A little Insight Please

I took this picture June 13th 2007 right before the Racetrac station in Middleburg opened up, little did I know that a year later the prices would almost be at this price. all I can say is greedy bastards!

The writting was clearly on the wall all the way back in the 1970's

Through several administrations democrat and republican. for the past 40 years we knew this was comming. We sat back and did nothing.

The enviromentalist, lobbiests et al screaming loud and clear. No Drilling for oil, no new nuclear power plants, and no new oil refineries.

We all went out and bought big suv's, pick ups, and the like, and used and used oil without any consideration.

Now it's payday. We reap what we sow, and we have'nt planted a single seed. Bon apitete. 

TRUTHHURTS

See I figured someone would miss the question.

CV

Have you taken a look at other inflationary stats over the years, or even overnight?  Rice, bottled water, the price of that car you put gas in, etc...? 

Somehow this country is developing the mentality that companies should not make money.  A very slippery slope to start down.  If a gas/oil company is charging too much, stop buying the product - or buy less.  If the price of movies goes up too high, stop going to see them.  If the price of cigarettes goes up too high, quit. 

We just cannot expect companies not to want to make money, I don't know who you work for but if the government just decided they were making too much and made them cut back on profits - you and/or others would be out of a job. 

Now, I may be a Curmudgeon - but I am not naive.  Are some companies charging too much for products?  Of course - but the way the system works - they charge too much, Consumer stops buying as much, price comes down.  It has worked for years and will work for many more. 

Price gouging is another thing, but again - there are current laws in place, we don't need more.  The last thing we need is more government control over gas/oil !!

Oil is a globalize commodity where pricing changes based on supply and demand. The current weak US dollar and the increased demand from nations going through an industrial boom like China are just two examples effecting the global demand. There are many, many things globally that effect this fine balance. If we planned better 40 years ago we would not be in the pickle we are in now.

TRUTHHURTS

Actually I think it is because they can. This is the part of what I consider obscene profits the oil companies are making. $18B in a quarter? There are hundreds of countries that don't have that kind of revenue in a year.

This is what I was talking about in another blog. The fuel that is in the tank in the ground did not suddenly cost more money overnight. I don't mind the price going up when the fuel costs the seller more. That is normal. But to change price overnight just because you can is gouging.

During the Katrina evacuation people were fined and went to jail for that. But it happens every day in thousands of stations and our leaders do nothing but line their pockets with oil money.

Was that your question? 

They just finished another round of 'questioning' of big oil and they still believe the crap they were told. Or at least pretend to. Demand is NOT up enough and supply is NOT down enough to justify the increases.

If an oil worker in Mexico farts does that mean we have a gas shortage here in the US and need to raise prices? I don't think so.

Mike Heemer http://24.23.126.8/ Petition for choice (5 or 7) in Nov.

Gasoline that is in the ground at service stations is not bought and paid for until we pump the gas into our vehicles and actually pay for it. The gas in the service station tanks are metered. When the price of oil rises or falls, the oil company that supplies the service station with its gas calls the station and has them adjust. If the service station does not make the adjustment and lets say increase the price, station owners will have to cut into their profit to make up for the difference. The price is based on global supply and demand not just US.

The fuel that is aleady in the ground, owned by the oil companies becomes more valuable based on this supply and demand, and they adjust accordingly. They want and expect the market value for their product.

Price gouging is ilegal and should be reported if discovered.

TRUTHHURTS

Does anyone Remember this? 

I Have A Plan....I have A plan…..Too bring down gas prices. This plan will work if we the people join the effort. The price of gas is outrages compared to the profits that the big five make. Big oil in this country has too much power. Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for making a profit, and the oil companies in this country do very well for there stock holders.           The power that they have is they can raise there prices based on speculation any time they choose to, and this gives them the ability to change our economy. If you think about it everything in this country runs on fuel.            But, we the people have power also. We have the power of numbers. We can make a difference in the price of fuel. If we were to come together and boycott one oil company they would lower there price of fuel. That’s right just one company. When the boycotted oil company lowers there price to a reasonable rate we the people will start using there fuel again. When the other four oil companies start loosing customers due to the cheaper fuel of the once boycotted company they will follow suit and lower there prices also.  Sounds too simple don’t it.  What say you!             

It will help to drop pricing by reducing demand. But the trick is getting everyone on board at the same time, but that would at best only work for awhile.

