Congressional debate should be a gas, gas, gas

April 17, 2006

If you’ve driven by a gas station recently, you probably noticed prices surging a little. OK, more than a little. What’s more, prices will go up even more over the summer.

As for what this means politically, congressional Dems seem to believe this will be the straw that breaks the Republicans’ back this year.

Led by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Senate Democrats will deliver a letter to President [tag]Bush[/tag] on Tuesday asking him to support legislation to prevent price gouging in advance of summer’s anticipated increase, pointing to the federal [tag]Energy[/tag] Information Administration projections.

Democrats will also renew their invitation to Bush to convene a “bipartisan energy summit” to address issues of energy independence and volatility of energy prices.

“The status quo in which the security of the United States and our domestic economy is left to the whims of foreign regimes and companies that do not have the best interests of our nation at heart — is simply not an option,” the Democrats tell Bush in their letter.

House and Senate Democratic sources said last week they will mount an ongoing offensive against Bush and Republicans on the issue — one they hope can pay dividends this fall when voters head to the polls.

Roll Call reported that Republicans “remain confident they can counter any Democratic attempts.” How, exactly? One House [tag]Republican[/tag] leadership aide said the party would point out that Dems opposed the GOP’s [tag]energy[/tag] bill, which proves Dems aren’t credible on the issue.

Far be it for me to give congressional Republicans strategic advice, but if Bush and the GOP leadership got together on a sweeping energy plan, which included massive subsidies to energy companies, and which have not lowered [tag]gas prices[/tag], why will voters care that Dems voted against it? Won’t they think the Dems were right?

Regardless, the GOP House caucus is expected to use the week of June 25 as “energy week” to talk about their ideas on the issue. Expect to hear a lot about ANWR.

A short lesson on the pyschology of gasoline prices.

When prices are steady, shoppers look around a bit to find the best price, tightening the margins for gasoline station owners and reducing their profits,

When prices are climbing, shoppers look around A LOT to find the best price, almost eliminating margins,

but when prices are declining, shoppers relax and take whatever price they find, giving gasoline station owners their biggest margins.

Thus, yo-yo gasoline prices.

  • Ev’rywhere I hear the sound of marching, charging feet, boy
    ‘Cause gas is high and the time is right for fighting in the street, boy . . .

  • Gas prices are a result of global supply and demand. While it would be nice to punish the “gougers”, there is little to be gained from it. We as a nation should have addressed our dependence of foreign oil back in the ’70s. Now, the piper has come home to be paid. Worse still, the piper is aided by our current Pres. and his crew.

  • Let’s charge that Bush invaded Iraq to prevent Iraqi oil from coming to market (expected with the erosion of sanctions), undermining his friends and business partners in Dubai, Saudi Arabia and at Exxon-Mobil.

    How are they going to refute it? Say that low oil production in Iraq is Bush Administration incompetence?

  • With Bush (an oil man) as President, gasoline price have gone through the roof. What makes Bill Frist (a hospital / health insurance corporation owner) think people will vote for him when the cost of health care is rising even faster?

  • Yup. First I heard this morning that oil had gone to $70. Then I thought: Gas up, kiddo, first thing today without fail! So I did. It was 10 cents more than a week ago, when I last got gas. And then, on my way home from other business,maybe half an hour later, the sign was just clicking up to 5 cents more. And that’s at the rock-bottom distributor where I get my regular unleaded.

    Lance has a real point there. Also there’s the psychological war on the part of various corporate-pocket institutions like AAA giving us plenty of warning that gas prices will rise… setting the stage for a major scam.

    But we scam ourselves as much as they scam us. We don’t boycott. We don’t march. We philosophize and sigh our way out of action.

  • The thieves are getting as much as they can as fast as they can.

    This whole sabre-rattling over Iran is to distract us from the meteoric rise in gas prices.

    The free-market folk who believe that energy follows the ebb and flow of supply and demand are deluded.

    Speaking of shortages/surpluses is meaningless without citing a given price level.

    The energy market is mostly speculative inasmuch as there is always reasons cited by the corporate media to explain the rise in gas prices.

    Yes, PW – we talk when, perhaps we should walk. Yes, easier said than done.

  • Good post. I don’t think Americans like having Republicans in charge of energy policy at this point. The real point Democrats should be making is that the energy companies have had the energy portfolio for decades and are doing nothing to make us less dependent on foreign oil and those same companies fight tooth and nail America’s need for cleaner energy. The other big issue is that oil companies are heading for dirtier fuels and that is not a solution.

