Major Bush supporter caused “Blackout 20 03”?

“The Ohio power company failed to separate from the national electric grid, as it was supposed to and as Michigan did. Thus the cascade of problems was sent on to New York.

"The system is designed to isolate itself to protect that area, to have the area go down and have the rest of the system survive. And instead it spread further and longer than it should have," said Michehl R. Gent, president and CEO of the North American Electric Reliability Council.

A spokesman for the Ohio power company, FirstEnergy Corp., said it had followed all proper procedures but would not comment specifically on whether it had triggered the huge blackout by failing to separate.

"If they had separated you might have seen a region in Ohio area that would have been without power, but you would not have seen it in almost a national scale, as we did," Divan said.

Where It All Began – ABC News


The President of First Energy, Tony Alexander, is a Bush "Pioneer," meaning he raised more than $100,000 in individual contributions for the 2000 Bush presidential campaign. Alexander was also a major player in the Bush Energy Transition Team, according to the National Resources Defense Council.

Much of the $100,000 was "donated" by First Energy employees:

When Republican presidential front-runner George W. Bush visited Akron Aug. 20, his campaign coffers swelled with the proceeds from a well-publicized $1,000-a-plate luncheon attended by more than 300 prominent GOP supporters.

But three weeks earlier, the same hotel hosted a private gathering of corporate executives also interested in financing the Texas governor's White House bid.

The earlier event at the Hilton Akron/Fairlawn wasn't billed as a fund-raiser. All the same, it poured tens of thousands into the Bush campaign -- vividly demonstrating how a major corporation can flex its political muscle despite laws aimed at curbing the power of big business to affect elections.

The occasion was the annual two-day conference of high-level managers of FirstEnergy Corp., the Akron-based utility giant that provides electricity for homes and businesses across northern Ohio and into western Pennsylvania.

Amid the usual business of business, about 170 executives, directors, supervisors, managers and spouses heard a hard sales pitch for donations for Bush.

There was nothing illegal about that. While corporations are barred by law from donating a dime to a presidential candidate, nothing stops them from asking their employees to give.

And give they did.

In the following days, 111 employees and spouses of FirstEnergy and corporate subsidiaries came through to the tune of $69,600 -- nearly 7 percent of all contributions made by Ohioans to Bush in the critical first six months of his campaign.

UTILITY EMPLOYEES BRIGHTEN BUSH'S COFFERS


Props to Mahablog”

“That's cool. How'd you find it?”

“If that was an actual satellite photo, the power would have been out over wide portions of the Virginias, Maryland, southern Pa., and into the Carolinas!”

“Looks like somebody put it into Photoshop and took an eraser tool to it!”

“Well, it was neat while it lasted. I would have believed it.”

“You weren't the only one, SMW...don't feel bad.”

“It would have been a lot more believable if the idiot who did it had even a passing knowledge of geography!”

“I heard there were a few of those floating around the 'Net.

The real NOAA images.”

“Yep - my sister e-mailed it to me. I really hate to 'snopes' her again. My family is going to leave me out of all those forwarded rumors if I'm not careful. DANG!”

“Well you could just give her a geography lesson and leave Snopes out of it ...”

“The only thing worse than telling someone that something they emailed you is bull#&%!$, is telling them that it was also obviously bull#&%!$...”

“Yeah, I can see now how that might start an internecine fight.”

“You should have seen the e-mails I got when I sent them all a link to my homepage.”

“And you being such a nice guy.”

“Message from my sister: "You suck."”

“I'm assuming that's different from her regular correspondence with you...

Hey, no one ever said that debunking bull#&%!$ would make you the most popular guy in the world. However, you do get the satisfaction of feeling smarter than everyone else.”

“I had to work or other wise I could
travel and finally find some dark
sky...for my telescope!”

“And now the lights go off in London! - Coincidence?”

“London Black out? I didn't know.
I thought I would use that satellite map as reference for
Dark sky society. They would like
to see a hood on every street light
so the light shines down, not reflected up. The last decade has
seen some mega money telescope arrays built,mostly south of the
equator because of light pollution.”

“Was just reading about the London blackout. I sympathize with those people, having the recent one from here so fresh in my mind. It really can be hell for some folks, depending on where you are, what you are doing and what it takes to get home and get to the people you can't get hold of...”

“Theirs was only a half hour

Blackout”

“that was bush's fault too”

“That map didn't black out Michigan either. For my business the hardest hit area was up there.”