How’s that pump price feel?
In my travels over the last few weeks, i saw gas at $4.65 near San Francisco, it was over $4 in DC last week and then topped $4 in my rural West Virginia town yesterday. So how’s it feel? Bet I can make it feel worse. The EPA denied air permits to Shell for drilling off of Alaska’s northern coast according to a Fox News article sent to us by ROS;
Shell has spent five years and nearly $4 billion dollars on plans to explore for oil in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas. The leases alone cost $2.2 billion. Shell Vice President Pete Slaiby says obtaining similar air permits for a drilling operation in the Gulf of Mexico would take about 45 days. He’s especially frustrated over the appeal board’s suggestion that the Arctic drill would somehow be hazardous for the people who live in the area. “We think the issues were really not major,” Slaiby said, “and clearly not impactful for the communities we work in.”
The closest village to where Shell proposed to drill is Kaktovik, Alaska. It is one of the most remote places in the United States. According to the latest census, the population is 245 and nearly all of the residents are Alaska natives. The village, which is 1 square mile, sits right along the shores of the Beaufort Sea, 70 miles away from the proposed off-shore drill site.
That cost us 27 billion barrels of oil not to mention the pain we already feel at the pump.
Of course we all know that just the losses suffered by Shell in this failed attempt will be passed along to us consumers.
In the meantime, the media is slavishly deflecting blame from Obama as discussed by Ace of Spades.
Ron Futtrell at Big Journalism notices the media’s disconnect with their consumers…or rather the lack thereof.
Julia Seymour at Newsbusters notices that they blame everyone except Obama;
Instead of asking whether Obama’s anti-oil policies could be increasing the cost of gas, the networks blamed other factors such as Mideast turmoil or the “money game” played by speculators. Certainly, the turmoil in Libya, Egypt and surrounding nations has increased worries about oil production and can influence the price. But the networks also should have looked for explanations much closer to home, like Obama’s many regulatory actions taken against the oil industry.
Scott Witlock at Newsbusters watched George Stephanopolis chastise you for your “gripes” and making Obama’s life difficult;
Good Morning America’s George Stephanopoulos on Monday described the country’s “gas gripes” over rising fuel costs, spinning, “Soaring prices lead to new pain for the President as big oil gets ready to report record profits.”
The former Democratic operative turned journalist tried to put the best face on Barack Obama’s growing problems: “And, Jake, these gas prices are also knocking down President Obama’s poll numbers, which is why he’s out there nearly every day addressing this problem.”
Addressing the problem IS the problem. Instead of yapping like a constipated Yorky, our president needs to solve the problem and throw open the floodgates of developers and drillers to solve not only the fuel problem, but take a chunk out of the unemployment rate, too.
Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden, Economy, Media
“The Gas Pump Hope and Change Sticky Note Campaign”
http://yourdaddy.net/2011/04/25/the-gas-pump-hope-and-change-sticky-note-campaign/
Combating the MSM one Post-It at a time…
I get a perverse satisfaction from your perpetual whining about gas prices. In your SUV-centric world, we should leave no shred of land unscarred by well pads, no region of the atmosphere unpolluted, just so you can drive your gas hog to D.C. and back on the cheap. Maybe they’ll start drilling near you so you can personally experience toxic fracking fluids in your tap water. Just like a junkie griping about the cost of smack……
There you go again, Joe, you don’t know a thing about me, yet you pidgeon-hole me.
When I lived in the city, I used public transportation, rode my bike to work or walked. I didn’t have a drivers’ license because I didn’t need one.
But out here in rural America we need Silverados to haul our trash to the dump miles from home, to make simple large purchases in towns miles away, to haul gravel to prevent erosion on our mountainside.
We don’t have an SUV because I don’t to be lumped in with your yuppie crowd. And we don’t need the extra weight and comforts of our living room on unused 4-wheel driven tires.
My truck (a work truck with no extra frills) has been parked for days and we used the Cobalt to go to DC last week.
When’s the last time you’ve been to Alaska? Do you really want a clean Alaska or does it just make you feel better about yourself to say so?
If I’ve got oil in my backyard, they’re welcome to drill – no hypocrisy from me.
You’re actually hilarious when you climb on your high horse, Joe. And I’m guessing it’s mighty long climb, too.
