selected, paid for and given a lifetime incumbency BY the regulated utilities, the process has been corrupted.
All the while, the average Citizen has little or no idea just what the PSC does and only knows it is another race they select the ‘I’ candidate from each cycle (with the mistaken assumption that being incumbent must mean the candidate has the broad knowledge necessary for the post).
This is probably the most important cycle in the last two decades to select ‘anyone but the incumbents’ in the PSC races, unless we really want to provide a unprecedented authority over our lives to monopoly utilities.
Mark
July 17th, 2012
8:06 am
Stan Wise never met a lobbyist he didnt love.
Eustis
July 17th, 2012
9:01 am
If Newt is endorsing Mr Wise, I’ll be voting for the other guy.
David Staples
July 17th, 2012
9:06 am
Atlanta_Man – the reason I’m arguing the property rights aspect is that I believe someone’s time is also their property. If campaigns want to hold signs on the side of the road promoting their candidates, fine. If they want to stand at the end of someone’s driveway and hold up one of those signs, fine. If they want to send me a piece of mail, fine. None of those really require someone’s undivided attention or stopping their current task to pay attention to the campaign. But I would wager that most people answer a ringing telephone. That requires them to stop whatever it is they’re doing and give it their undivided attention if only for a short amount of time. So does someone’s time have value? If not, then why should commercial telemarketing calls be outlawed either? Furthermore, is not all political speech of equal value? If it is, then why is it the Gary Johnson protest at CNN yesterday was told that it was getting too large and that they were pretty much going to have to shut down? (The protest was that Johnson isn’t being included in the polls, thus he can’t meet the debate requirements to poll at certain levels if he’s not even included in the polls in the first place.) So robocalling is okay, but political peaceful protesting is not?
Furthermore, it’s not just “political speech” that is considered an “Exempt Organization”. Non-profits – 501(c)3 groups – also are exempt. Since charity isn’t exactly political speech, how would you categorize this in terms of protected speech that should be entitled to robocall whomever they want?
I’m not really all that concerned that possibly no other states have said robocalling / telemarketing extends to any form of soliciting. Just because they haven’t done so doesn’t mean it’s not possible. How many politicians do you think are really all that eager to pass a bill such as I described? They’d probably be just as eager to vote themselves a pay cut. (Note that I’ve also said that I’ll take a 10 percent pay cut if elected. Teachers, firefighters, police, and other government workers around the state have taken pay cuts and furloughs… why should the PSC Commissioners be any different?)
WOW
July 17th, 2012
9:10 am
Mr. Staples just got my vote!
hiram
July 17th, 2012
9:13 am
It seems that Georgia Power only contributes to Georgia’s Republican Party, with the exception of their giant contribution to Roy Barnes in 2110. I wonder why???? Should make all of their Democratic customers feel really happy to pay their electric bills each month.
Roy 2010, Inc
Roy E. Barnes
Georgia Power Company
11/12/2010
Monetary $10.76
Georgia Power Company State Employee PAC, Inc.
Georgia Power Company
11/23/2011
Monetary $200,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company
1/26/2012
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
06/19/2006
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
05/10/2007
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
03/03/2008
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
04/15/2009
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
03/24/2010
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
04/28/2011
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
04/03/2012
Monetary $5,000.00
Georgia Republican Party
Georgia Power Company-Federal Pac Inc.
06/04/2012
Monetary $5,000.00
ethics.ga.gov
hiram
July 17th, 2012
9:31 am
Every Democrat in Georgia should start paying attention to the Public Service Commission’s agenda, and raise immortal he11 when they award these @#!%&^&’s a rate increase, and seek alternative power sources…
Question Man
July 17th, 2012
11:03 am
Was I correct in voting against Stan Wise because Newt endorsed him?
Morning Reads For Tuesday July 17
July 17th, 2012
12:27 pm
[...] nobody to blame but themselves for the public’s reluctance to support TSPLOST. – Newt Gingrich did a robocall yesterday for PSC Commissioner Stan Wise. – Speaker Ralston was in Athens and talked about healthcare. – [...]
george8661
July 17th, 2012
12:37 pm
I am a Republican who reluctly supports Romney because Obama is such a poor excuse for a president. However, Why does Romney not want to release his tax records? Does he need to hide something? Even Republicans are calling for him to release the records. I say if he refuses to come clean and re;ease them the Republican party should not give him the nomination and should have a open convention to get a better candidate.
Carol
July 17th, 2012
1:39 pm
The NO CALL LIST is handled by the FCC not the PSC. It hasn’t been that way for about six or seven years.
Locally when it was, political campaigns and charities could call you regardless. That has also been the case since the Feds took over the list. So I suppose we need to appeal to Congress. Good luck with that. They definitely want to be able to call and bug the heck out of you.
Carol
July 17th, 2012
1:49 pm
Based on a story I saw a couple of years ago, Wise seems to like testifying in Washington. Why not let someone else have his job so he can continue to spread all of his knowledge around. Because I’m trying to figure out exactly how that’s helping the voters here in Georgia.
And if Newt is endorsing him, that’s definitely a vote for the other guy in my book.
honested
July 17th, 2012
1:56 pm
NPR was discussing a recent study (I think it was from Pew Research) yesterday that found ‘robo-calls’ make absolutely no measurable difference in the outcome of ANY election.
Think about it, the most annoying type of ‘political speech’ to everyone makes almost everyone angry but does not change anyone’s vote.
What wizards campaign directors must be.
Carol
July 17th, 2012
2:20 pm
Robocalls definitely don’t sway my decision about a candidate, at least not usually in a positive way. I guess they all have to do it, but when you have No-Ethics Newt doing the dialing for you, well….
Atlanta_Man
July 17th, 2012
2:31 pm
David-
Passing a law against robocalls for political speech might as well be called the incumbent protection plan. It’s the cheapest outlet a potential challenger has to get his message to the voters. Without the ability of a challenger to get his/her word out, the vote tends to default to the incumbent.
David Staples
July 17th, 2012
5:14 pm
Atlanta_Man – while I agree with you that robocalling is very cheap to do, I’m still not a fan of it. I think it actually ticks a lot of people off. I don’t currently have any plans to use it. If by some odd chance I do end up doing a little bit of robocalling, I promise I’ll use the do not call list to make sure I don’t call people who don’t want solicitations. Like I said though, I’d rather go for other avenues to get out my message.
Just as one example – Stan says he doesn’t very often comment on blogs. I think it’s important for our elected officials to be as open and transparent as possible and communicate with the public. People are going to disagree with me on some things, but they’ll agree with me on others. I’d rather communicate with people openly and directly than have a recording played to every Georgian with a telephone. That’s just one of the many problems we have with the PSC right now. It’s not very open and transparent. When enough people decide it’s time for that to change – it will.