Who's to blame for those high gas prices?

Wain, you have an oil leak! Oil supply is not the problem. Here in America we burn about forty-million to fifty-million gallons of gasoline per day more than our refineries can supply. America has not built an oil refinery in over thirty years. This excess demand is covered by imported gasoline, much of which comes from Europe. Oil rich countries can increase crude oil supplies but this will not change our American problem of a lack of ability to refine crude oil into gasoline and diesel. Unless America builds more refineries, demand will always exceed supply. High demand, low supply, high prices. Another problem is America mixes ethanol with gasoline, around ten to twenty percent. This is to comply with environmental laws. Ethanol reduces the octane rating of gasoline so cars are designed to dump more gasoline into engines to compensate for a loss of power. Because of ethanol, America is using a higher amount of gasoline relative to years past. Ethanol burns cleaner but a fuel to air ratio must be lower for efficient burn; more fuel is used but less smog produced. About one-third of the price of gasoline is the fear dividend, real or imaginary. Fear of disruption of oil supplies adds about thirty-three percent to the price of gasoline. This is a direct result of the Cheney-Bush foreign policy which has two wars going on and much terrorism and tension all around our world. Wall Street greed, which politicians prefer to label “speculation” accounts for another ten percent or so of the price of gasoline. Yes, Cheney and Bush are oilmen and big oil companies are certainly adding to their vulgar profits through significant tax breaks along with Bush appointing Christopher Cox, who has prior indictments for financial crime, appointing Cox to chair the Securities and Exchange commission. Cox is Wall Street’s favorite son. Since Cox took the chair, securities regulation enforcement has fallen to record lows. How big oil companies make profits is so simple. Current profit per barrel of oil, this is, profit per single barrel of oil, is in the range of thirty to forty dollars. Commodity trading sets a price of $120 per barrel, Americans are actually paying $150 to $160 per crude oil barrel when the final product, gasoline and diesel, is produced. There is one more factor involved in big oil company profits, the most simple of all. This simple profit is the lag time between buying oil and processing oil. Moving oil around our world, moving oil around America, takes a lot of time, days, weeks even months. Oil is bought today for $100 per barrel, tomorrow the per barrel price flies to $120 per barrel. Gasoline and diesel prices instantly increase but oil companies are still processing the cheaper $100 per barrel oil. This is an instant additional $20 per barrel profit earned simply by the lag time of moving oil from the ground, to tanker, to pipes and finally to refineries; oil profits increase while oil is still moving through the pipes! Oil companies charge fuel prices based on the commodities daily price, not the price actually paid for current oil being refined. America is currently using five percent to ten percent less gasoline than past years. Our oil usage is falling but crude oil prices continue to rise. This is happening because India and China are dramatically increasing usage of crude oil. America can cut our oil usage in half and fuel prices will continue to climb because of increasing demand by India and China. Supply of oil is not the problem. Fear around our world, commodities market greed and wasteful usage of oil by developing third world countries is the problem. There is no need for America to ruin our pristine wilderness areas, no need to spoil our oceans, no need to increase our supply of oil because we do not have the capacity to refine oil to meet our daily demand. Should we build more refineries, which are extremely expensive, by the time we bring those refineries on-line, a decade or so away, our fuel consumption will be below what refineries can supply because of more efficient cars, hybrids, electric cars and better mass transit; we will have an excess supply of gasoline and diesel fuel. What America can do, right now, to reduce the price of oil all around our world, is to bring an end to our wars in the Middle-east, bring an end to Islamic terrorism, develop better relationships with all countries, other words, bring peace to our world. This would cut the price of oil in half. America is going Green. This is the rage. Large vehicles are of the past, even if gasoline prices drop by one-half. America has learned a hard lesson and we will not repeat this mistake of being energy wasteful. Increasing oil supplies is not the answer, world peace is the answer. Peace pays an excellent dividend, much more than the fear dividend. By-the-by, price of regular gasoline here in Southern California is about $3.90 to $4.00 per gallon. On the average, my husband uses six gallons of gas per month, I use an avearge of five gallons of gas per month. We are doing our part. Okpulot Taha Choctaw Nation

