Hacker News Reader

Comment by DiabloD3 | Hacker News Reader

So, seeing as how the Governor of Nevada just cost thousands of citizens of his state their job, in an industry that is progressive and required for the survival of that state (and the nation as a whole), why has the state legislature not immediately begun impeachment?

Politicians need to be taught that they serve at the pleasure of the people, and when they stop doing what they are told, they will no longer be employed. Nevada has been one of the most pro-solar states in the US, and what he is doing is political suicide.

View on HN

>why has the state legislature not immediately begun impeachment?

I was under the impression that impeachment is not a "I didn't get my way, I'm going to remove you from office" card. It's not for validating the whims of the electorate because some of them think they're not being served. It's for bringing official charges to an elected official and putting them on trial. What charges can you file against the governor based on this short article and actually bring to trial?

I know it isn't but technically it really should be. What use is it to have someone represent you that no longer serves your interests.

I think the "we don't like what you've done" mechanism is a recall election rather than an impeachment. Of course, lots of places don't even have those.

Under this same logic the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) would have lead to the impeachment of the President and most of the Democrats in Congress. It was HUGELY unpopular and has only recently become so-so... 5 YEARS after it was passed.

I think the best legal action is SolarCity (and others) to sue the State of Nevada over loss of business. Is that possible?

You want to create a right to not lose business because of government action? Are you sure about that?

You just entirely destroyed the EPA.

It already exists: investor state dispute settlement.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investor-state_dispute_settlem...

While in some sense that corresponds to the words I used (by which I mean, I see why you mention it as relevant), it definitely doesn't come close to applying here, as that is international law.

You just need to find the right angle to sue someone. That's probably hard for a company without a billion dollars to spend on lawyers.

A better argument would be, as the NV consumer advocate asserted, that the way they reduced a previously agreed-upon rate is illegal: http://www.utilitydive.com/news/nevada-regulators-will-consi...

To be clear, my point is and was that that is a terrible line of argumentation, not that there are no possible good ones.

Isn't this what the TPP does?

> would allow foreign corporations to sue the United States government for actions that undermine their investment “expectations” and hurt their business

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/26/business/trans-pacific-par...

You just entirely destroyed the EPA.

Yeah, but there's probably bad consequences to it also.

Actually, such a right exists in some cases, in particular, if it's found to be a taking.

https://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42635.pdf

Additionally, states generally can't impair existing contracts through legislation due to the contracts clause.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_Clause (mainly because i'm too lazy to write it all up here).

Nevada has had a Republican governor since 1999. Sandoval, the current governor, is in his second term, was reelected about year ago with 90% of the vote in the Republican primary and 70% of the vote in the general election, and currently has something like a 2/3 approval rating in state polls.

His Wikipedia page currently has one section which is a long hit piece written by pro-solar flacks, but that seems likely to be cleaned up as soon as other Wikipedia editors take notice. Other than that, I don’t see much evidence that he’s in any particular trouble.

“Political suicide” seems like a fairly dramatic exaggeration, unless you’re sitting on some information the rest of us don’t know about.

(Note: I think the Nevada Republican party is crazy, and am strongly pro-solar myself... but let’s not kid ourselves here.)

Edit: Sandoval’s statement about the SolarCity announcement, http://www.news3lv.com/media/lib/166/0/e/8/0e8f2127-0e76-464...

It's only political suicide if you have no political capital (aka favors that other people owe you). This is how politicians can get away with things and not get impeached or voted out of office.

> Politicians need to be taught that they serve at the pleasure of the people, and when they stop doing what they are told, they will no longer be employed.

I have seen very little evidence that this is true, at least in the last 50 years or so. Sure, there are isolated recalls here and there, but the vast majority suffer no repercussions regardless of how they act.

A single vote every few years is a piss-poor way of making your voice heard, but it's what we have. The current state of affairs makes it seem clear that our system does not work well, regardless of what we were taught in Civics class.

Most people don't have time or know how to protest even when they are pissed about law changes. There should probably be a class on this in grade school.

That coupled with deep pocket companies supplying nearly 90% of campaign financing to elected officials narrows the choices to the point the voters can never get a candidate which truly represents their interests.

The article said 550, where did you get the thousands figure? Is it from other solar companies? How many employees does NV Energy have and how many millions did they offer the state in discounts or whatever. It's unfortunate that they are working against solar, but I would be very surprised if this affair has a negative financial effect for Nevada in the short term.

edit: woops that's what I get for skimming too fast, thanks :)

> Other Nevada solar companies with higher cost structures than SolarCity are expected to collectively lay off thousands of additional Nevadans in the coming months.

From the article, "Other Nevada solar companies with higher cost structures than SolarCity are expected to collectively lay off thousands of additional Nevadans in the coming months." That's probably where he is getting the thousands figure.

According to Wikipedia, NV Energy employs ~2500 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NV_Energy

If the people of Nevada would vote on higher electricity rates in exchange for some people getting a subsidy on soar panels, I doubt the subsidy would win.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com