Hey Joe, Good i hope they drill here in Virginia, in the Bakken (sp) Range and anywhere else they even think there might be oil. If you really think solar and wind is going to be the answer, tell me how it is going to power New York City during the middle of August. I guess as far as your concerned it’s alright to screw the country and economy over so we can have solar and wind and nothing else. The Germans are building more coal fired power generating plants as we speak. France gets something like 65% of it’s electricity from nuke plants and it recycles it’s uranium. It does no good to have a clean atmosphere when you have no economy. What a putz you are
Yeah, wishing for cleaner air, pure ground water, an arctic unpolluted by oil spills, yeah, that makes me a real putz.
you can’t put a wind turbine on a tractor.
I’ll amplify some.
Screw you Joe. I own a patch, and the mineral rights. Some folks are getting over $10k a month from a natural gas well.
I’ll do what I can to keep yer lights on. Unless the government(s) decides you don’t you don’t need lights. that is.
BTW, do you have solar and wind online? I do!
Methane. From all the skittle-unicorns. Lights, water, gas…Joe’s good to go. Probably selling the excess to his local utility and drawing royalties.
Let’s see. I live in an “SUV-centric” world. Ownership of a particular type of vehicle automatically invalidates whinging about fuel prices in Joe’s World (TM) (Yes, gonna trademark that fantasy land).
Around here, there aren’t so much SUV as 3/4-ton and above trucks hauling big-a$$ critters, feed, and so on. The prices of fuel, in combination with drought are enough for farmers to plow under their winter wheat crop and talk about going on the dole.
Folks on Joe’s side of the aisle are quick to point out that there’re shortages in food out there in the world. But they’re pretty callous when farmers and ranchers can’t get that food to market. Green policies will result in the death of millions overseas as well. Snail Darter Uber Alles, eh Joe?
Our POTUS and his SecInterior, Salazar, could have had us at $1.50/gallon gas. They chose to blow it up to $4 and more. Piss-poor Progressive politicking perturbs people.
Help me out. With all of that oppressive regulation, the oil companies are making record profits. That isn’t your tax dollars at work, that is the difference between the price we pay and what it costs them to make it. So why shouldn’t we be exercised about that? BTW, I lived in Alaska for 16 years; I think it is one of the best places in the world. In the late 1980s there was a disaster called the Exxon Valdez that spilled a lot of oil. Some locals are still litigating damages that the oil companies didn’t pay. Today for 200 miles, if you turn over rocks or dig up sand on those beaches you will find oil. I don’t mind the oil companies drilling in the Arctic ocean but after the Exxon Valdez and the inadequate cleanup, inadequate payments to locals and the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and the inadequate payout, I would want to see a VERY large insurance policy and a real disaster plan. Thad Allen is great but he can’t live forever nor be in two places at once. It was trivially easy to get cleanup vessels out to the spill in the Gulf — remember that fleet? It is 3,500 miles from Seattle to the North Slope. That is more than 200 hours running full tilt and non-stop in a tugboat at 15 knots — assuming that they were in Seattle, assuming you could get 15 knots, assuming open water (a risky assumption on the Slope in January), assuming relative calm seas, and assuming that the vessels you needed could actually make the trip across the North Pacific. Almost nobody fishes up there so there are almost no local boats. Did you ever watch Deadliest Catch? Those cleanup vessels would have to cross those seas. I wonder what it would be like to clean up an ocean spill when the ocean was covered with ice. Let’s assume that the discovered oil would come down the Alaska Pipeline. There are problems with that line — several sections have substantial corrosion and need… Read more »
And Joe: It isn’t so much Oil VS Solar/Wind, etc.; as it is USA Oil VS Rag’ed Oil. I don’t think that there is a single person here who wouldn’t like to see us use less fossil fuels, but at the same time, about all of here, (you excluded, apparently), are fed up with financing the rest of the world on our dime.
I own a 4 banger jap truck and a V-8 Diesel Truck. I prefer the Diesel truck on trips because it has a sleeper berth, and gets a reasonable mileage. And when I come up on a Prius or other suck car like the SMART FORTWO, I can scare the shit out of them when they see my grille in their rear view mirror.
Get a Life.
Richard7298,
All that profit the oil companies are making? In which currency? The dollar has been debased too much that give the argument that Big Oil is profiting much cachet. I do agree that we as a Nation need to identify and address the issues head on.
Guys, the EPA could have handed them the shovel to go dig and drill with, and it would not have made ONE bit of difference.
