Gas prices have more than doubled since President Bush was inaugurated. In some places in the US gas prices have risen by more than 120% since Bush took office. For anyone to suggest that it is all a political ploy would be quite naïve and extremely difficult to prove. Instead my argument is written to make the point that there are forces that are controlling the price of gas in the United States and that the recent decline in the prices is not due to less demand but is because we are in an election year that could usher out many republicans and some democrats who have been friends of Big Oil companies.
Below are the usually stated reasons why Gas prices have risen.
(1) demands for gasoline exceeds supply
(2) hurricanes Katrina and Rita damage to Big Oil infrastructure
(3) leaks in the Alaskan Pipeline
(4) rising price of Crude Oil
(5) inadequate refining capabilities
(6) government regulation of specialty fuels
(7) the War in the Middle East
Let’s say we can agree that all of these are factors. The first question I ask is that if these oil companies pocketed $110 BILLION in profit in 2005, don’t they have enough to gauge what supply is needed? Don’t they have enough to put into Research and Development to have adequate predictability models so they can refine enough oil to get the gasoline to market. Only an extremely uninformed person or a liar would answer “No” to these questions.
Why do gas prices go up in the summer? The common answer is because Americans travel more in the summer so the demand is greater. But oil stockpiles are currently at an 8 year high.
Has anyone ever noticed that gas prices went up immediately after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita were plotted to hit the southern coasts? Gas prices also went up as soon as we announced we had attacked Iraq. There was not reason the prices to go up because there was absolutely no affect on the supplies. The prices went up to help those who held stock in the oil companies and refineries make profits. The only people hurt by this were the average Americans.
Gas prices are raised because Big Oil tycoons want to make profits and for no other reason. It is insane that the greatest profits to Big Oil have occurred under the Bush Administration. Oil executives making out like bandits. Exxon is giving Lee Raymond one of the most generous retirement packages in history, nearly $400 million, including pension, stock options and other perks. [ABC News, 4/14/06] Raymond's retirement deal and paycheck in 2005 amount to $141,000 a day, or nearly $6,000 an hour. [ABC News, 4/14/06] The top executive for Occidental Petroleum received about $63 million in total compensation last year, an increase of more than 50 percent over 2004, while the CEO for Chevron received nearly $37 million. [New York Times, 4/15/06]
Is Bush from Texas? Do any members of the Bush family hold blind trusts? Do most politicians democrat and republican have blind trusts? Are you naïve enough to believe that there is anything blind about a blind trust held by a politician?
Finally someone should ask about shale oil deposits in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming that could supply American with oil that it needs for more than 100 years. Why has the public not been informed? Why is there no debate on its merits? They mine shale oil in Estonia and in Brazil and also until recently in Australia. We can do more, but congress to sit on its collective behind.
THE LINK TO THE BUSH ADMINSTRATION TO THE HIGH PRICES
(1) Vice President Cheney convened an energy task force that secretly met with energy company executives to develop the nation's energy policy. He never even met with consumer or environmental groups [Washington Post, 11/16/05]. The result was a national energy policy that failed to restrain energy prices, that failed to plan for the future, and that failed to take into account our environment or national security. Five years later, we are reaping the fruit of the Administration's energy policy.
(2) Oil companies helped write the Administration's energy policy. Recently disclosed documents show that in February, March, and April of 2001, executives from Exxon Mobil, Conoco, Shell, and BP met with Cheney's task force. Just a week before the documents came to light, chief executives of most of those companies denied, while testifying before Congress, that they had met with the Cheney task force. [Washington Post, 11/16/05]
(3) The Bush Administration filled key posts with executives and top officials from the oil and gas industry. As Newsweek commented, "[n]ot since the rise of the railroads more than a century ago has a single industry placed so many foot soldiers at the top of a new administration." [Newsweek, May 14, 2001]
(4) President Bush himself was involved in oil ventures in Texas and abroad in the 1980s. Bush ran Arbusto Energy, a firm which after a few years became the Bush Exploration Oil Co. [National Journal, 4/7/01]
(5) Vice President Cheney was the Former CEO of Halliburton, the world's largest oil field services company. In August, 2000, Cheney received $20.6 million for his sale of Halliburton stock. Since taking office in 2001, Vice President Cheney has received about $800,000 in deferred compensation from Halliburton, as well as a $1.4 million bonus in 2001. [Los Angeles Times, 10/14/04; New York Times, 4/16/05; New York Times, 4/15/06]
(6) Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice served on the board of directors for Chevron, a major U.S. oil company, for 10 years. In fact, Chevron even named an oil tanker in her honor.
(7) Don Evans, former Secretary of Commerce, spent 25 years at Tom Brown, Inc., a $1.2 billion Denver-based oil and gas company where he was chairman. As CEO, Evans was given a retirement package worth $5.3 million when he left to become Commerce Secretary. [Gas Daily, 2/26/01, PR Newswire, 2/22/01; USA Today, 1/22/01; www.crp.org]
(8) The most prominent member of the Energy Department transition team was Enron's Chief Executive Ken Lay, who died after being on trial for manipulating energy markets and robbing consumers of hundreds of millions of dollars. [Washington Post, 5/16/04]
(9) Republicans rejected a real energy independence plan. In 2002, the Senate passed a Democratic energy bill that would have eased today's energy crisis by advancing our alternative fuel infrastructure, requiring more ethanol to be on the market, and improving our energy efficiency. Instead of passing these critical provisions, Republicans chose to derail the entire energy bill in conference negotiations because they could not pass one special interest provision - liability protection for oil companies producing MTBE, which has contaminated drinking water across the country. [Environment and Energy Daily, 12/2/02]
(10) Republicans enacted royalty relief totaling $7 billion. Oil companies stand to gain a minimum of $7 billion and as much as $28 billion over the next five years under an obscure provision in last year's giant energy bill pushed by Republican leadership that allows companies to avoid paying royalties on oil and gas produced in the Gulf of Mexico. [New York Times, 3/29/06]
(11) Republicans enacted oil and gas subsidies -- DeLay's hometown drilling research for Halliburton. Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) managed to insert at least $500 million in subsidies over a 10-year period -- with the option to triple the amount -- for research into deep-water oil and gas drilling, a grant that many lawmakers expect to go to a Texas Consortium "Research Partnership to Secure Energy in America" located in DeLay's home town of Sugar Land [Washington Post, 7/30/05]. This provision would benefit Halliburton, which has been accused of overcharging taxpayers on its contracts in Iraq, and Marathon Oil.
Just for the record, unless things change in Washington, the same will happen even if the democrats control both houses, but probably not in such a blatant way. Big Oil has no real answers. They only have rhetoric and lies. I have laid out the TRUTH. Is it a conspiracy….well, decide for yourself based on the facts, not on rhetoric and state in your comment if you think its a conspiracy.
Is is a coincidence that prices are going down in the home stretch of an election year............Absolutely not! How is it that oil field can burn and the next morning the gas prices have risen by 15 cents. The gas at the pumps was already paid for. Its a rip off. A big time rip off. As for the election connection, the Big Oil barrons want to reduce the chances of it becoming a huge campaign issue and facing further government campaign promises to investigate them.
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