The other night, I was watching a network news program. The commentator was interviewing a former administrator in the U.S. Department of Energy, who is now an executive with a large energy commodities brokerage firm. Well, times are good at the brokerage firm, but the executive did his best to weep crocadile tears for the consumers and corporations around the world, who are being decimated by the cost of gasoline and other petroleum based fuels.
The executive's opening statement said it all ..."The current instability of crude oil prices reflect the "beauty" of the free market system. Increased demand results in higher prices, which inevitably results in reduced consumption and technological innovation."
Now wait a minute sir ... the word "free" means that the action or person is neither restricted nor manipulated. Are you trying to dupe us Americans into thinking that an oil cartel known as OPEC is not involved with the escalating prices? Do you expect us to believe that the doubling of natural gas prices in the United States - an energy source that is plentiful and domestically produced - was not manipulated so that natural gas companies could enjoy the same bonanza as the oil companies? Do you expect us to believe that when there is only three major oil companies now operating in the United States, these three companies don't try to maximize their profits? In fact these companies are now making the largest profits of any corporations of any time in world history.
One's economic politics aside, the fact is that the more than doubling of gasoline and diesal prices in the United States and Europe is having a catastrophic effect on our economies. Many individual households and companies have either gone bankrupt or are tetering at the edge right now. The prices of foods and animal feeds seem to be going up daily. MOST Americans are suffering the worst drop in their standard living the nation as seen since the Great Depression of 1928. And yes ...we seem to be headed toward an even Greater Depression real fast. Back then, the majority of Americans lived on the farm, or at least owned a garden. A extremely tiny minority of Americans even live on farms, and most of those farms do not grow their own food. They are merely businesses that specialize in the production of one or two agricultural comodities.
The reason that political leaders and bureaucrats are appearing to ignore the obvious is that their incomes are far, far above that of average Americans. Economic sacrafice to them means shortening their quarterly vacation by one day or going to Colorado to ski this Christmas instead of Switzerland. I have not noticed any leader of any major party come up with any proposed solution of substance. They seem to be avoiding the issue as much as possible.
The other day a blowhard ultra-righter in a supermarket waiting line annouced to all of us that the solution to the gasoline prices is to first kill all the environmentalists, then kill Obama, and then open up oil drilling anywhere that oil companies want to go. The obvious insanity of killing so many people aside, drilling for new oil sites this year, would have no effect on the oil supply for many, many years to come.
What our country immediately needs to do is develop alternatives to imported oil for our energy sources and apply existing technologies to transportation. The use of compact electric carts for daily errands around town, would dramatically reduce gasoline consumption. Installation of massive solar collectors to recharge those domestically produced carts would eliminate the need of power companies to expand central electrical generation plants. Right now, Peachtree City, GA a planned community southwest of Atlanta, has over 9000 electric carts in operation. I am proud to say that I prepared the original plans for Peachtree City's electric cart trail system. This is old technology and it works!!!!! OK I don't look that old - Creek Indians just age slowly 
Without a political resolve from all political parties to address the crisis, our nation is doomed to quickly become a weak, second tier nation, whose sovreignty is being held ransom by a group of non-democratic sheikdoms and Latin American demogoges. We do not have much time left before a catastrophe will strike that could take decades or centuries to repair - if ever.
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| Exploding Fuel Prices - A Global Catastrophe in the Making |
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buatbu
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Jun 14 @ 5:32PM
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Boy have you been brainwashed!
We can't drill for oil less then 200-250 miles off shore. However Cuba which is only 90 MILES AWAY is allowing China and India to drill between the US and Cuba. They will also "SLANT" drill which will allow them to get closer to US shore.
Currently the world is using 87 million barrels of oil a day but producing ONLY 85 barrels a day. You do the math. More oil (supply) means lower prices (demand) It is called the law of supply and demand. The U.S. is producing only 50 % of the oil we did 25 years ago.
What kind of "other energy" will replace 87 MILLION BARRELS A DAY??????
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Etowah
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Jun 14 @ 6:06PM
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Sorry, the days of Americans being bullied by right-wing bullies is over. The caustic words and belittling of others just doen't fool anybody anymore. Notice that the comment began with a belittling of the writer. That is classic fascist tactic that goes make to Mussolini's political campaigns in the early 1920s and was polished Adolf Hitler in the early 1930s
No, I am not being brain washed - I am paying $4 a gallon for gasoline and my natural gas bill just doubled even though, I am using much less than last year. You just don't get it do you Mr. Oilman. Your profits are killing our country. What is good for three oil mega- oil companies is definitely catastrophic for everybody else.
The excessive prices of oil based energies are are an involuntary transfer of my economic well-being to your well-being. I realize that it should be the patriotic thing for most Americans to go bankrupt to show their continued support for bankrupt national energy policies, but history has shown us that at a certain point, the people of any nation get fed up with a tiny minority owning most of the wealth, and political instability results. That is exactly what caused the violance of the French Revolution. The reason that the American Revolution went a different direction is that in 1783 the new United States had the most egalitarian economy of any nation in the history of mankind. Such now is not the case.
