Bush Says Little Can Be Done About High Gas Prices

Sierra Times ^ | 4/22/2006 | AP Staff

[barnswallow]

For those conservatives who still believe that high gasoline prices are just "free market capitalism at work" then check this out.: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,192263,00.html

This is quoting a CONSERVATIVE (Bill O'Reilly), not some capitalist-hating lefty. Some conservatives (e.g. Rush Limbaugh, Brit Hume choose not to see the truth behind high gasoline prices). There are none so blind as those who will not see. Here is what CONSERVATIVE O'Reilly has to say:

"You are being gouged by the American oil companies. Gas supplies, gas supplies are at an eight-year high. Gas prices have doubled since 2004. Even if you don't know anything about economics, this one's pretty obvious. "Talking Points" has been saying for more than a year, U.S. oil companies are exploiting uncertainty in the world by raising prices they don't have to raise. The companies are making record profits while American workers are getting hurt. Every time the commodities speculators bid up a barrel of oil, the price of a barrel of oil, every time they bid it up, you pay more at the pump. It has nothing to do with supply and demand. It's all about exploiting fears about Iran, terrorism, what might happen down the road. President Bush knows what's going on, but doesn't like to interfere with big business."

[xzins]

Hmmm........you are correct. It doesn't show any such direct quote, does it?

"if we find any price gouging it will be dealt with firmly."

If he said anything, then that is it, and that probably should have been the headline.

"Bush Threatens Price-Gougers!"

[lepton]

we should have been drilling more and producing refineries decades ago due to the obvious factors that these two highly populated nations were progressing and would demand more oil.

Ummmm. Refineries don't produce oil, and our number of refineries has nothing to do with China's or India's oil usage. We should have been allowing refineries to be built because we use more refined products.

Our limit is a combination of NIMBY and EPA regulations - and under Clinton the government produced many ridiculous interpretations of regulations that actually took refinery capacity off-line.

[lepton]

To hear the President say we can do nothing is hallucinating. There's no quote provided which supports the contention that he said any such thing.

[Rebelbase]

thanks.

[kabar]

“I think the president ought to get on the phone with the OPEC cartel and say, ‘We expect you to open your spigots.’ … The president of the United States must jawbone OPEC members to lower the price.” [Financial Times, 2/2/00]

He has done that. Bush and his cabinet have been to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq and other gulf countries numerous times. If you recall, the President had Crown Prince Abdullah to his ranch last year, including the hand holding picture. The CS Monitor reported the meeting as follows:

Oil prices have been falling since President George W. Bush's meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah at his Texas ranch Monday. The two leaders discussed a variety of issues, including the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, terrorism, security, trade and Mr. Bush's call for more democracy in the Middle East.

But the focus was on oil prices.

As The New York Times reports, the talks "focused on a plan by the Saudis to increase their oil-pumping capacity over the next decade rather than on any short-term efforts to bring prices down."

As the Sydney Morning Herald points out, the prince's second visit to the ranch makes him the only world leader to have had two invitations.

Diplomatic hand-holding

[chris1]

I don't even listen to him anymore.

Again, like almost every other issue, the idiots in D.C. try to make us believe its more complicated than it really is.

[chris1]

Oh please, more excuses and utter garbage. GWB has proven to be a complete disaster as far as domestic issues are concerned. No leadership, no initiative, no
follow-through, no vision, no guys, no cojones.

After 9/11, this should have been one of the top priorities and, yes, if they would have done it then, it would be making an impact now.

All we get is excuses and nonsense. Nonsense on the border, nonsense on spending, nonsense on almost everything.

[joesbucks]

You did however insinuate that the jawboning comment was never made. And in the context of it, he was suggesting that the president at time didn't have the contacts or the gravitas in place to move oil prices and a simple phone call from the most powerful man in the world would make a difference.

And while after the meetin in Texas, the drop in prices was short lived.

[lepton]

I remdember seeing and hearing HW. Bush saying that the American people could pay the same as Europeans.

First, saying "could" is very different from saying "should". Saying that if you walk around the east side of town at 1AM you could get mugged, is not at all like saying that you should get mugged.

Second, Gore had a book called "Earth in the Balance," which was the subject of many campaign debates from mid 1992 on.

GHWBush never advocated European gas prices.

[new cruelty]

BANANA... hah. that's neat. Lets see other fruits can be used!

