From $2.00 gas to $5.00 gas in 4 years

Have you even seen an oil rig? A shallow water oil rig, is literally just a touch bigger than the channel markers for Government cut. You don't even notice them, they're only large enough to land a helicopter on. We hold the largest oil reserves in the world, yet cannot use our own oil. If we did, the US economy would be BOOMING between not exporting our wealth to pay for oil AND all of the jobs created building and servicing the oil wells.

Since you seem to think Obama is your savior:

While the BP oil geyser pumps millions of gallons of petroleum into the Gulf of Mexico, President Barack Obama and members of Congress may have to answer for the millions in campaign contributions they’ve taken from the oil and gas giant over the years.


BP and its employees have given more than $3.5 million to federal candidates over the past 20 years, with the largest chunk of their money going to Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Donations come from a mix of employees and the company’s political action committees — $2.89 million flowed to campaigns from BP-related PACs and about $638,000 came from individuals.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0510/36783.html

Who cares what they look like. If and when we need them, we'll have them. But we don't need them. The oil companies need them to make more money. There's plenty of oil, and it could be had at a fair price if greedy SOBs weren't in the middle stuffing their pockets at the world's expense.

The only ecconomy that would be booming would be the oil company's boardroom's.

He's not bad, but the thing that got him my vote was the damage his predecessor did to us, and that the GOP put up a very honorable, but over the hill senator who quite possibly wouldn't live out his term leaving our nation in the hands of a complete idiot and the people who run her. I feel that a 2nd term for any president should require that he be exceptional or that his opponant be just so so much worse, because during it he's not answerable to voters. Obama gets no pass from me unless he does what's right.

In my book, campaign contributions are simply legal bribery and should be banned. Let the taxpayers pay equal share for campaigns (budgeted), and let them compete on being better, not outspending. I don't want anybody who buys their office.

It's not the gas prices causing it..

It's the quantitative easing...making EVERYTHING more expensive.

Seen the Euro to USD value latelty???

They are dillutiong the heck out of every dollar we own...so it buys less and prices skyrocket.

Exactly...But lets be absolutely clear here. Barack Hussein Obama is totally responsible for everyone's pain and suffering, and will also be responsible for the upcoming crisis as you put it. We are seeing and feeling firsthand what printing money as fast as possible and monetizing US debt does to the value of the dollar. Then wrap in unrest in the middle east and escalating fuel prices and we get a double whammy.



The use of fossil fuels isn't the root problem. From where we procure said fossil fuels is the problem. The United States has enough petroleum sources to provide 100% of today's usage for the next 90+ years. We're not using it because of idiotic energy policies that the libs have PURPOSELY forced upon the American people to prevent it. So, yes, Barack Hussein and his liberal cronies are indeed the problem. The EPA (can't drill in ANWAR because some **** turtle might have to nest 200 yards farther East than it does now....), the supposed DoE (wasting BILLIONS on nonsense energy sources that are at least 25 years away from being practical), Middle Eastern lobbyists who control our Congress, and an INSANE hatred of the American oil industry have all conspired to artificiallly keep gasoline prices high.

Per Capita global energy use rate rising? Yep, they are. China, India, many other players raising the per capita use. We don't have to compete for their finite sources. We have our own. On-shore, off-shore, in a variety of forms, we don't need Middle Eastern oil. We never did. Move the environmental whacko, tree hugging, power-driven libs out of the way and drill absolutely everywhere there is a profit to be made for the American oil industry. THAT is the answer. We also need to build new, modern refineries to replace the antiques we use today. If we started today, it would take a minimum of 5 years for the flow to be sufficient to replace what we now get from foreign sources. We need to start NOW. Enough liberal nonsense.

What you don't seem to get is that once a species is extinct, it is gone forever, and all species on this planet depend on each other for their own survival.

Again, what you don't get is that we need these technologies to be 25 years away, not 50.
Screaming "liberal" and pandering to racists (Yes, we all know why you include the president's middle name, and it's not out of respect) doesn't change a thing.

Many independant studies have found that drilling in Anwar would not hurt the turtles. Only the EPA found that to be the case. In 100 years we probably won't even need oil and all of the oil we're sitting on will be useless. Other technologies will grow and become more efficient as technology allows it and reduce our need for oil.