The 87 million barrels of oil a day, you claim is there is not necessarily a proven reserve. The actual available daily production that is practical under oil drilling technology would not affect the world supply significantly in the near future. We will need that oil later anyway to make fuels, plastics and asphalt when other supplies run out,
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ragtopcookie
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Jun 14 @ 6:41PM
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all i know is.....the four dollar mark in fuel prices will cause some to be upset.....and what we need to do as citizens of this counrty is to band together and do something about this ripp-off.....if we need to storm the white house to do it......something needs to be done.....and now.........cookie
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hereshannon
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Jun 14 @ 9:53PM
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You are exactly right, using electric cars is the solution to the problem. All local travel should be done with electric vehicles, and all long distance travel should be done with hydrogen powered vehicles. With current technology, if we placed solar panels in just 10% of Nevada we could produce enough electricity to power the entire country. Likewise, if we were to place wind turbines in 10 percent of North Dakota we could produce enough electricity to power the entire country. The only thing stopping this is political corruption. All the energy companies know that their days are numbered, so they are all scrambling to take over the alternative energy sources, so they will be able to rip us off until the end of time!
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Etowah
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Jun 15 @ 12:03AM
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If any one wonders what oil executives do with all those billions of dollars of profits after they have taken all the vacations they can stand and built the biggest houses they can keep clean, just look at the donors to candidates in your region. Candidates committed to doing nothing about the skyrocketing cost of living get the oil industry's money, big time.
One notorious example ...former Senator Mack Cleland of Georgia was the only paraplegic to serve in the U S Senate. He lost his legs and one arm in combat in Viet Nam - a certified war hero, if there ever was on. He had also been about the only Secretary of Veteran Affairs that ever truly cared about the welfare of the veterans. He was considered one of the most conservative Democrats in Congress. That wasn't good enough though, Mack wanted to see our country free of dependence on foreign oil imports for national security reasons, and that made him a "bad guy" to the oil industry and the arms industry.
The oil and defense industries (primarily those based in Texas) put together an 84 million dollar TV saturation program which repeatedly portrayed Senator Cleland as a traitor and secret agent for Al Quaida. Night after night after night, Georgia television viewers saw Cleland in a fake photo standing between Sadam Hussein and Osama ben Ladin. It was like something out of the Manchurian Candidate.
His Republican opponent was a draft dodger who feigned a "bad knee" to his family doctor while in law school, in order to get out of being drafted. However, Saxby Chambiss, also promised to push through legislation that eliminated restrictions on oil drilling and fight any attempts to tax eccess profits made by Exxon.
Guess who won the election?
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travelwoman
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Jun 15 @ 1:13AM
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Many individual households and companies have either gone bankrupt or are tetering at the edge right now. The prices of foods and animal feeds seem to be going up daily. MOST Americans are suffering the worst drop in their standard living the nation as seen since the Great Depression of 1928. And yes ...we seem to be headed toward an even Greater Depression real fast .
....
The use of compact electric carts for daily errands around town, would dramatically reduce gasoline consumption
The main problem for using less gas, and therefore oil,.... you can find it in your own blog, put together in another way.... as I did.
Hey, I would buy a hybrid car to begin with today rather than tomorrow. But since my personal economy is so drained by the gas prices I had to pay lately, and buy the food prices that are so horrid that I basically run through the store in order to get to the check-out before it goes up again.... I don't have any spare dollar for any high-priced technology.
It will be as usual.... those who are rich (or do farely well) will be able to save their dollars because they can afford the newer technologies, while those who are poor (and there are more and more of those) must continue riding their old, gas-guzzling too-big cars, because they cannot save a penny, because of the gas prices.
The cat bites its tail....
Your info on this blog is very interesting, as is "cookies" comment.
But.... what COULD anybody ACTUALLY DO????? (I mean with no extra dollars, which we obviously have less and less....)
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Etowah
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Jun 15 @ 7:09AM
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Bob Barr, the Libertarian presidential candidate, has his law office in our town. Like Max Cleland, he is concerned about the national security aspects of the fuel cost explosion. In a speech the other day, he listed the massive increase in our trade deficit and federal budget deficit being caused by the oil producers and processors getting rich, while everyone else is getting poorer. Barr really didn't state a solution for his observation, but the implications are great.
We are at the point now where the federal government could GIVE an electric cart to every household - you know one that is enclosed and had lights and a heater -and still be far better off fiscally, than continue to have our national energy policies directed by Exxon and Haliburton corporations.
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jaynie
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Jun 15 @ 11:17PM
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Max Cleland's "war hero" status may be a bit suspect. He was injured while wearing grenades across his chest and accidentally somehow snagging a pin. He had been told several times previous to remove the grenades and wear them as regulations dictated.
I met Max Cleland while visiting Capitol Hill on ALS Advocacy Day several years ago (of course, while he was still in office). He had (and probably still has) the disgusting habit of relying upon the pity of others instead of cultivating their true respect. I don't mean to say that he has not accomplished much despite his disability - he clearly has. But in person, he does tend to use disability as a crutch. He never seems to let anyone forget it.
Having experienced disability myself (confined to a wheelchair for two years), I rapidly saw just how easy it is to play the part of "poor little me". It's disgusting and demeaning.
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