Gas prices= Enron price-gouging redux

Hats off the the Center for American Progress .  They have the goods but haven't properly connected all the right dots with their most recent Progress Report.

Maybe you've heard how American companies are held hostage by OPEC prices and aren't at all responsible for high gas prices?  Not so.  ConocoPhillips said second-quarter profits surged nearly 75%, to $2.1 billion." "Shell saw its earnings rise 54%, thanks to higher prices for oil and natural gas." The company pocketed an additional $3.7 billion in profits.  British Petroleum posted record-setting second quarter profits of $3.9 billion- a 23 percent jump from just one year ago.   And ExxonMobil "posted its highest quarterly profit ever yesterday as the company continues to benefit from the long run-up in energy prices." The company posted second-quarter profit growth of 39 percent to $5.79 billion.

The above-mentioned Progress Report documents all the money flowing from these companies to Bush and  the Republican party.

As with Enron and the California Energy crisis, the White House and its Capitol Hill allies have countered criticism by claiming their corporate-crafted energy bill would fix the problem.  In fact, the Bush administration's own analysis  confirms energy prices would not be lower if its energy bill was law.  

As with Enron, Mr. Bush's ideal energy policy would provide tax cuts for Big Oil and lack of funding for possibly competitive alternative energy sources.

As with Enron, Mr. Bush wants to put a pet fox, instead of a watchdog, over the henhouse of public interest.  Despite mass consolidation in the energy industry causing a huge spike in energy prices, President Bush is attempting to appoint a ChevronTexaco representative to run the Federal Trade Commission - the regulatory body that oversees mergers.  Since he took office, Bush has "allowed an increase in oil refinery mergers to go unchecked" and rampant consolidation "may have contributed to the highest gasoline prices in 20 years." The Bush administration has approved 33 oil refinery takeovers worth $19.5 billion and hasn't tried to block any. The Boston Globe reports, "the result is big players control far greater market share." Last year, the five biggest US oil companies controlled 63.4 percent of the country's retail gasoline market, up from 46.2 percent in 1997, according to an industry trade publication, National Petroleum News.

George Bush is directly responsible for high gas prices just like he was responsible for aiding and abetting Enron while it raped California taxpayers.  He stifles possible competition, appoints pet foxes instead of watchdogs, and otherwise refuses to properly regulate Big Oil.  He is allowing Big Oil to use the OPEC prices as an excuse to gouge prices and thus they made record profits during the second quarter.  More money coming for the GOP coffers.

•  tips jar

  by mikepridmore on Fri Jul 30, 2004 at 04:39:05 PM PDT

  •  No Defense

    but the refinery consolidation started long before Bush.

    BP bought Amoco and Arco in the 90's.  That was the first biggy since the 80's. Exxon-mobil and Chev/Tex are more recent.  It's gotten ridiculous.  

    However, the demand side of the equation is the bigger part of the problem.  There are enough independant retail stations and independant refiners to keep the major honest except that there's a real tightness in gasoline now so no one need compete very hard to sell their entire production.  This wasnt the case 6-8 years ago.

    There is no spare refining capacity now that mogas use is 9 MMBD and up, and insufficient means to deliver imports to knock the market back down easily.  Much as people hate Wall Street, the trading community are the only players left who can sell down the market with cheaper product from elsewhere (when/if available).  All these special blends make this damn near impossible in the inland regions.

    by HiD on Fri Jul 30, 2004 at 05:31:37 PM PDT

•  With the outlandish profits

  it is obvious that competition is not as strong as it should be.  To a large extent they are just charging what they want to.... with tight supplies used as the excuse.

  by mikepridmore on Fri Jul 30, 2004 at 05:46:11 PM PDT

•  Nice

  More good knowledge to know.

  by dopies on Sat Sep 04, 2004 at 02:11:03 AM PDT