douglaschick21's Blog

typo,
there

It's called "supply and demand." We wouldn't allow ourselves to drill. We wouldn't allow ourselves an alternate source of energy (nuclear). We wouldn't allow ourselves to build refineries. You see the results.

What do you recommend? Tax them? All they'll do is pass on the cost to us. They have investors. They have employees. They have costs. They don't set the price of oil.

Ethanol is driving up the price of food. Ethanol is costly to produce and is a bigger polluter than gasoline. It demands much from the corn market (restricting supply, driving demand)so all products made from corn or corn-based ingredients (high fructose corn syrup, etc.) rise in price. The government is messing with the market.

EVERY attempt by the government to "control" gas prices since the 70s has been a disaster. I suggest we slash gas taxes (at the pump and at the corporate level.

The strength of the dollar does not necessarily reflect the strength of the economy... neither does the trade balance. I believe the last consecutive positive trade balance for the US was during the Depression (another time that raising taxes and raising tariffs was given as a "solution"... how'd that work out?).

Good night John boy!

Good night Mary Ellen!

Interesting
This is just another opinion, and it is about the only thing that I can say is actually mine.
It is not about America and changing our habits so much. Sure I guess it would help.
Compare China's market demand to ours.
I am going to get a bit off track but I am attempting to make a point.
God at some point may decide to speak to the world but it just may not be the US is the happening point.
Received an email the other day from a friend and I guess she thought she was doing me a favor by passing along an email from a churchgoer (extreme) about Obama being the antichrist. Nuts as I think this woman churcher is and I do think she is playing out of bounds, I just do not think everything is about the US. Not anymore.
WW2 was won because we as a nation had manufacturing facilities that could gear quickly over to a wartime effort. We do not have that any more. People seem more knowledgeable and more opinionated, not that that is a bad thing. Hopefully that is a positive.
Things are a changing. They have done changed and the world is a different place. China's economic raw material usage demands and dictates a lot. Look what the steel we import from China has done to us. We inspect none of it and accept it as labeled to specs. We have no inspectors looking at it and it is not up to standard specs. This steel holds up bridges and roofs of schools. Lets go back to the beginning of this little tidbit...that we import steel from China.
I am more in agreement with bleechers we have done it to ourselves by decisions we have made. As we all know change does not ha

The price of gasoline will only rise in proportion to what the demand will allow.

As for ethanol, the end result is what I was referencing as that is all that matters. Thanks for the other info. At the end of the day, the government love affair with ethanol has been a disaster on every front: pollution, food prices, gas prices, subsidies, etc. If the market demands cleaner ethanol production, it will happen. It cannot be forced, however.

The love affair with ethanol has led them away from much better solutions. Government is not the market. It drives no innovation, it responds to no forces.

Axe's arguments are just too much for me. What logic could possibly counter attacks on a fictional family living during the Depression?

With the first quarter numbers I have been reading about if we all cut our gas usage by 50% the oil companies have made enough money to wait us out. You guys are really ignorant to the fact of just how much money moves everything around us. So you will know the Walton’s thing is humor (I hated that show), and for those who didn’t recognize that well that could be one of your main problems! Think about this water is a natural resource wars have been fought over water (can you say drought) now how can you charge a price for a natural resource? You are not charged for water you are charged for the pressure it takes to pump that water into your house and if your are fortunate enough to have a well you are and irritant to city government because you are cutting in on their revenue I say this to make a point these alternative sources of energy we like to talk about will not come to pass until they can figure out a way to make huge profits from the process, the same mentality that fights free education is the same mentality that fights anything we can’t put a price tag on. I have a hunting cabin totally of the grid using only the sun and wind for power it is a very liberating thing but I need gas for my four wheeler! Maybe I should buy a horse nah you people have turned me against animals.

bleechers, I agree that we should not try to tax windfall profits of the oil companies to try to cover the price increases. The problem with your other idea is that I don't think it it is sustainable. In the U.S. we produce about 8.3 million barrels of oil per day.......but WE CONSUME 20 MILLION BARRELS PER DAY! A DEFICIT OF 11.7 MILLION BARRELS! There is no way unless we have a huge technological breakthrough that biofuels, coal to gas, and anything else currently in use can make up for our importation level. If we could convince people to drive smarter and buy the more efficient vehicles cutting our 20 million barrel thirst down we might be able to sustain ourselves without importation. Canada's tar sand require much more refining energy to make oil, but when you factor in fueling a tanker and transporting the oil they are cheaper. Mexico can't be fully depended on either the Cantarell

We don't utilize the vast coal reserves in the US.

People don't need to be convinced to "drive smarter," the market is already doing that. SUV sales are down and people are carpooling more, etc. The supply problems coupled with the slowing of demand will eventual force energy companies to seek solutions. They are the experts and they have to adapt to survive. The government does not function that way.

If the market and the oil companies were allowed to function without threats from the government or pressure to chase subsidized government selected solutions, need for profit would advance the needed technology.

The Pharmaceutical companies pump billions into research because of the necessity to bring returns to investors. Thus, we get the great advances that we have.

Politicians deciding for political reasons that ethanol is the answer, will only lead to disaster.

Let's see AXE that equates to about 5.5 gallons he saved. There are over 190,000,000 drivers. If everyone saved just 5.5 gallons your $20 worth of booze. The gallons saved would be 1,045,000,000 that is billion not million. The dollar amount at $3.69 a gallon would be $3,856,050,000 dollars, I'll take that any day. You don't have to buy a new car either mine is 15 years old bought second hand for $2,500 and gets 31-33 mpg on the highway. I'll bet that SUV or truck of yours with the boat won't get better than 13mpg on the highway. If you would conserve and drive something more efficient during the work week and we could convince other people to do the same, I could afford to join you on the lake with my boat and catch fish and drink all weekend long.