Listed in order of taste preference and having little if anything to do with anything involving the subject at hand-

ORANGE: Obstruct Redeveloping Any Non-Government Environments

APPLE: Abetting Private Property Loss Everywhere

GRAPE: Government Restrictions Are Penalizing Everyone

PEACH: Permits Exclude Any Construction Here

PLUM: Past Limitations Undo Modernization

PINEAPPLE: Purposely Investing Nothing Eschews Abetting Private Property Loss Everywhere

APRICOT: Any Project Reducing Income Can Omit Tax

This is fun... sort of.

Gotta run. Work beckons.

[hford02]

There are two forces at work here: the reality of world economics of petroleum prices. and THE PUBLIC PERCEPTION of petroleum prices. No other issue (save maybe war) has as much effect on current public approval ratings. Three dollar a gallon gas is a deal breaker for the republicans...They have to get the domestic price of gasoline heading south soon or we will have 40 more socialists in the senate to set the price.
They need to do some or all of the following:
Forget Bush (He thinks everybody has an MBA from Yale)

Push to open drilling in all known area of oil reserves
Including ANWR, California, the entire Gulf of Mexico including sacred Florida

Immediately reduce Federal taxes on gasoline.

Remove tariffs on imported ethanol

Remove seasonal ethanol mandates

Sell 20% of the Strategic Reserve (just for show)

Expand refinery capacity by 20% by subsidizing the construction of new refineries with 50% federal matching funds.

Ditto with a dozen or more new nulear power plants to be built on Federal lands vacant from recent military closures.

Fund Bio-diesel, hydrogen research with massive federal dollars.

Dare the Dems to vote against any of these proposals.

Make them pay for not acting on the energy plan that Bush prepared five years ago (which would have alleviated many current problems)

[Alberta's Child]

O'Reilly is full of sh!t. The "record profits" in the oil industry are "records" primarily because these companies are much larger than they used to be. ExxonMobil, BP/Amoco, Texaco/Chevron, etc. are all the result of major corporate mergers involving two huge oil companies merging to create a single "mega-huge" company.

It should also be noted that ExxonMobil's "record" $10 billion profits in 2005 resulted from about $100 billion in gross revenue -- which means the company showed a return on investment of about 10%. This is hardly an obscene profit margin in any sense of the word, and is dwarfed by the enormous profit margins in many other industries. In fact, people who know the energy business actually laugh out loud at the suggestion that buying stock in a company like ExxonMobil is a good investment in a booming energy market. To an investor in the energy sector, buying ExxonMobil stock is the equivalent of putting your money in a savings account at your local bank.

I shouldn't be too hard on O'Reilly, since there's no reason to expect anything more than this nonsense from a guy who probably hasn't contributed to the production of a single product or commodity in his entire life.

[rollo tomasi]

Sorry if I implied refineries would increase the supply of oil. I was speaking in general terms of the problems DC always gives us (Shortage of refineries with all the boutiques required). Again sorry if I lumped refineries with India/China demand.

[kabar]

This is quoting a CONSERVATIVE (Bill O'Reilly), not some capitalist-hating lefty

Like so many things, O'Reilly is talking through his hat again. He is not an oil or energy expert. He is just trying to pander to the general public's unhapiness with incresed prices at the pump. It is easier to demonize the oil companies than educate the public about how oil prices are set and why the US is limited on what it can do to influence the price.

If you want to learn more about the facts and understand the problem better, check out these links:

Global oil capacity growth hinges on mega-projects

Apocalypse, not

Some interesting oil industry statistics

Supply

World Crude Oil and Gas Reserves

[lepton]

I did not base my comments on the headline at all.

Then what did you base them on?

[new cruelty]

President Bush's speech did very little to offer hope for lower gas prices over this summer. But you are dead-on correct that he never stated that little could be done about high gas prices.

[lepton]

Check out your local library archives and look it up.

I'm not the one who said he said something completely contrary to his common arguments. That burden is yours. At most I can see him downplaying arguments over how $1.10 gas was a crisis.

[stevio]

Bush could end the politics on this issue right now if he spoke out. he is letting the RATs demagogue the issue.

This pattern has been all too common throughout his presidency.

[steveo]

Americans want cheap energy but are not willing to make the changes necessary to deal with the fact that worldwide demand for oil is increasing faster than supply.

Exactly... there is NO location anywhere in the U.S. that you could build a new refinery that wouldn't be hit with lawsuits and be tied up in court for YEARS.