HOW AMERICA BECAME FOREIGN OIL DEPENDENT & WHY IT STAYS THAT WAY The United States agreed to transfer jobs and technology to developing countries under INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENT Algiers Declaration Algiers, Algeria, 4-6 March 1975 "With regard to the depletable natural resources, as OPEC’s petroleum resources are, it is essential that the transfer of technology must be commensurate in speed and volume with the rate of their depletion, which is being accelerated for the benefit and growth of the economies of the developed countries" A major portion of the planned or new petrochemical complexes, oil refineries and fertilizer plants be built in the territories of OPEC Member Countries with the co-operation of industrialized nations for export purposes to the developed countries with guaranteed access for such products to the markets of these countries. [Excerpt from declaration] Read sections 10 and 11] FOREIGN TAX CREDITS In 1977 Representative Benjamin Rosenthal of New York produced secret Internal Revenue Service documents going back to 1950. They showed that the tax laws of Saudi Arabia were drafted with the help of Aramco to call the added price of oil not a "royalty" or "cost of doing business," as was proper, but an income tax." The Saudis did this knowing that income tax paid to a foreign country is deductible from the income taxes an oil company pays the United States on all income received in the United States by the parent firm. From Pgs. 61-64 The Media Monopoly by Ben H. Bagdikian 5th edition paperback color emphasis added "This practice, perfected in Saudi Arabia, was quickly adopted elsewhere. Eventually, every oil-producing nation where American companies had a concession enacted an income tax law to increase its oil revenue by tapping the foreign tax credit provision of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code." From pgs. 183-190 America: Who Really Pays The Taxes by Donald L.Barlett & James B. Steele paperback "Since that time the major multinational U.S. oil companies have paid hardly a penny of U.S. income tax on their foreign income." page130 BANKS. BORROWERS, AND THE ESTABLISHMENT SO CONSUMERS WILL ULTIMATELY PAY MORE REFINERIES IN AMERICA OPERATING AT 85% CAPACITY Excerpts from Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois floor statement http://durbin.senate.gov/showRelease.cfm?releaseId=296989 below: That is fact. The oil companies say: Well, the problem is we do not have enough refineries. If we had more, then we would have more product and we might have a smaller spread and we would not be. Let me tell you what: Today, the refineries in America are operating at 85 percent of capacity. Do not buy this argument that it is about refineries. They have more capacity. They are holding back so they can keep their product dear and limited and short, and so the consumers will ultimately pay more. This morning, British Petroleum, BP, announced they made $7.6 billion in profits in the first quarter of 2008. Royal Dutch Shell announced $9.08 billion in the first quarter. We are still waiting for ExxonMobil. Understand, these are not the biggest profits in the history of the oil industry, these are the largest profits in the history of American business, some say in the history of all business throughout mankind; the largest profit taking ever. At whose expense? At the expense of consumers and families, small businesses, truckers, airlines, and our economy.

There is no energy crisis! There no oil shortage! See for youself! A must see!!! "The Non-Energy Crisis" by Rev. Lindsey Williams http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3340274697167011147

Who cares who�s is to blame. What are we going to do about it. From my viewpoint, there are 2 or 3 options. Sell your car, buy a bike and take mass transit. Drive less or buy an electric car or a car powered by hydrogen. And option 3 is buy a pair of comfortable Nike�s and get ready for some walking. Since all of these options are out of the question for me, I decided to try and do something about it. While looking around, I stumbled across GasBankUSA, located at http://www.gasbankusa.com. The site talks about fixed price gasoline and locking in at a fixed price. An interesting concept and a little better than my magic 8 ball which continually tells me �try again later� everytime I ask it where are gas prices going OR will gas prices continue to rise. Looking through this site, it looks like a way to take control over something we had no control over in the past.