Why? Glad you asked-
We have no REFINING capacity- name ONE refinery that has been built in the last 25 years- can’t? Right- ’cause there haven’t been any. One major reason that prices are so high is that we cannot PRODUCE gasoline even if we had the crude available- an speculators and those that set price of crude know this. If oil were 10/barrel we could not have much cheaper gasoline- we just can’t produce it. This is partially why diesel is so high- we can’t produce enough of the ‘special mix’ required to meet new EPA guidelines.
The EPA barring drilling isn’t nearly as bad as the EPA barring building new refineries…
Defund the EPA now!
Joe, You still didn’t answer the question of how do you power large cities, factories, build roads etc on wind and solar energy. You can’t because it is not technologically possible, at least not at this point in time, nor in my lifetime nor my children’s lifetime. Canada, which has some very very pristine lands comparable to Alaska seems to have no problem extracting oil and natural gas from Mother Earth with minimal impact upon the earth. Germany, which if you ever served there would know, is way more concerned with their environment and the spilling of oil and polluting the air than we are, yet they have no problem building more and more coal fired power generating plants. I mean, they even went to unleaded gas sometime in the late eighties. When the technology is there it will replace fossil fuel. There is as of yet a viable battery run car and will not be economically feasible for years, so how do you expect people to get to work, store, doctor’s office etc, or how do the farmers get their labors to market, in a Prius. Environmentalists, tree huggers, whatever you want to call yourself have no idea of the economic consequences of their actions. Sort of like global warming, now that it has been basically debunked, they now call it climate change, duh, of course the climate changes, it always has and always will.
Mr. Wolf, You are exactly right, I forgot to add that in, thanks to the old peanut farmer if I remember right. Same with nuclear power plants. So again I am still waiting for Joe and others of his ilk to explain to me on paper how all these renewables are going to be able to power even a city of say 15,000 let alone New York. Hell, they can’t even get the White House to lead the way by turning it into a wind and solar farm and make it completely self sufficient.
DaveO: I was relying on this quote,
Good Morning America’s George Stephanopoulos on Monday described the country’s “gas gripes” over rising fuel costs, spinning, “Soaring prices lead to new pain for the President as big oil gets ready to report record profits.”
The quote is in the last gray box in Jon’s original post.
We need the big energy companies and they have to make a profit but it seems to me that if you combine $4 per gallon gasoline and record profits, somebody is getting rich and the consumer is getting screwed to pay for it. We also need a middle class and I am getting squeezed from both ends — my income is way down and I just bought a bottle of Clays powder that contained 14 ounces and cost too much. The Deepwater Horizon disaster should be a risk for the oil companies, not a risk where all the cost gets passed to the consumer. Record profits, reduced employment and wages, and $4 / gallon gas is adding insult to injury.
Richard7298,
BLUF: the folks who are driving up the price of gas want us angry at Big Oil, not at our employees (Obama, Salazar) directly responsible for the prices.
I think I understand what you’re saying, however I believe the premise (Geo Stephanopolous’s remarks) are a feint. Using his same logic, we can be equally angry at dairy farmers, hog and wheat farmers. We aren’t discussing them, but we are allowing ourselves to focus on a corporate target for 2 minutes of distractive hate.
I agree that accident mitigation, and prevention should be born by the offending company. Stephanopolous and others want us to look the other way, and they’re very good at doing that.
Richard7298. That is all he is doing (Obama) addressing the issue. Like everything else he does he is a dollar late and a day short. Surely with all of his so called “intelligence” he could have foreseen this happening, Drilling on land is probably 99.9% safe and with proper oversight and preventative maintenance the rigs and pipelines are safe, they have valves that will shut the pipeline off in case of a emergency, so what’s the problem. I too am getting squeezed on both ends. My wife and I both drive between 75-100 miles a day just to get to work, not counting the time I sit idling on 95 South here in Virginia. Can’t wait until we can retire. Remember, for every action there is a reaction and the law of unintended consequences. Oil companies make a profit and it sure does help my IRA and 401k along with every other American that invests their money. The energy companies are publicially owned and they have to make a profit to return to their investors so they will go out of business. I would bet you a beer that if you really could see into the portfolios of Pelosi, Reed and all of them (politicians) they are also getting fat from the oil companies profits. It is a fact of life that a company will pass along any costs that are mandated down to the the buyer. Besides, how much of a profit margain area they suppose to have. The poor guy running the 7-11 only makes 2-3 cents on each gallon they pump. I want the oil companies and the other ones I have money in to make a profit as I am an avowed capitalist.
