| This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a top-secret battery project of Bloomberg Opinion's opinions. Sign up here. Today's AgendaTesla's Texas SolutionWhen Texas' power grid failed last month, plunging millions into icy darkness, Governor Greg Abbott rushed to blame green energy. His wrongness was immediately obvious, but even today we're still discovering new levels of that wrongness. In fact, Liam Denning writes, green energy properly applied could have kept Texans warm and well-lit in February. Tesla could be involved in this, and not just with the top-secret battery project outside Houston that Bloomberg News revealed this week. Tesla and other car makers have thousands of potential powerhouses already on the ground in Texas, Liam writes: Electric vehicles plugged into the grid could ensure the "reliability" part of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which Elon Musk mocked. Musk's secret battery project might provide 100 megawatts of storage. A Texas car fleet that is half-electrified could provide 23 gigawatts, by Liam's estimate, or enough to meet a third of the state's demand at the worst point of February's crisis. Dismiss green energy at peril of profound wrongness. Read the whole thing. Biden's Stimulus WinPresident Joe Biden signed his $1.9 trillion Covid relief package into law a day early today, meaning checks could start rolling out as soon as this weekend. That could make a bill already polling at 75% even more popular. In olden times, this would have been a political disaster for the Republican Party, as not a single one of its lawmakers voted for this popular bill. (Though some are trying to claim credit for parts of it anyway.) It's also chock-full of what once would have been major policy setbacks for the GOP. But Jonathan Bernstein writes the MAGA-era party's top priority is owning the liberals, which precludes seriously negotiating with them for better outcomes. Better to lose and feed the Fox grievance machine than to win a little and be labeled a RINO. Biden will cap his big day with a prime-time speech tonight, marking not only the bill's passage but also the one-year anniversary of the WHO declaring the Covid pandemic (not to mention the NBA canceling its season and Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson catching the disease). It would seem out of character for him to dunk on his rivals or take a premature victory lap, but the temptation may be overwhelming, warns Robert George. For his own good and that of the country, he must resist. The battle against Covid, for one thing, is far from over. Potemkin Vaccine PassportsEarlier today, Biden tweeted that 1 in 4 American adults has gotten at least one Covid vaccine shot. The number of fully vaccinated people is an even more elite group, which probably feels ready to get back to normal life yesterday. To that end, some have proposed passports that would let the vaccinated travel, kiss grandkids and eat in restaurants. Such wild privileges could help change the minds of the millions of Americans who still refuse to get vaccinated. OR, perhaps just as likely, they could make those Americans really angry they don't have vaccine passports. Tyler Cowen explores all the many, many hurdles to making vaccine passports work and proposes a compromise: The government could announce a passport system to encourage people to get shots, but then drag its feet so long it never has to actually solve the puzzle of making passports a reality. Bury it in bureaucracy, in other words, like the Ark of the Covenant. Further Pandemic Reading: The 1957 and 1968 flu pandemics weren't nearly as deadly as we've been told. — Justin Fox Telltale ChartsThe flawed Optional Practical Training program is putting low-paid guest workers in STEM jobs and keeping them there, depressing wages and keeping American STEM grads from work, writes Rachel Rosenthal. Biden has a golden opportunity to reform it.  Germany overreacted to the Fukushima disaster by hastily shutting down nuclear power plants, writes Andreas Kluth. Meanwhile, it's slow to shut down coal plants. Its priorities are upside down, in other words.  Further Reading Biden should re-engage with Cuba, but Havana must reciprocate this time. — Bloomberg's editorial board You can question Cathie Wood's strategy but not the durability of the ARK ETF. — Jared Dillian Universal basic income could help Gulf countries wean themselves from oil. — Ziad Daoud The UN must stop dragging its feet and help the people of Myanmar avoid genocide. — Ruth Pollard The Greenhill debacle is another black eye for Credit Suisse's asset management business. — Elisa Martinuzzi Adidas is betting we'll be wearing sweatpants for a long time. — Andrea Felsted The Knicks may continue to be terrible, but James Dolan is right to re-combine entertainment businesses. — Tara Lachapelle ICYMIA new Covid antibody treatment cuts hospitalization and death of at-risk patients. Amazon has been quietly building a grocery chain. An NFT sold for $69 million at auction. KickersTourist thinks Maine is San Francisco, hilarity ensues. Oldest-known biblical manuscript once dismissed as forgery may not be a forgery. (h/t Scott Kominers for the first two kickers) The Brood X cicadas are returning after 17 years. (h/t Alistair Lowe) RIP to the inventor of the cassette tape. Notes: Please send mixtapes and complaints to Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.net. Sign up here and follow us on Twitter and Facebook. | 
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