Gettin it Done.

[GwynnInTheHall]

Sadly, if he's trying to mimic a former president with a huge cult following, you're not actually wrong here.

He's mimicking a RJ Cultist

[Kevin Seitzer]

This is all Ted Cruz's long game for winning in 2024. You guys just don't see it yet, cuz you can't comprehend how smart he is. Won't you all feel silly when he becomes prez from 2024-2032.

Why stop in 2032? President for L1fe!

[heyelander]

Why stop in 2032? President for L1fe!

we should be so blessed!

[The Feral Slasher]

This is all Ted Cruz's long game for winning in 2024. You guys just don't see it yet, cuz you can't comprehend how smart he is. Won't you all feel silly when he becomes prez from 2024-2032.

I sure hope you (and many of us) don't regret this. The Dems do need to be "Gettin it Done".

[Bene Futuis]

I love that AOC & other Democrats in congress helped raise $3.2 million for Texas disaster relief while Ted Cruz made his escape to Cancun. As Dave Chappelle would say, "That's a Prince judo move." Because Cruz can't complain about AOC making him look bad for abandoning Texas during it's time of need. That's all on him. Crisis doesn't create character. It reveals it.

AOC up to $5M now raised for Texas. She's better for Texas than the entire Republican pool of politicians over there. On that note, at least two more Republicans have been caught fleeing their state during Texas' time of need: one Republican state rep who flew to Florida on a private jet and infamous Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who fled for Utah to have supposed "lengthy discussions" on the Google case with Utah's AG. No word yet on whether Zoom has been invented in Texas or Utah. Also no word on whether AG Paxton, currently under indictment for felony fraud that he reportedly tried to get the other guy to pardon him for by supporting the Big Lie publicly, understands that he is the one charged with overseeing all the crazy financial shenanigans befalling Texans, in which they are getting $15,000 utility bills during the crisis.

[Kevin Seitzer]

I don't know how Griddy was allowed to operate. I didn't sign up with them for the very reason that their low prices came with the risk of a $10,000 electric bill in extreme weather.

[Kevin Seitzer]

There are other political shenanigans that resulted in Griddy customers getting those outrageous bills, including last-minute changes to ERCOT rules. Jerry Jones and some others are making out like bandits. It's criminal.

[GwynnInTheHall]

There are other political shenanigans that resulted in Griddy customers getting those outrageous bills, including last-minute changes to ERCOT rules. Jerry Jones and some others are making out like bandits. It's criminal.

as someone potentially moving to Austin, is Griddy the only utility down that way?

[Ken]

as someone potentially moving to Austin, is Griddy the only utility down that way?

No, there are many, many options.

I use energyogre so I don't even remember what provider they found for me this time, but I'm on a fixed rate thankfully.

[Kevin Seitzer]

as someone potentially moving to Austin, is Griddy the only utility down that way?

No. Texas has a unique (deregulated) electric market. There are the power generating companies. I'm far enough removed from them that I don't even know their names. Then there are the distribution companies that maintain the transmission and distribution systems. For most of the Houston metro, for instance, this is Centerpoint Energy. (This is the equivalent to Pacific Gas & Electric or whoever you have out there.) If there is an outage, Centerpoint is the company whose trucks and workers go out to fix the lines. In the old regulated days, this is the company that you would have gotten your bill from. But no longer. Now there is a third layer of companies that actually sell the electricity to you. The vast majority of them sell at a fixed rate for some contract term, 12 months or 24 months, for example. Griddy is one of the companies that sells electricity to end customers. Griddy purchases electricity on the wholesale market and passes that spot rate on directly to the customers, rather than having a fixed rate contract for some term. During this winter storm, ERCOT set the wholesale price at the emergency ceiling of $9/kWh for several days. Griddy passed that cost directly on to its customers. Most of the rest of the providers did not, because their customers were on fixed rate contracts. That cost will presumably be passed on to their customers in the form of higher rates for everyone the next time we sign up for new contracts. There is no reason for you to choose Griddy, unless you like gambling with your electric bill. There are probably a hundred other providers to choose from, and there is literally no reason to choose based upon anything other than cost.