“Folks on Joe’s side of the aisle are quick to point out that there’re shortages in food out there in the world.” And yet, not a peep out of the left side of the aisle or Joey, when it comes to Algore’s Ethanol scheme, which is causing a whole lot of the food shortages in the world.
Meanwhile, Mr. Wolf, in #13, is exactly right. I can think of 4 refinery sites within about 100 miles of me that have been plowed under, “super-cleaned” and left. Not a one has been replaced.
Let’s not forget that higher oil prices (thank you money printers, among other things) also mean: higher costs for fertilizer and other ag chemicals, higher costs for irrigation water (for those who irrigate) as well as higher fuel prices for tractors, combines, and trucks. Which add to the higher prices in grocery stores, even for those of us who combine errands, take public transportation and try to buy local. And higher prices for clothing. “If you can’t mine it, you gotta grow it.”
$4 per gallon gasoline and record profits
And right there is all the libtard dipshits want to know or care about.
Uh, Rich? You DO know that the oil industry typically runs a profit of less than 10 percent, yes? And when one sells the same amount of product for double the prices–which they pay, just like us–their revenues go up, their profits go up, etc…
Finally, why is it you seem to have no problem with the government making 60-70 cents on a gallon of gas for doing fuck-all, yet the company which drills for it, transports, it, refines it, distributes it, and retails it makes IN TOTAL in that entire chain about 25-30 cents a gallon? Yes, Exxon-Mobil made $40 Billion in profits in 2008. On revenues of $430 Billion. And of that, they paid over $105 Billion in taxes. Guess who ultimately pays THAT bill?
Of course, in you and Joe’s world, we don’t have issues like these, since your world is all unicorn farts and skittle rainbows.
Yeah, Sparky, if only they’d add record taxes realized by the fed government and state governments from oil prices. But, lib heads would explode all over the landscape, if the truth were really known.
A lot of good points, most of you agree that oil supplies are finite, we’re gonna run out someday, it’s gonna effect a lot of things, esp. food prices; but I want to keep living my comfortable suburban lifestyle, don’t want to spend any R&D money on new technologies, certainly would never raise taxes on gas to pay for the development of new technologies, resent that the price of the finite resource going up, cheap gas is my birthright, and the only possible answer is drill baby, drill. Kick the can down the road for my kids to figure out, unless the entire unsustainable house of cards collapses first.
So, Joe, we can just choke on it in the meantime while we wait for someone to figure out how to refine unicorn farts? We don’t need to subsidize energy development with tax dollars – if there’s an efficient energy source out there, someone will find it. Things do get done by private industry without the government, ya know. Government has been throwing money at the problem for decades with no results and your answer is to throw more money at it, huh? Is that how you run your household chores?
Like I’ve said countless times before, if a new energy source is discovered this afternoon, how soon before it gets to market? How soon until everyone can afford it to make it universal? Can you afford to buy an entirely new car this year? How many people are still driving cars without the latest efficiency technology today? But some how you expect them to drive the latest discovery tomorrow morning.
Stop being so idealistic and join the rest of us down here in the real world (not to be confused with the MTV show).
And your patronizing smugness doesn’t help you make your point.
Joe,
A correction to your premise that we will run out of oil. That will never happen. Easy sources will run out and more expensive ones will be utilized driving up the price and those will be used, etc… It will become prohibitively expensive and something else will be more cost effective and then we will use that. It is estimated that we have not even hit peak oil yet, that point at which we’ve used half of all available sources. This process will be long and gradual, it’s not like the oil spigot will just be shut off one day. Right now we are forcing the price of oil artificially high. Democrats understand that economics drive the use of oil so instead of allowing it to take exactly the same course all by itself they force it to happen because they have determined that they know better than everybody else…it’s called arogance and they are the masters of it…
Yeah, you wanna see the “more expensive sources”? “More expensive” in more ways than one. Search Google Images for “Alberta Tar Sands”. Coming to a western state near you unless we figure out a better plan, and to do that we will need federal help.