If the government really wanted to do something about reducing our need for oil. They should start by converting all post office vehicles, city buses, city vehicles to natural gas. It would be easy to refill them because they all go to the same depot at the end of the day, and we have extremely large natural gas reserves and it burns cleaner than oil anyways. It's proven. Instead of wasting energy with Ethanol which doesn't do anything useful. So are diesel cars instead of Hybrids you need to drive 230k miles to equal the environmental impacts of the production and batteries. Volkswagon has been getting over 50 mpg on their diesel cars since the 80's, Europe has used mostly diesel cars and trucks for decades, yet we don't.

I think one really needs to read a simple book on simple economics before they call the oil companies robbers and greedy and this and that. They are simply selling their product at the highest price people are willing to pay for it. Just like your local grocery store is selling their milk and eggs for the highest price they can sell it for that people are willing to pay for it. China and India are becoming larger consumers of oil and willing to pay for it.

I agree Bush was not the best President we ever had, but what on earth did he do to get us into this mess? You do realize that ACORN, backed by Obama and Harry Reid and Barney Frank, were the ones that fought and got it to allow banks to co-mingle funds and allow mortgages with little money down that created the whole mortgage mess ? You do realize the co-mingling of funds was done by Acorn during Clinton's tenure and allowed or almost made banks give loans to people who should have never gotten them? The co-mingling of funds gave the banks a lot more use of the cash they had, whereas it had to be split before between mortgages, investments, etc.......

Who else would? That's their job.

If we don't need it now, and won't need it then, why destroy things for no purpose except to fatten the wallets of the oil industry?

That has already begun in many parts of the country, but we all know that the technology and costs aren't in the right place yet for a total conversion. It has to start with baby steps if we're to get there though.

They're not the only ones involved. Let's not forget the traders and speculators, etc.

Willing has nothing to do with it. We are held hostage. We need it to live, work, heat our homes and survive.

Not that this has anthing to do with the subject, but the Dems had almost no say in what passed the legislature during the Bush administration. But again, I have no desire to defend either party. It's time to stop the politics, accept who our leaders are for the next 2 years, and just hold their feet to the fire so good things can get accomlished. Especially considering yesterday's news.

And ... this is the biggest hoax of all on the "constituents" of the libs.

Obama, Barney Frank and the rest of the libs claim to be on the side of the poor, middle class and downtrodden while promoting quantitative easing which makes the stock market healthy at the expense of EVERYBODY.

Thanks Barack ... I have given up resisting you guys. I now benefit from your policies. So ... bring it on because you are making me more rich and keeping the little man down so my family will be a little monarchy JUST LIKE YOURS!!! And Al Gores, George Bush's and the rest of the progressives.

Thank you Thank you Thank you!!!

Let's Blame Speculators
Walter E. Williams
Ref: http://townhall.com/columnists/walterewilliams/2011/05/04/lets_blame_speculators/page/full/

Here's a non-rocket science question: If you expect a reduced harvest of wheat, corn, rice or any other commodity some time in the future, what would be the wise thing to do about your consumption today? I bet that the average person would answer: Consume less now so that more will be available in the future.

But how in the world can people be encouraged to consume less now? Enter the futures market, which consists of a worldwide group of millions upon millions of traders, often called speculators. Speculators, betting on a future shortage, buy up wheat, corn and rice today in the hopes of making money selling it for a higher price when the bad harvest hits. As speculators buy more and more wheat, corn and rice, they drive up today's prices. As today's price gets higher, people consume less, but more importantly, people do the intelligent thing without bureaucratic edicts. The vital role of the futures trader, or speculator, is to allocate goods over different time periods. And, it's not just wheat, corn and rice that must be allocated over time but all commodities including oil.

There's no guarantee that speculators will make money. They might guess wrongly. For example, they might buy wheat now at $8 per bushel, expecting to make a killing in November at $12. Weather predictions might have been wrong and instead of a reduced harvest, there's a bumper crop driving November wheat prices down to $4 per bushel. That would make the speculator's $8 investment worth $4.

If we don't like commodity speculation, we could easily outlaw it. That way, for example, even though there might be every indication of a reduced fall wheat harvest, today's price of wheat wouldn't rise. We could consume wheat today and not fret about fall.

President Obama has asked the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate whether Wall Street speculators could be manipulating oil markets. If Obama could convince other nations to put an end to worldwide oil speculation, we might be able enjoy $2 per gallon gas and ignore Middle East conflicts that might impact heavily on future oil supplies.

