I don’t like Bush but people cannot blame him for every thing.

OPEC is the biggest name in oil.. they control how much they sell barrels for. We have to buy they barrels at their prices… meaning if the country has to pay more to buy it, then pay for refining costs/shipping.. its going to cost us more.

And people, please don’t regurgitate a bunch of inaccuracies without checking your facts. Yes current U.S. refining capacity is tight in relation to demand (oh look, there’s demand again!), so whenever an event such as a hurricane or fire reduces refining output you’ll see a temporary spike in prices at the pump. BUT, during the period 1994-2004 U.S. refining capacity actually increased by 13%. And you blame the price increase we’ve seen over the last few years on a lack of refining capacity? It’s almost comical. All you need to do is compare the price of crude oil futures to gasoline futures over the last 2 years and it becomes evident that it’s the price of crude oil that’s behind the price increase at the pump. Check it out for yourself at http://futures.fxstreet.com

Oil and gasoline resources are traded just like any other commodity. Fact is, some of the recent price increase is due to market speculation and many Americans are thus causing, as well as benefiting from the gain in prices, by pumping more money into their portfolios that in turn invest in oil and gas futures (at least their 401k’s are benefiting from it).

And you suggest that the U.S. gov’t own and operate some refineries? Since when did the U.S. give up on free market capitalism? Don’t you think Donald Trump and Warren Buffett daily analyze the economics of refining, and if the economics look good, they would pump (no pun intended) millions of dollars into new refining operations? Yes it is a free country, anyone can own and operate a refinery, including yourself.

Fifteen years ago or so, the EPA started putting pressure on the oil companies and small refineries to clean up or shut down. Many shut down, dismantled their equipment and sold it to overseas buyers. Production capabilities were drastically reduced. Independents were out of the refining business and what was left was all owned by the Big Boys.

They were smart … they keyed in on the Law of Supply and Demand and looked to the future. Don’t build any new refineries … the laws are too stringent and make any new operations too expensive to build … just sit back and wait for demand to increase … even if crude oil is available, the we can only produce so much per day. When we reach capacity, or close to it, demand will drive the price up. We can get away with it … our customers have no place else to go, and we have almost everyone in the federal government in our back pockets. We are also smarter than them. When they yell and scream, we can point our fingers back at them and say, “The EPA forced us to shut down old refineries”; “They made it too expensive to build new ones”; “We wanted to build a couple on the West Coast but the Californians wouldn’t let us”; “We wanted to build a couple on the East Coast, but New Englanders wouldn’t let us”. If the vast majority of refineries weren’t located along the Gulf Coast, do you think the Big Boys could holler, “That will be another ten cents per gallon for the next six months. We had to shut down the Louisiana plant for a couple of weeks”.

We really are stupid. The Big Boys have us by the “you know what’s” and we really don’t have any way out. We can start pumping new stuff out of the ground in Alaska; we can start drilling off the California coast; we can become best of friends again with all the Middle Eastern producers … the price still isn’t coming down because enough is never going to get refined to satisfy our demands.

So here’s what I’m saying … the key to any type of “recovery” is to build new refineries … get some competition going. Maybe the U.S. government should build, own and operate a couple of them. Right now, the Big Boys are all in cahoots with each other. You think that they don’t strategize together? Develop gameplans together? Fix pricing together? Fund PAC’s together? Lobby Congress together? They have to be confronted with competition before they will change. Where in the hell is it going to come from?

As the old saying goes..”the masses are the asses”..and any consumer that uses anything that is petroleum based (which is all of us)..not counting the gas used in the automobile…is being hosed…sorry for the pun…and there isn’t a lot we can do about it…

And oil boycotts, what is that all about? What a joke. If you really want to make a difference, reduce demand. I’m tired of hearing people complain about high gas prices when I don’t see them lift a finger to reduce their consumption of gasoline.

They move out of the cities to afford single-family homes with large lots, and then waste their money (and time) commuting farther to work. Hopefully higher gas prices will reverse that silly trend.

I still see a lot of large, inefficient vehicles (SUVs) on U.S. roads. If your vehicle doesn’t get at least 30 mpg you automatically forfeit your right to complain about high prices. Again, hopefully high prices will remove most of these vehicles from our roads and at the same time make the roads safer for smaller vehicles.

If you need a larger vehicle for work, just pass on the cost to your consumers. If you can’t raise your prices, then the service or product is not worth the price. That’s plain economics at work.

Mark: Thanks to our current administration! I have long believed that oil companies should be regulated the same as any other utility. After all they are just providing another form of energy.

Laura: In major suburban areas such as SF, NY etc it is possibly to live a perfectly normal life WITHOUT owning a car. BUT in rural parts of the country it is a neccessity. No car means no job. Not to mention all those construction workers that HAVE to drive large trucks plus pull trailers.

Stephen: I agree $4 or $5 a gallon will make a lot of people think twice about their next automobile purchase. I suspect the oil companies will push us to the brink then back off when sales of larger less economocal vehicles start to slow.

Shawn: This further solidified my disgust with Mr. Bush. It appears that most major decisions he has made in his presidency have benefitted big business ie. his buddies.

Sept 1st 1997 20 gallons of gas @ $1.229 = $24.58 or 4.77 hours of work.
Feb 2nd 1999 20 gallons of gas @ $0.885= $17.70 or 3.44 hours of work
Aug 22nd 2005 20 gallons of gas @ $2.619= $52.38 or 10.17 hours of work

To get to work, a person making minimum wage, needed to work less then 3.5 hours a week for his or her gasoline in1999. Now a person making minimum wage spends more then 1 day at work just to pay for their gas to get their. Added with the rising cost of heating, the cost of living, etc., you can begin to see how it is not possible to survive on minimum or a low wage in this country.

The price of a gallon of gas is nearly 3 times what it was 6 years ago. The time has come for US citizens to ask, “Why, after defeating 2 oil producing countries, are we paying more for oil then ever before?�

*Gasoline price referenced from the Energy Information Administation(www.eia.doe.gov)