The government is going to do R & D for “new technologies”? Lord help us, I mean, Gaia help us. Look what they’ve done for education so far, Joey. Not to mention agriculture, and the Department of Energy, which was supposed to get us off of foreign oil. Hate to break it to you, Joey, but the federal government can’t properly run a c*****r f**k.
But, just fall in line with your fuhrer, and tell everyone to “get a tune-up”, inflate their tires, or buy a new car. Unfortunately, most folks can’t afford to buy a new car, and most vehicles on the road now don’t need “tune-ups”. Remember Cash for Clunkers?
Your across the board view that “government’s the problem, not the solution” is a simplistic (but memorable) bumper-sticker Gipperism. The US Forest Service for example is one department that has conscientious, effective employees that do a great job when we get out of their way and let them do their work without political interference. I’d also say that the military did a pretty good job of developing a hair trigger nuclear arsenal that would launch on command but not go off accidentally, a huge engineering challenge; they were successful as evidenced by the fact that we are even having this conversation. So the Gipper’s catchy slogan is B.S. Sometimes gov’s screws up, sometimes it works. We barely have a clue how the human brain functions, so it’s not surprising that when we scale up this lack of knowledge into an entire Dep’t. of Education, it’s a failure. I wonder where we’d be now if Reagan hadn’t dismantled Carter’s Solar Energy Research Institute, among other programs?
It might be “bumper-sticker Gipperism” as you put it, but can you tell me one thing the goverment bureaucracy can do with better results, greater efficiency, and lower cost than the private sector?
Particularly in the areas outside those specifically stated in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution?
I wonder where we’d be now if Reagan hadn’t dismantled Carter’s Solar Energy Research Institute, among other programs?
Even more broke than we already are? If there’s a practical, economic use for energy, the private sector will 1–find it, 2–fund it, 3–develop it. All without the “hep” of big government. Well, big government might hinder the shit out of it, as evidenced by development of our electrical generation and transmission/distribution system, for starters.
Joe,
What are you going on about….YOU want high prices….you want the government to artificially induce them. They will go up all by themselves, with out the governments help and I’ll bet they would be more gradual than what we are seeing today…
“…can you tell me one thing the goverment bureaucracy can do with better results, greater efficiency, and lower cost than the private sector?”
So you buy into the whole privitazition hoax? All their proaganda worked – the corporations have you right where they want you NHS.
So, IOW, Joey, your answer is nope, correct? You can’t name one thing, and source it, right? Thought so.
And, thanks for admitting that DoEd. is a failure. You merely confirm what thinking people know. One thing you left out, about the DoEd, Joey, the budget for that one department is expanding exponentially. With admittedly no results, according to you, correct? However, the department has 30 offices, with a title, and staff, and budget. Tell us, what does the Office of the General Counsel do to educate anyone? The Office of the Undersecretary of Education? The Office of the Deputy Secretary?
UpNorth
Let’s throw the department of energy in there. Created to lower our dependance on foriegn oil. They cost a boatload of money, and we are using even more foriegn oil than ever…How’s that for government efficiency Joey?
And let’s not forget that domestic production is at the same level it was in 1946, despite our known reserves being several times what it was back then. Yeah, that’ll show ’em!
C’mon, Joe–show me where ANY government agency would succeed in a private sector setting. The Post Office? Amtrak? DoEnergy? Education? Homeland Security?
Well, you might have said CIA/FBI, but consider those aren’t public functions. Then again, for all their vaunted reputation, it’s amazing how the liberals have put walls up to prevent efficient use of these assets. Church Commission, Stansfield Turner, Toricelli Amendment, Jamie Gorelick, stop me if I’m confusing you here, m’boy.
And again, you could TRY to say DoD, but consider that most of our equipment is contracted out to civilian companies who have other functions as well. So no, that ain’t gonna work either. Please don’t tell me the VA is more efficient than a private health insurer, etc., either.
All in all, nothing useful will come from your non-answer, unless you once again consider your being a shit-flinging monkey “useful”.
OK, OT. Joey, how about the DoE? It has 16K federal employees, 93K contract employees, and a budget of $24.1 Billion. What do we get for that? Zip, nada, nothing, except a president telling us to “properly inflate” our tires, and to get tune-ups. And, Salazar saying, in effect, not only no, but hell no, to any and all drilling. Go ahead, give our money to Petrobras, because that’s where Soros wants O to put our money, but whatever you do, don’t develop our own resources.