White House and congressional attacks on oil speculation do not alter the oil market's fundamental demand-and-supply reality. What would lower the long-term price of oil is for Congress to permit exploration for the estimated billions upon billions of barrels of oil off our Atlantic and Pacific Ocean shores, the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska, not to mention the estimated billions, possibly trillions, of barrels of shale oil in Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and North Dakota.

Some politicians pooh-pooh calls for drilling, saying it would take five or 10 years to recover the oil and won't solve today's problems. Nonsense! I guarantee you that if permits were granted to all of our oil sources, we would see a reduction in today's prices.

Why? Put yourself in the place of an OPEC member knowing there's going to be a greater supply of U.S. oil in five or 10 years, which might drive oil prices to a permanent $20 or $30 per barrel. What will you want to do now while oil is $120 per barrel? You would want to sell.

OPEC's collective efforts to sell more would put downward pressures on current oil prices. The White House, U.S. Congress and environmental wackos, by keeping our oil in the ground, are OPEC's staunchest ally. I wouldn't be surprised at all if we discovered OPEC reciprocity in the forms of political contributions to congressmen and charitable donations to environmental groups.

In the wake of higher gasoline prices, the only intelligent thing that Obama has called for is an end to $4 billion in annual taxpayer subsidies to oil companies. To get that done, he has an uphill bipartisan fight on his hands. Oil companies buy off both Republicans and Democrats in order to receive government handouts and special treatment.

Gasoline and Onions
John Stossel
http://townhall.com/columnists/johnstossel/2011/05/04/gasoline_and_onions/page/full/

The speculators are ripping us off!

"The skyrocketing price of gas and oil has nothing to do with the fundamentals of supply and demand, and has everything to do with Wall Street firms that are artificially jacking up the price of oil in the energy futures markets. ... (T)he same Wall Street speculators that caused the worst financial crisis since the 1930s through their greed, recklessness and illegal behavior are ripping off the American people again by gambling that the price of oil and gas will continue to go up."

Here we go again. That quote was Sen. Bernie Sanders doing what some always do when the price of oil spikes: complain about speculators. Now, President Obama says he'll investigate them: "We are going to make sure that no one is taking advantage of the American people for their own short-term gain." I assume that his new Financial Fraud Enforcement Working Group, like its predecessors, will uncover nothing untoward.

In America, we don't have a free market -- we have a government-saturated economy in which oil companies and other corporations have a cozy relationship with politicians and bureaucrats. That's wrong, but even that can't explain the recent run-up in prices. Oil companies today are no more greedy or clever than they have been all along.

We have to look for a better explanation -- and it isn't hard to find. Demand for oil rises with the growth of China, India and other developing countries. When poor people get a little richer, they buy cars, computers and refrigerators. They burn more fuel to make them and to run them. Rising demand, other things being equal, increases prices.

And other things have not been equal. Japan's nuclear plants are out of commission, and Libya, which accounts for about 2 percent of world oil production, is wracked by civil war. This is small compared to previous disruptions in the region, but it still affects the price.

The evil oil-speculator theory also runs up against the fact that the Federal Reserve's inflationary policies (QE2) and other factors have continued the dollar's slide against foreign currencies -- to a three-year low. As the dollar loses value, oil sellers demand more for their product. "Commodities, along with most traded goods globally, are priced in dollars," former Federal Reserve official Gerald P. O'Driscoll of the Cato Institute writes. "It is the old story of too much money chasing too few goods."

If Sanders and other economic illiterates get their way, we'll have new laws banning "speculation." That will raise prices further. Don't believe me? Think back to a previous time when a Senate committee said that "speculative activity causes severe and unwarranted fluctuations in the price. ..." That was in 1958, when people got upset about the price of onions. Fools in Congress addressed that problem by banning speculation on onion prices.

The result? A Financial Times analysis found that the ban made prices less stable. This year, the retail price of onions rose more than the price of gasoline -- 36 versus 24 percent. Most years, the price of onions fluctuates more than other goods. No mystery there. Speculators help keep prices stable. When they foresee a future oil shortage -- that is, when prices are lower than anticipated in the future -- speculators buy lots of it, store it and then sell it when the shortage hits. They know they can charge more when there's relatively little oil on the market. But their selling during the shortage brings prices down from what they would have been had speculators not acted.

Speculators are like the ants in Aesop's "Ants and the Grasshopper" fable: They save resources for lean times. Everyone benefits because everyone has a chance to buy from them in those lean times.

Speculators don't "artificially jack up the price of oil" -- they take risks. Those who guess wrong lose a lot of money.