I think what we need to do as a nation is to throw everything we have at and see what sticks. Start drilling for our own oil, build some oil refineries, build some nuclear power plants, find alternative fuel sources, use less fuel, build more fuel friendly vehicles, reduce fuel taxes at the pump, to name a few. Just throw everything we have, and what we can think of at the problem aggressively.

TRUTHHURTS

Like it or not, our economy is an oil based economy. We could all stop driving tomorrow and the price of gas wouldn’t change a lot. Name one thing that you buy in any store that doesn’t rely on petroleum in at least one segment of the manufacturing process. Even the growers of vegetables need fuel for their equipment and petroleum bases for the chemicals that they use for fertilizer and pesticides. Every item delivered comes by a truck that has to spend the big bucks to buy fuel. Look at each and every item in your home and try to decide which one doesn’t have a bit of petroleum.

We could boycott a specific gas company if we wanted but the owner wouldn’t suffer much. A gas station makes more profit on all other products than it does on gasoline. The profit on a gallon of gas is around $.13 per gallon. The station makes more profit on coffee than it does on gas. Don’t believe me? Just ask the manager.

People are hollering about alternative fuels to power their gas guzzlers. So, how much will that relieve the problem when we have to get our engines modified to even accept it? The expense of refining coal or oil shale will be cost prohibitive making a gallon of gas around $10-$15 dollars a gallon. Making fuel from corn will drive up the cost of corn products up due to supply. A bag of Doritos will cost $20.

Nuclear power, solar power, wind power are great ideas to solve a lot of problems but are you ready for the initial monetary cost to build? I don’t see any easy solutions but it’s a problem that needs attention starting yesterday.

I knew this would be tough.  In a nut shell this is what I asked.  No economy 101, supply and demand 40 years ago or any of that.  On Saturday Racetrac in Middleburg jacked the Diesel up from 4.29 to 4.35 then on Sunday when travel is down they dropped it to 4.31.  The Shell on Blanding and Madison had gas at 3.69 all weekend until at least 7 p.m. on SUNDAY but by 6:30 a.m ON MONDAY they jacked it a whole dime to 3.79. 

 A.  When does Price Gouging come  into the picture?

B.  Since when did the Commodities Markets open on Weekends?

And actually the first go around of the Mighty gas shortages was in 1972/ that was 36 years ago.

Sweet Texas Crude comes from Texas not Saudi.  Must be nice to be a Texas oil man bout right now.

Thank you CVP! The comment from TH made me sit up, scratch my head and think "Say what?'

Price gouging is ilegal and should be reported if discovered.

Who do I report it to? I'll turn in every station in town.

What we need is definition of price gouging. It's gouging if you raise the price 10 cents during an evacuation but it isn't if you raise it 30 cents over a one week period.

The fuel in the tank in the ground only costs X amount to make. Why should they be able to change the price of it after it has been delivered? 

Mike Heemer http://24.23.126.8/ Petition for choice (5 or 7) in Nov.

Finder et al

To report price gouging click on the link below.

http://myfloridalegal.com/contact.nsf/contact

TRUTHHURTS

the tree hugging democrats will say no and over course the Repubs will say yes.  And once again the stailmate that all democrats love.

Today congress is voting on some issues surrounding oil prices. One of the topics will be to drill in Anwr Alaska.

Years back congress passed the bill to drill in Anwr, but President Clinton vetoed it. If Clinton had not vetoed that bill we would be pulling out the same amount of oil we import from Suadi Arabia today.

I wonder how are democratic majority congress will vote today, and at the end of the day who do we really have to blame for the fuel problems we are having.

TRUTHHURTS

I was just listening to a story on NPR @ the new boom times in the Fort Worth, TX area.  It seems that boom times have returned to Texas.  The geolgical whiz kids had know for some time that there was a rather large pocket of natural gas in the Fort Worth are.  X TRILLION cubic feet of the wonderful stuff.  But because previously the price of gas was relatively low, they deemed that it was not cost effective to drill for it.  My my, how times have changed.

Now that the price is @ $126.00 a barrel, they have seen the light.  They be drillin' like there's no tomorrow.  Now mind you, the price of gas is still high & apparently going higher.  I can't give you the exact quote, I don't have a photographic memory, but one person interviewed offered his long range view & concern for the environment, not to mention the future, in his best Texas twang, or drawl, or whatever you might wish to call it.  He basically said, "Shoot, these are boom times.  I bought me an RV & a pick up truck."  Now there are words to live by.  There's a view we should all emulate.

And does anyone wonder why we need look much further to see why we're in the mess we're in, at least in part?  JATFUR.

RichK