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www.NationalView.org's Note From a Madman
June 11, 2008
Just Another McBush Plan
"The Energy Department's Energy Information Administration (EIA) said oil
inventories fell by 4.6 million barrels last week. Analysts surveyed by energy
research firm Platts expected a much smaller decline of about 1.4 million
barrels,"
-The Associate Press (http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080611/oil_prices.html)
Leave it to the Bush administration's Department of Energy to add fuel (so to
speak) to the already out-of-control fire that is known as our current US
gasoline crisis. While others are trying to find ways of keeping our vehicles'
fuel costs low, Bush's Energy Department is tolling yet another alarm and
estimating that our current situation is actually worse than it already is.
That's hard to imagine, I know.
Why?
With other commodity forecasters telling US citizens and investors that our fuel
inventories have moderately fallen, Bush's "people" are telling us that this
horrific situation is even worse - more than three times worse.
Again I ask: Why?
Every time someone comes out and says that oil is a problem, the stock market
goes crazy and gas prices rise. And while this ever-increasing-in-value
commodity gains economic strength, our US dollar falls. As the announcement was
being made, the European Union's Euro earned more of our US dollars in exchange.
The rate rose to $1.5566 US dollars per Euro from $1.5449.
And there appears to be no end in sight to this trend, at least while President
Bush is in office. (So why would we allow a new John McBush term?)
Oil prices have been "been hand in hand with what the dollar's been doing,"
-James Cordier, president of Liberty Trading Group and OptionSellers.com.
It's hard to know which is the chicken and which is the egg in this scenario.
Our falling dollar has sent investors to the commodities markets in droves,
forcing the price of crude to climb and set new records nearly every day.
Similarly, as these investors sell their greenbacks for "slick-backs" (I just
made that up), the dollar falls.
And what is the Bush administration doing to help the situation? Nothing at all
- well, at least nothing to help. However by overstating the depth of the worst
of the situation, they are "helping" their "base of haves and have mores" as
they create more and more wealth and make us regular Americans more and more
poor.
The end-game, more than likely, is for President Bush to urge Congress to allow
for drilling in ANWAR, which most experts agree won't give us the amount of
crude we truly require. In the end, that will open the gates for all sorts of
drilling off of our shores, with the exception of Kennebunkport, Maine, of
course.
After all, some things are sacred.
And they'll use statements such as the one below to make their case:
"If crude inventories were seriously in surplus, I think that would start to
override the effects of the dollar,"
-Michael Lynch, president of Strategic Energy & Economic Research Inc.
Surely that must be a part of the Bush end-game.
But as we see a drop in our oil inventory we also see our refineries refusing to
purchase more crude oil for processing. Even though the cry from President Bush
after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf coast was that "We need more refineries,"
the ones we have now aren't even operating at full capacity. Let's not forget
that the Bushies used that disaster to make gasoline reach well over the three
dollar mark for the first time in our history and cause a mini-gas-crisis back
then. The day after Hurricane Katrina hit I paid $3.63 per gallon after waiting
in a long, artificial gas line reminiscent of the 1970's.
It must have been a test or something - and we passed. It would have been better
if we had failed this one.
All of what is happening in the last year of President Bush's tenure in office
has done nothing but harm the American public. He has taken a once strong and
powerful middle class and made us the mule of the very rich and Big Business -
the core of his true "base of haves and have mores" - and he has done so in such
a way that it appears there may be no way to turn it around.
With our tax dollars going to the Bush-McCain-McBush never-ending war in Iraq
and our personal income going towards gas and, for those of us lucky enough to
have jobs and still afford it, health care, there appears to be no hope or end
in sight.
The plan is working, President Bush. Good show.
-Noah Greenberg
In response to, "I hope you're all breathing a lengthy sigh of relief today
knowing that the Saudi Royal Family is on the case," Rhian writes:
Now that's funny!
Actually, it might be the brokers who are trading futures on oil, without the
covert shield of Valerie Plame's phony company, which was keeping the traders
from knowing which market the US was tapping.
Do you really think Bush and Cheney outed her because they were jealous of her
hair?
In response to Hillary Clinton's run, Dorothy Schwartz writes:
I am so tired of hearing that people didn't vote for Hillary because she is a
woman (though I have to admit I've recently seen a compilation of hits on her
from Fox News and they were disgusting.) When Hillary Clinton first came into
public view, I greatly admired her, even identified with her, since we were
similar ages and similar politics. I even backed her when people said she should
leave her husband during the whole Monica ridiculousness, feeling that she was
doing whatever she thought was right and best for her family and for the
country.
I still remember however, the shock I felt when she voted for the war. I was
listening to the live broadcast of the Iraq war vote in fall of 2002 and when
they called her name and she voted for it I felt totally appalled and let down.
Perhaps if she had shown a different attitude about that vote subsequently I
could have forgiven her, but she did not.
Another issue I have with the acclaim of her as a woman candidate is that
unfortunately she did not get where she is on her own. Would she have run for
president, and nearly claim the nomination, had she not been married to Bill?
And during the recent campaign, I became disgusted with the statements that were
directed toward Obama. She and her campaign often supported a racial
divisiveness.
I would be overjoyed to vote for a woman for president in the future, if she
represented my politics and values, but unfortunately Hillary did not.
In response to, "The Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE standards which
determine the miles per gallon as fuel efficiency for our vehicles was presented
in an act of congress way back in 1975 in response to the first gas crisis in
1973. Its purpose was to make America less dependent on foreign oil by creating
more fuel efficient cars, vans and light trucks. The idea was that, in a few
years, all of the vehicles on US roads would be reaching the 40 MPG mark. It was
passed by a Republican President (Gerald Ford) and was all but killed by another
Republican President (Ronald Reagan)," Sean corrects the record with:
Wrong. CAFE was mandated by President Carter and repealed by Reagan. If left in
place the MINIMUM fuel efficiency of American vehicles would be at 70 MPG
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-Noah Greenberg