Historically, speculators have been convenient scapegoats, and they have suffered greatly for it. So have the rest of us.

While government should never create political opportunities for speculation, it should also stop interfering with its legitimate economic function.

We all are harmed when central planners take charge.

And finally, we're complaining about the price of oil here in the US, here is how it compares to other places on our globe:

The 15 most expensive:
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-15-most-expensive-places-to-buy-gas-in-the-world-2011-4?op=1

And the cheapest:
http://www.businessinsider.com/15-cheapest-places-to-buy-gas-2011-4?op=1

See you in Venezuela!

That only means that others should be screaming louder, not that anybody should be screaming less. That argument has been used by the oil industry for decades to quiet the Americans, because they lead the fight. It is meaningless. That's like a rapist telling his victim that she shouldn't complain because he tortured and killed his other victims.
And BTW, when there is a shortage of something needed for life, the proper course is to ration it equally, not to hoard it and profiteer off those who are suffering.

To be objective..... I posted *BOTH* the high side, and the low side.
Yes, there is $7 dollar fuel out there. There's also $0.09 cent fuel.

Government subsidies, politics, payoffs, speculators, OPEC, free markets, monopolized markets. I don't make the rules. I pay what I pay when and where I am. Should we be screaming? That's up to the reader. I can't make that decision.

Review a Previous Thread on Oil Crisis

I might make the suggestion that a few of the posters on this subject thread go back and review a previous subject thread that took place during the last BIG increase in crude oil prices.

http://www.yachtforums.com/forums/general-yachting-discussion/552-2-00-gas.html

This subject thread has now been CLOSED to additional discussion, but there is some really good material and discussions there


BTW, want to see some of the toys these big crude prices buy....see posting #36

Spratly Islands, new tensions with China, higher oil prices

I started a new subject thread that might have VERY significant influences on oil prices as well, but since it involved very likely conflicts with China, I chose to make it a separate discussion. Since it was not a 'yacht design issue', I put it over here in the yacht club discussions


Spratly Islands, new tensions with China, higher oil prices

Nice to know that they did not spend it all on nose candy.

Why We Went To War In Iraq......oil

Visit this video and fast forward to time frame 5:20
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGASfcNTVbM

"The day before yesterday the Iraq Oil Report made the projection that there's a hundred billion barrels for sure, two hundred billion probably and at the outside three hundred billion. That dwarfs Saudi Arabia. I know why Dick Cheney went to Iraq." - Colonel Wilkerson....Colin Powell's chief of staff

I've been saying this since the very beginning...before the war with Iraq. This was Dick Cheney's war to install a friendly government there that was in charge of what use to be the second largest proven reserves in the world. That is now the first largest reserves in the world!!
Brian

Oh you incurable skeptic. You mean that you didn't believe it was in retribution for 9/11? You do realize that you're saying that Bush & Cheney lied to the American people and the world, and it was for more than just billion dollar contracts for Haliburton. Next you'll be telling us there is no oil shortage and that the oil companies don't have our best interests at heart.

Cheney was dangerous

WOW, I guest I really was naive,...I really did believe those great leaders Bush and Cheney ....NOT!!

..like 50% of our population that bought into their bulls--t.

I've referred to Cheney as 'Darth Vader', and Bush to 'Frat Boy'. Its not that I believe Cheney was evil,.... but certainly dangerous.

I wrote a friend this morning with some references to this Cheney fellow:
Colin Powell likely kept us out of other wars....with China, Iran, North Korea, etc.
Cheney wanted new cold war with China
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3j2E7VtA

Curveball
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxerr_iGRXE

#10 Wilkerson on Cheney
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGNhbc3rgRY
....very interesting

#11 Why Saudi King Might want US to Attack Iran
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFW33KNKPsI
.....this gets real interesting at the end....and it also talks about some attacks we made on Iranian ships attempting to block the Straits over there.

I've seldom felt so sorry for a person as I did watching this honorable warrior standing before the U.N. and speaking words that he didn't believe, trying to balance loyalty to his country against following the orders of his Commander In Chief.

Feast your eyes upon the linked chart and ask yourself, "Who is in the White House during the current price spike?"

http://www.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=EER_EPMRU_PF4_Y35NY_DPG&f=D

HINT: Brace yourself. It's a real shocker! It's not GW.

From $2.00 gas to $5.00 gas in 4 years

Down to 2.00 gas (Bye-Bye GW)

Back to the current price spike in 3 years

Gee, Is GW still in the White House?