Posted on 02/26/2008 4:30:47 PM PST by reaganator
Well, old surfer dude take a look at that “crap” on your feet.
That black stuff.
Where do you think it comes from?
That's the ticket...pi$$in' on the amerikan weenies that cower under Al Gore's skirts
MY ENGINE BLOCK IS COVERED IN BLOOD
and I guess I....been on the road too long
Slaid Cleaves...a great AMERICAN Songster
The only thing I have ever said on that level is my post (don’t recall if it is this thread or another) was a semi-tongue -in-cheek “conspiracy theory”, but it did not directly involve the oil industry, but was an effort to force Kyoto-style regulations without officially passing them (depreciating the value of the dollar and jacking up world oil prices to force high costs on consumers who would eventually be limited by financial issues instead of legislation).
And again, it was primarily tongue-in-cheek.
The oil industry profits are actually relatively flat - they make pretty much the same margin on fuels regardless of the price of oil - with total profits running right around 10%. A lot of industries could not exist on 10% profit margins. So if oil is at $20 per barrel, or at $100 per barrel - the end profit overall for big oil is about 10%. The records in profit come from demand, not from increased margins.
But even if that is what was done you're still wrong. The ocean is not an infinite sink capable of hiding all our sins. It's in terrible shape and getting worse as a result of our activities. I'm familiar with Santa Monica Bay (Los Angeles) where the city makes enormous efforts to keep the waters pure and clean. It hasn't worked very well. San Francisco Bay is much worse. I very much doubt it's better anywhere else.
If we were talking about animals instead of human beings the solution to the problem would be immediate; cull the herd. That's what we do now, that's what we did in the past. The great buffalo herd of the central plains was deliberately slaughtered in only a few years because they got in our way, because the Indians couldn't live without them.
Nor have we been all that careful when we dealt with inconvenient human beings. Hitler rightly held us up as a shining example of how to deal with the surplus and unwanted. Then he and Stalin and Mao showed us what could be done if modern methods were consistently put to use by ruthless and determined men. Then Pol Pot and the Rwandans showed us that modern methods weren't required, that the same thing could be done with knives and forks.
A hundred years ago Theodore Roosevelt and the men around him recognized that the short-sighted pursuit of private profit was ruining the country. 50 years ago the California coastline was, with the exception of a couple of a few major ports, pristine and at least 40,000 tigers roamed the world. Today, even suggesting that it might not be a good idea to further despoil the ocean and its coastlines is considered unpatriotic and tigers are only a few years from extinction.
Open your eyes man! It's still possible to avoid turning the entire world into desert of radioactive slag. Barely.
And dozens have been shut down by the oil companies. Tight supplies keep prices higher. There is no incentive for them to build more.
The high price of their product is the incentive to build more refineries.
Ever hear, “Buy low sell high”? When your product is selling at an all time high you push EVERTHING you can out onto the market.
How many investigations have there been to determine if the oil companies have been gouging the American consumer? They all have concluded that they were not.
I started this thread KNOWING that the answer to the high cost of gasoline was TO MANUFACTURE MORE GASOLINE!
As for the environment, the environment will NEVER be clean enough for the environmental extremists. Everyone wants clean air, clean water and not a ruined environment. Going to extremes on this will most certainly ruin the American economy. Whether there is a Grand Conspiracy on this with millions of “useful idiots” is besides the fact that this course WILL MOST DEFINATELY ruin the American economy.
Madeline Albright as Secretary of State, “The world would be a safer place if the United States was not a superpower.” I am paraphrasing, I need that quote! Help me find it.
Ever hear, "supply and demand"? When supplies are tight and demand is high the price is high. When demand is high and supplies increase the price goes down. The refineries are selling every gallon they produce, at a very nice margin. There is no incentive for them to increase supply and drive the price down.
I was responding to someone who blamed the Democrats for the fact that there have been no new refineries opened by pointing out that scores have been closed over the same period to ensure that there would be a minimum of excess refining capacity. That has worked in the oil companies favor.
None of this will help, but they don't care.
Shut up and be a good little peon...
Wrong way to look at it. They currently ARE doing something. They are making things worse.
Mandates, taxes, regulations, etc artificially change both the price floors and the price ceilings. This skews the economic impact of increased demand by artificially limiting the efficiency of the supply. Add in a falling dollar due to truly self-destructive spending/taxing policies and you have the "stagflation" driving prices.
None of this will help!?
Might as well say, “They are throwing gasoline on a fire but it will not help to extingush the fire.”
Too bad we can't find someone with a nice Class ABC extinguisher...
You don’t even know where the black stuff on your feet comes from
You obviously don’t like anything produced by man.
You and your ideas are playing into the hands of the people you mention in your post to me.
Your kind seem to believe that the planet would be better off with out people.
Volunteer, but don’t try to take any of us with you.
My, you are cagey, but finally started answering the question that I asked you 3 days ago.
One of your first answers is quite telling:
It's not just the black stuff on my feet, it's everything produced by man...and that's the point. The more people there are the more stuff we have to produce. (Why would you say that if you didn't want less...or...NO people?)
So less "inconvenient human beings" would help huh?
So now, what is a "seep" that causes that black stuff on your feet, and what can we do to prevent it from happening?
We will see as we go along that the "seeps" are caused by the inaction of man, caused by...yes... "your kind"...buying into every environmental law and restriction put into action. Now I know you called me a name, but I only described you as a special type of person.
A liberal, and a strict environmentalist.
One who complains about man's great numbers on this planet, and the fact that we produce things.
And we are "inconvenient" beings to you, your words.
Don't be shy about being who you are, Larry.
You are a special kind of person.
Yes.
We will see as we go along that the "seeps" are caused by the inaction of man, caused by...yes... "your kind"...buying into every environmental law and restriction put into action.
Contrary to certain religious dicta, the natural world does not exist solely for the convenience of man. Which is why he attempts to alter it. Those alterations have consequences - many of them highly counter-productive. How difficult is that to understand?
You have some better way of dealing with "inconvenient human beings" and "counter-productive alterations" than that proposed by environmentalists? Fine. I'm listening. But so far all I've heard are denials of reality and ad-hominem distortions of my position.
The RATS in Congress refuse to allow drilling in ANWR, in the Gulf and on the coasts. So we should expect to pay $4 + for gas. As long as the RATS continue to get elected expect more of the same.
If it’s so difficult to build a refinery here in the US...
...why has no US oil company simply built one in Mexico, Canada, or the Caribbean - and then either piped in/shipped in the end product?
That would increase US gasoline supplies and circumvent the environmental laws.
Well?
Because they would be subject to the whims of those countries (Mexico would have to be a MAJORITY owner). You might think they don’t do it because they want to make more money, and you might be right. With more refineries, they could make more money on more gasoline. They would have to find the correct supply/demand balance. Until then they only have so much supply. They will soon be out of balance, if not already.
Actually, I think that you may be mistaken on this.
For Adam Smith disagrees with you.
"The natural price, or the price of free competition ... is the lowest which can be taken, not upon every occasion indeed, but for any considerable time together...[It] is the lowest which the sellers can commonly afford to take, and at the same time continue their business."
The Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter VII
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