[Ken]

There are probably a hundred other providers to choose from, and there is literally no reason to choose based upon anything other than cost.

Generally agree but there's a slight oversimplification here. Things that go into my choices on power:

1) Average cost
2) Costs in the extremes (it's often tiered, $x/KWh for 0-1000, $y/KWh for 1000-2000, $z/KWh for 2000+)
3) Discounts - sometimes there are games you can play where you get a discount if you fall in a particular range
4) Energy type - for the environmental conscious
5) Contract duration - shorter terms can be better if you want to look again in 3 months and find a better deal. Longer terms can be better if you fear that it will increase or don't want to keep changing

(obviously 1-3 above are all "cost")

Eventually I got tired of messing with it and outsourced the decisions to energyogre

[Bene Futuis]

The FBI has formally elevated the threat of domestic white supremacist groups to be on par with international terrorists like ISIS and has called white supremacist extremism the greatest domestic terrorism threat to our country. FBI Director Wray testified about the presence of pro-Trump white supremacists at the attempted coup on January 6th. Predictably, the Republicans in committee responded with a "whatabout" regarding Antifa.

[Bene Futuis]

Democrats are working like crazy on all sorts of fronts (although to be fair, this one is a rehash of the bill McConnell refused to even allow a vote on in 2019). Another huge piece of legislation passes the house 222-210 on yet another party line vote. The bill aims to protect and expand voting rights (there's why Republicans oppose it) and enact significant campaign finance reforms. https://www.npr.org/2021/03/03/97256...ce-reform-bill

Meanwhile, riding their high from pushing the Big Lie, Republicans have now pushed over 250 state bills to increase barriers to vote across the country.

[Sour Masher]

This is gonna sound like a very privelged whine fest, but I cannot help vent somewhere.

Not happy with how Biden folded to Manchin over the stimulus limits, especially with a hard cap that doesn't give credit for kids. I was comparing notes with a friend who combined with his wife to make 148k. He has three kids, so will get the full 7k. My wife and I made more than we ever made in 2019 and 2020, taking on all the extra work that we could, moonlighting, teaching extra classes, etc, because her mom lost her job and needed some financial support for her brother who is disabled, and my mom has medical issues and needs financial help as well. We were fortunate to be able to have jobs and work extra, so we did and combined to make more than we ever have, which put us at 161k for the year. We didn't end up keeping any of that extra money--we used it to help extended family. Given what we make, I was not expecting or feeling we should get the full amount, but given that we have two kids, I thought we'd get something, even when I heard about the aggressive phase out. But the 160k is a hard cap, no matter how many dependents you have.

That is the part that is really annoying the hell out of me right now. I get that there has to be a cut off, but living in NY, with the taxes I pay, combined with the fact that we currently have a lot of people leaning on us financially, in addition to our own young kids, we sure could have used something--anything, to help pay off some debt and buy stuff that we have put off. All told, Manchin's cut saved 12 billion out of a 1.9 trillion dollar bill. And Biden folded on it like a house of cards. Again, if they wanted to lower the cut off, I get it, but they should have kept the kids in the equation. If we made what we made with no kids, we would be much more comfortable financially--there is a huge difference between having kids and not that is being ignored with this change in eligibility. I'm sure there are folks even more screwed than we were, folks who made 161k but have 8 or 10 kids. I know it is a lot of money compared to the average (for most of our adult lives, we made below average as students)--it would have seemed like a lot of money to us just 5 years ago. But between the massive taxes of living in NY and the financial burden of our extended family hit harder than us right now, we are left really regretting we didn't combine to make $1500 less. It would have netted us thousands of dollars.

A phase out that goes from thousands to 0 because of a $1500 gross pay difference is an idiotic phase out. I'm not begrudging my friend who will get 7k in stimulus, but he lives in rural Georgia, with much less expenses, and is getting 7k. We will get nada. I believe I'd feel that stark difference for two comparable families was unfair even if it did not negatively impact me. We are obviously much better off than most, so I'm not complaining about not getting the money so much as frustrated by the way it phased out. It seems really poorly thought out that a family can go from getting a stimulus of several thousand dollars to 0 with such a small difference in gross income. With the previous stimulus, kids counted toward the phase out. I guess I was naïve to assume they would this time too.

