Comments like these just evade the issue.....it does not matter who is wrong and who is right. It matters what policies are effective or ineffective.

 

I'm just still trying to figure out what I said that was "wrong"?

You don't go into business to lose money.

 

Don't worry, they're not losing money are they?

I think you will be surprised, in a good way of course, you are a consumer like me. Remember this upcoming president only has a 4 year lease, in a recent CNN poll, 42% of Americans voted gas prices#1 in their voting concerns.

 

If gas goes up anymore and if they can't get it down at least 50 cents I wouldn't get comfy if I were them. The Bush admin has done little to try to lower gas other than ask the Saudis for more oil.

 

Lets be honest the dollar gas days are gone but there is no reason why we can't get in in the low 2's. The democratic president will clash with them and really take it to them making it so that they have to get oil down to around 50-60 (where it should be now). Making gas about 2.20, which is still comical because that will still equal billion dollar profits for big oil. The question is are they going to continue to have record profits, or just really strong profits.

I don't see how exactly the Democrat will force the Big Oil companies to lower their prices. I can't think of a method that would work.

 

Interesting point brought up on putting political pressure on the Arabs, who knows if it is practical though.

I don't see how exactly the Democrat will force the Big Oil companies to lower their prices. I can't think of a method that would work.

 

Interesting point brought up on putting political pressure on the Arabs, who knows if it is practical though.

 

A windfall tax will. They tried to pass a bill about a year ago to tax them heavily anytime the price of oil is over $50. So they would have to do "more" then what they are right now to make sure it stays below that. The Dems major debate is big oil made over 123 billion last year, and only gave 100 million or so to fund other sources, yeah that's a nice piece of change, but not on 123 billion, AROD makes more then what they funded to "alternative sources."

 

I read today on my CNN blog that Dems are trying to push new rules on how much speculators have to put down on oil. Right now they only have to put 5-7% down (on an oil contract), because its a commodity. Most other stocks you have to put 50% down.

 

If they can make this happen oil will go down drastically and so will gas. Because they won't be able to jump off and on it like they are right now, only losing chump change when their wrong on which direction it goes.

Where does the U.S. get their oil from?

 

1. Canada

2. Mexico

3. Saudi Arabia

4. Venezuela

5. Nigeria

6. Angola

7. Iraq

8. Algeria

9. United Kingdom

10. Brazil

 

 

http://www.energyrefuge.com/archives/where_oil_comes_from.htm

I have a question for those of you who believe that a "windfall profit tax" would force oil companies to lower the price of gasoline. Can you name a single instance where raising taxes on an industry to punish it has resulted in lower consumer prices? Just one, please.

I have a question for those of you who believe that a "windfall profit tax" would force oil companies to lower the price of gasoline. Can you name a single instance where raising taxes on an industry to punish it has resulted in lower consumer prices? Just one, please.

 

 

The purpose of it is to develop alternatives with the tax money. Surely, you wouldnt rather have them pocket hundreds of billions of dollars and only donate a very small portion into developing alternatives. Everyone says we need alternatives to lower cost and to be energy independent. It's not gonna happen with the current route. I think ethanol is a joke personally.

 

Exxon executive was given 350 million dollar retirement package I think big oil can do a lil more than donate 100 million to finding new alternatives. But you have to ask yourself... right now why would they want to, it's going to cut their profits down.

 

Each time oil goes up a dollar big oil makes millions. I will say its a joint process, they need to kick in more and we have to do something about the speculators, i'm not purely going to blame big oil, but right now i'm not smiling when I fill up. My car gets 30 MPG by the way.

The purpose of it is to develop alternatives with the tax money. Surely, you wouldnt rather have them pocket hundreds of billions of dollars and only donate a very small portion into developing alternatives. Everyone says we need alternatives to lower cost and to be energy independent. It's not gonna happen with the current route. I think ethanol is a joke personally.

 

Exxon executive was given 350 million dollar retirement package I think big oil can do a lil more than donate 100 million to finding new alternatives. But you have to ask yourself... right now why would they want to, it's going to cut their profits down.

 

Each time oil goes up a dollar big oil makes millions. I will say its a joint process, they need to kick in more and we have to do something about the speculators, i'm not purely going to blame big oil, but right now i'm not smiling when I fill up. My car gets 30 MPG by the way.

Raising taxes on oil companies, regardless of the purpose, is an indirect and regressive tax on all Americans. Oil companies will invest in alternative fuels when it makes economic sense to do so, as they have done in the past.

 

The alternatives may not make global warming alarmists happy, but oil companies will use profits to develop coal and oil shale, as well as other alternative fuels as those alternatives become cost effective.

