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Fred Dooley, Real Debate Wisconsin

Does Big Oil have a fair oil trade policy for the Nigerians? No! The author's supply/demand statements are no longer effective on the supply side. He believes there is plenty of supply available if only Big Oil would be allowed to drill in environmentally sensitive areas. How come the world reserves have not increased dramatically in the face of such high prices? It is because Oil is a non-renewable global resource and it is running out--period. Demand reduction (whether because of high prices or conservation) is the only part of the curve that can easily be affected now.

dave allen (Mon May 05 07:27:01 2008)

Eliminating the gas tax would be like pulling your fist from a bucket of water. The hole will fill almost immediately with price increases from the oil conspiracy. Add a windfall tax and they’ll again make it up with increased prices. No amount of price manipulation will work.

But the Feds could break up ExxonMobil, as they did Standard Oil in 1911. And we must revisit nuclear power and look at converting coal to gas.

Then Congress must authorize a new oil exploration effort to drill in the deep Gulf, and create a federally-owned entity like the U.S. Postal Service to compete with the OPEC conspiracy (where ExxonMobil is part of the problem, not part of the solution). See here.

 Can we make this happen? It won’t be easy with Big Oil owning a piece of every congressman through their campaign contributions, and another piece of those who own oil stock.

Jack Lohman (Mon May 05 07:35:19 2008)

Jack, I agree with almost everything you say. However, I believe focus on the Supply side also will line big oils pockets in light of a world market. Our increase in supply will be exported overseas. Yes, if we do something like nationalization it may increase domestic supplies by internal production. But don't you think conservation/efficiency is the best way?

dave allen (Mon May 05 08:17:52 2008)

"The author's supply/demand statements are no longer effective on the supply side."

I was not aware the basic laws of economics had been over-turned. environmentalists have done everything in their power to curtail supply for years. We are now paying the price.

Fred (Mon May 05 08:20:00 2008)

These comparisons of the per-gallon cost of other valuable goods is non-sense. **I don't buy Starbucks coffee 15 gallons at a time.**

Americans have lived the last century with cheap energy, and now we will have to compete with the Chinese and Indians for the incremental barrels. The bottom line is, we're going to pay more for petroleum. It's the iron law of supply and demand.

Isn't 80% of the worlds oil pumped by government (therefore shoddy) owned oil companies? With decades of mal-investments and drained capital, how in the world could they be expected to get it right?

Even the US gov't nets more per barrel of oil than American oil firms, and Uncle Sugar doesn't even have to risk any of the capital.

Brian Heyer (Mon May 05 08:45:35 2008)

Hmm, who are these new guys? Jo usually uses a bit more logic. "We" control supply and demand? And no mention of the rest of the world wanting more oil and what effect that has on our price? Big Oil is big, but not big enough to build a new refinery without government help? This article seems like pretty thin coffee.

John Foust (Mon May 05 09:13:24 2008)

Ah John, you are the stalker I never wanted.

For once you might want to write something original instead of just being critical of someone else's work.

This was a column of limited space designed to shine the light on the plight of coffee growers and the sub standard wages that they receive.

I used the oil industry as an example with which to draw a comparrison. Your mentioning of global demand as a factor in the over-all picture is valid, but not in relation to this column.

To me it shines the light on the idiocy of our own policy. We should be pumping our own oil and expanding capacity in every way possible to increase supply on the market. Expansion of global demand dicatates that as the logical response. Again, enviro-doom types have fought that at every step ensuring our current situation of short supply and high prices. Politicians of every brand have ensured this bad policy.

Did you ever stop to think that you might speak out for or against an issue instead of just being critical of persons having the courage to do so?

Fred (Mon May 05 11:32:13 2008)

This debate is rather lively today and that's a good sign for Fox Politics.net: mo ' readers, mo' readers, mo' readers. Great. But these guest pieces are a rehash of national issues that you can find at the Cato Institute, the Hoover Institution and the National Review and the Daily Standard. Etc. It's the national debating society not a lot different from what kids do in high school.

Our issues are local. I could make some rhetorical question about "What does Fred know about the Water plant?" or some other local concern. But pundit pleasantries from the usual sources and argument base do nothing to get the local issues on the table. They are diversions only. That's why I've started and stayed reading FP. A bit of de-constructing will reveal the same old admonition to the latee drinking, sushi eating elite who buy the expensive brand that the Right has branded and ranchised over the last 30 years: Listen to these clever arguments because the conservatives know all the answers (with facts to back them up) just like dad on "Father Knows Best."

But since I'm in here and I do have an opinion on the oil crisis I'll try to take the spin off of the captain of the debating club.

The issue of high oil prices is one which may seem like a passing social problem like the oil drought of the 70's. And the question for those with their heads in the sand is "How are we going to keep all the cars running?" This is the wrong question. The right question will only be asked when we fully realize how dependent we've become on making those 17 car trips per day (which is a national statistic.)

That's a local question. And I'll close with another one:

What if the real question is not about high fuel price, but the "For Sale" sign on the local 'FastMart?'