[Teenwolf]

This is gonna sound like a very privelged whine fest, but I cannot help vent somewhere.

Not happy with how Biden folded to Manchin over the stimulus limits, especially with a hard cap that doesn't give credit for kids. I was comparing notes with a friend who combined with his wife to make 148k. He has three kids, so will get the full 7k. My wife and I made more than we ever made in 2019 and 2020, taking on all the extra work that we could, moonlighting, teaching extra classes, etc, because her mom lost her job and needed some financial support for her brother who is disabled, and my mom has medical issues and needs financial help as well. We were fortunate to be able to have jobs and work extra, so we did and combined to make more than we ever have, which put us at 161k for the year. We didn't end up keeping any of that extra money--we used it to help extended family. Given what we make, I was not expecting or feeling we should get the full amount, but given that we have two kids, I thought we'd get something, even when I heard about the aggressive phase out. But the 160k is a hard cap, no matter how many dependents you have.

That is the part that is really annoying the hell out of me right now. I get that there has to be a cut off, but living in NY, with the taxes I pay, combined with the fact that we currently have a lot of people leaning on us financially, in addition to our own young kids, we sure could have used something--anything, to help pay off some debt and buy stuff that we have put off. All told, Manchin's cut saved 12 billion out of a 1.9 trillion dollar bill. And Biden folded on it like a house of cards. Again, if they wanted to lower the cut off, I get it, but they should have kept the kids in the equation. If we made what we made with no kids, we would be much more comfortable financially--there is a huge difference between having kids and not that is being ignored with this change in eligibility. I'm sure there are folks even more screwed than we were, folks who made 161k but have 8 or 10 kids. I know it is a lot of money compared to the average (for most of our adult lives, we made below average as students)--it would have seemed like a lot of money to us just 5 years ago. But between the massive taxes of living in NY and the financial burden of our extended family hit harder than us right now, we are left really regretting we didn't combine to make $1500 less. It would have netted us thousands of dollars.

A phase out that goes from thousands to 0 because of a $1500 gross pay difference is an idiotic phase out. I'm not begrudging my friend who will get 7k in stimulus, but he lives in rural Georgia, with much less expenses, and is getting 7k. We will get nada. I believe I'd feel that stark difference for two comparable families was unfair even if it did not negatively impact me. We are obviously much better off than most, so I'm not complaining about not getting the money so much as frustrated by the way it phased out. It seems really poorly thought out that a family can go from getting a stimulus of several thousand dollars to 0 with such a small difference in gross income. With the previous stimulus, kids counted toward the phase out. I guess I was naïve to assume they would this time too.

Well, Biden managed to cut the amount of folks eligible for the $1400 stimmy check by 17 million from the batch Trump gave the $600 checks to, so Biden just made 17 million others pissed off in the way you are. Super smart, austerity politics in the midst of a global crisis.

I've been waiting ages for somebody to bring up cutting the $15/hr minimum wage. If you all think Biden is going to keep his high approval ratings and not get destroyed if he abandons the minimum wage increase, you're smoking stronger stuff than I am. The bullshit excuse of the Senate Parliamentarian recommendations is so laughable. They're trying to pretend this person has authority when it's just a recommendation. Kamala Harris could overrule the recommendation, but she has signaled she won't. That's a very bad move for her own future ambitions. If you want to fuck over the progressives they'll come for your head.

Now, I will state this publicly. If Biden passes a $15/hr minimum wage with a 5 year or less phase in, I will praise him to high heaven and change my avatar back to one praising Biden. That's how certain I am he will fail, but I hope I'm wrong!

But I'm sure it will be something like a $12/hr federal minimum wage, phased in over 10 years, or some such nonsense. Like Kamala's primary campaign proposal of M4A phased in over 10 years which sunk like a rock as soon as she announced it. Transparent bullshit that won't pass the smell test for most voters who get screwed over like Sour Masher did, only they're living below poverty. Good work, yep, gonna crush the midterms.