 

The gullibility of the American public never ceases to amaze me. Millions of our fellow citizens will become convinced that it is in their own interests to "punish" oil companies and that the oil companies will be paying taxes out of their profits. We will be paying any new taxes at the pump. We will also be paying for the new taxes every time that we purchase food and other consumer goods that are transported by rail, truck, or plane.

 

Yesirree, I cannot wait until Senator Obama sticks it to those big old evil oil companies.:irked:

 

BTW, my car gets 35 mpg highway and around 32 around town. The only thing that I agree with you on is that ethanol subsidies are a cruel hoax.

I said ethanol was a joke from the beginning. All it has done is increase our food prices.

The bottom line in this is the way things now are slowly killing this country and the oil big wigs are the only ones not getting killed.

The bottom line in this is the way things now are slowly killing this country and the oil big wigs are the only ones not getting killed.

So are you okay with paying more for gasoline and everything transported by gasoline in diesel in the belief that it will cause oil big wigs some pain as well?

 

You are wrong about oil big wigs being the only ones not getting killed. The people in Congress who are demonizing oil companies on a daily basis may get away with raising our taxes and using oil companies as the scapegoats. We will all pay whatever new taxes are imposed upon oil companies, in proportion to the amount of gasoline that we use - and the people most responsible for higher prices will continue to get reelected.

Any which way you look at it Ace I can't justify 123 billion in profits. I am all for capitalism and understand everyone is out to make a profit or why have a business but that's excess. Three small airlines went under this week, one out of Columbus I used, UPS is cutting back due to rising fuel cost. When I was in Florida last summer the locals were taking a noticable hit due to lower tourism or higher gas. Truck drivers who use to make a 25% profit are now making around 5%. Gas is 3.35 as we speak and we are at least .25 to .40 cents away from peaking for this year. Where do you draw the line? When the recession hits in late summer to fall oil will be a prime factor in it.

 

Oil has been able to do as they please thus far. I do believe a Dem will get in office just because I think our country is absolutely fed up and tired of fastballs, I have all repub beliefs but people want a change up. What is the big deal if someone cuts there 123 billion dollar profits down to say 75 billion? And use a portion of the difference to develop alternatives, real alternatives, and bring the pump price down to around 2.25 which is still high technically.

I also haven't studied the windfall tax in detail. All I know is it's coming if Hillary or Barak gets in. However, will we need it once we get out of Iraq? You have to believe oil goes down once we leave Iraq. I will still stick by that big oil could be donating A LOT more to funding new alts, the windfall tax basically will be doing that, at least that's what Barak or Hillary says.

Higher oil prices will not help airlines or truckers be more profitable and surrendering Iraq to the Muslim extremists will destabilize oil prices even further. Our defeat in Iraq would be a green light to Iran and the terrorists that it funds to use whatever means necessary to wipe Israel from the map.

 

Iran, Syria, and leaders of terrorist organizations like al Qaeda and Hamas use Israel exactly like Democrats use big corporations. They foment hatred against a bogus enemy to divert attention from their own policy failures.

 

Our elected leaders have failed to secure our borders and have created one obstacle after another for US corporations to compete globally and the demagogues are promising more of the same to cure the problems that they have created.

 

Windfall taxes have been tried before. The more our government involves itself with our economy, the more employers and employees will suffer.

Any which way you look at it Ace I can't justify 123 billion in profits. I am all for capitalism and understand everyone is out to make a profit or why have a business but that's excess. Three small airlines went under this week, one out of Columbus I used, UPS is cutting back due to rising fuel cost. When I was in Florida last summer the locals were taking a noticable hit due to lower tourism or higher gas. Truck drivers who use to make a 25% profit are now making around 5%. Gas is 3.35 as we speak and we are at least .25 to .40 cents away from peaking for this year. Where do you draw the line? When the recession hits in late summer to fall oil will be a prime factor in it.

 

Oil has been able to do as they please thus far. I do believe a Dem will get in office just because I think our country is absolutely fed up and tired of fastballs, I have all repub beliefs but people want a change up. What is the big deal if someone cuts there 123 billion dollar profits down to say 75 billion? And use a portion of the difference to develop alternatives, real alternatives, and bring the pump price down to around 2.25 which is still high technically.

It's funny you use profit % in your example of how truckers are being hit but you use profit $ to illustrate how oil companies are putting it to us. What if oil companies were making 150 billion in profits but that only equated to 1% net profit? What should they make 1/2%, break even? Maybe oil companies should be non profit.