31.   Critics of price caps say they distort the market, discourage consumers from conserving and add, not stability, but greater uncertainty to the market.

32.   Curtis Hebert, the head of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, is an avid free marketeer who rejects the notion of price caps on the wholesale market.

33.   Davis arrived in Washington for what had initially been billed as star testimony urging FERC to impose price caps.

34.   Critics alleged that generators were allowed to send their electricity out of the state, and bring it back to evade the price cap.

35.   Cruickshank said the new price cap is based on direct comparisons with efficiency at the U.S. regional Bell telephone companies.

36.   Davis had hoped the House bill would call for refunds to California consumers or provide the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission with instructions to impose stricter price caps.

37.   Davis wants the federal government to impose a temporary wholesale price cap on Western electricity sales.

38.   Democrats, who have been pounding the administration for failing to impose price caps, reacted with qualified applause.

39.   Economists called the price cap politically motivated, insufficient and a poor substitute for what many have described as a basic lack of competition in the Irish pub business.

40.   Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said he favored a price cap.