Lon Ponschock (Mon May 05 11:48:25 2008)

Everyone seems to forget that the US is competing with the rest of the world for the oil that is being produced worldwide.
The US can say all they want and only offer to pay less for the million bbl boat loads of oil.. but, it will then just be sold to those other countries that need/use it. It's worldwide competition. A disadvantage we see is that it's priced in US Dollars here. The value of the dollar keeps droping.. Thus the price of our oil/gas seems to us to go up. Compare the price of a year ago to the value or the Euro/gold/silver/Canadian$ etc and it isn't as changed as compared to the $.

Fritz Voecks (Mon May 05 13:04:44 2008)

I’m not suggesting nationalizing, Dave, but getting the government to be "one” of the suppliers. Just as the US Mail service has kept the cost of overnight delivery of packages within reason, they could do the same with oil. And FedEx and UPS have done just fine in the process. But the OPEC conspiracy and ExxonMobil will destroy the nation if we don’t step in.

I agree with Fred that we are now paying the price for the influence of the environmentalists, but let’s also not forget about the greed of the auto manufacturers. They fought like hell to block improved CAF standards, and they won. Actually, they LOST as the Japanese beat them to the punch.

Brian, we don’t have to have “shoddy” government oil under my proposal. We can subcontract it to American companies, but it remains taxpayer owned rather than shareholder owned. But we must also block the exporting of oil to Japan that is currently taking place.

I sort of like one suggestion I heard, and that is for every American to quit stopping at Exxon stations for a year and force them to lower their prices to stay in business. Then everybody else will follow.

Jack Lohman (Mon May 05 17:38:52 2008)

Jack, I agree with almost everything you say (amazing?) except the influence of environmentalists. I believe that we in the US have had it our way so long that we cannot see beyond our own borders, beyond our belief that somehow we have the power to affect everything in the world. We are naive. Our environmental laws and environmental political movements have affected the supply of domestic oil. But, have they affected the supply of world oil (and price) significantly? No. Our potential oil reserves (pumped not shale oil etc) are increasingly a smaller and smaller part of world reserves, no matter how you calculate it. We move towards the Europeans and Japanese who by and large have no domestic oil reserves. So what. Do they fret over the price of oil? No, not like we do. Do they rely on drilling (other than North Sea oil) no. Why not? because they conserve and focus on technology not commodities, it's a world market, and they have not been affected by declining currency. In short,they see the world the way it is not they way they think it should be. We are cursed by our historic reliance on domestic oil, we are blinded.

dave allen (Mon May 05 21:21:42 2008)

It’s no ONE factor, Dave, but blocking drilling and nuclear power plants have not helped. Mainly our politicians have been owned and operated by corporate interests and decisions have been made on the basis of the short-term bottom line rather than the long-term good of the country. Giving subsidies to companies who outsource jobs to India, and converting our $300 billion surplus to a $600 billion deficit has trashed the dollar bill and we are paying the price in virtually every industry because of it. A tax break in a time of war was absolutely stupid. Our economy is not going to return until our jobs return, and there is little chance of that with a bought-and-paid-for congress.

Jack Lohman (Tue May 06 04:05:50 2008)

Funny, I used oil as a point of comparrison, the column is about Big Coffee...

I guess no one cares about the plight of those poor coffee farmers and processors.

Fred (Tue May 06 10:05:41 2008)

Get serious, Fred. Coffee is an elastic commodity, oil is not. We can quit drinking coffee but we can't do without a car. Or food or health care. So No, no one cares about incidentals.

Jack Lohman (Tue May 06 11:18:39 2008)

"We can quit drinking coffee but we can't do without a car. "

Speak for yourself, Jack.

True, we need cars; our cities are designed around fast individual transport.

Cars do not have to use petrol as a fuel source.

But I suspect you're being short and snippy - the big users of petrol in the country are in industry, not personal transport. If you eat it, use it or wear it odds are good petrol at some point was involved in it's manufacture.

Brian Dunbar (Tue May 06 14:39:37 2008)

I am a big believer in nuclear power. I am also a believer in fair trade for coffee and fair working conditions and level playing fields for areas where foreign workers work very hard to provide us our coffee, running shoes, Tvs etc. Having said that however, coffee is not as hard to give up as oil and I suppose many people are giving up a $4 cup to get that extra gallon of gas.



dave allen (Tue May 06 20:45:27 2008)

Indeed I support electric cars for short trips, and fueled by nuclear power. But the Big Three have been reluctant. See a list of suppliers HERE (item #5) and also if you get a chance to see the documentary on the electric car, do it. My point was that high coffee prices are the least of our worries, given our oil, health care and food crisis, though I also expect that Fred's was only a casual comment as well.

Jack Lohman (Wed May 07 05:58:59 2008)

Electric cars can't cut it.
Sorry...I believe in them and they offer a lot, so do electric trains instead of trucks..but the environmentalists again hold the key.

A Harvard Professor calculated that if all cars and trucks went to electric, it would require three times more power plants than we currently have now, AND the new plants would need to be Nuclear or Coal fired..neither which will happen, and you know it. So if you get enough electric cars, your power will be rationed. Supply is the answer guys, forget the "conservation kick"

Rich (Thu May 08 21:39:13 2008)

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