    I’ve been reading a lot of comment threads on progressive blogs and while there’s a lot of great commenters, in general I wish people would raise their game somewhat. Let’s see: American production in the Gulf still has not returned to last year’s levels after the hurricane. Nigeria’s production has fallen off because of domestic problems. Iraq is producing less than it was than before the war. And major new oil finds are not coming on line as fast as was hoped. Oh, and Bush is talking about starting a war with Iran. The oil companies will play their games because they always play their games but the supply problems are real.

    Are there solutions? Yeah, roughly close to 300 million solutions according to the latest US census. Solutions from the federal government (of course not written by the crooks who currently run the Republican party) would be extremely helpful but we’re hardly helpless at the individual, local and state level. And it helps to Google phrases like: alternative energy, home heating solutions, hybrid cars, windmills on agricultural land, nonprofit energy solutions, etc.

    I read an article the other day bad-mouthing hybrids because on the open road the mileage gets mediocre. My reaction was, so? Go rent a car on long trips; it’s probably more cost-effective anyway.

    Our energy problems are huge and require major investments but Americans, in the meantime, need to educate themselves.

  • This shit doesn’t happen in Europe because governments there tax the hell out of petrol, such that fluctuations in price-per-barrel of crude oil have zero effect on the price at the pump. Also, they use all the taxes to fund… PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION!

    This is what we need here. Fat-ass gas taxes… bring it up to $6/gallon or more, like it is in Europe. Use the tax money to reduce the budget deficit and get us off of the goddamned suburban-sprawl, highway-construction binge, and instead fund public transportation, walkable, livable cities and inner suburbs, alternative electricity production, etc. And high prices will dramatically reduce consumption, thus reducing the need for war! Regulations won’t work, but there’s nothing like high prices to make all of us suddenly get very creative about carpooling, turning down the thermostat, putting on sweaters, moving to cities and out of the damned suburbs, buying locally-produced goods and services to support our local economies, and slaying the big corporate fat-cat globalisation monster.

    Gas needs to be *more* expensive– much more– and not less. Gasoline profits need to be used to rebuild America as an energy-efficient state.

  • Oh and one more thing: a massive, excessive, punitive gasoline tax is not only a huge simulus for the public transportation industry, it is a direct subsidy for alternative energy entrepreneurs: by making the customer price expectation high enough to justify investment in new technologies which are always expensive when first introduced.

    Think anyone here has the political will to propose this? It gores every oxen in the country: Repugs won’t go near it because it is *shock, gasp* a TAX!!! Horrors… run, tax! Aiieee! Spineless Democrats won’t go near it for the exact same reason. And many on the left will scream bloody murder about the horrifically regressive nature of such a tax. Well guess what? I don’t care. This is the bad medicine we need to take– all of us– if we are to have any credibility.

  • “Our energy problems are huge and require major investments but Americans, in the meantime, need to educate themselves.” – Craig

    We need to build the next generation energy/fuel economy in this country NOW! Why wait until all the oil is gone? Let Europe, India and China keep their economies on on the Oil energy/fuel economy. While their CO2 emmissions will effect us, why don’t we let them become dependent on Saudi oil manipulations (Saudi Arabia is the only place with surge capacity, Russian oil has to keep flowing at all times or it freezes in the pipeline). Hell, if we did it right, we could start selling U.S. oil on the market at a huge markup.

    We can’t rely on the Oil companies and we certainly can not rely on the Texas mafia and Republicanites currently in charge. We need a new policy in this country, not one that looks out two decades and says let’s do something then.

  • Didn’t Cheney say that high gas prices are a sign of a failed presidency? I f there is a clip of that, Democrats should be playing it every chance they get.

  • I see all of this bickering and finger pointing between the two parties. I think that government as a whole is to blame for the high prices. Not one specific party. Perhaps we need to unite the parties and sit down and bring the facts to the table. 1) less taxes = lower prices. 2) less regulation on an industry = lower compliance costs and thus lower prices. 3) increasing supply (ANWR; alternative energy) = lower prices. Less rhetoric and more cooperation between the parties is the way to a solution.

  • Of course we need an energy policy and of course we need cooperation to get one. I can’t imagine that’s going to happen before the November elections, however. We should all be out there talking up domestic petroleum supplies, wind power, nuclear generation, and solar power. Then maybe the next congress will be able to get something done.

  • Big oil follows the law of big numbers. BILLIONS of people consume big oil’s products every day, so it follows that their profits would be huge. What we need to be talking about is a comprehensive, sensible energy policy that doesn’t allow knee-jerk reactions to take anything off the table.

  • Agreed, Cannon. It seems clear to me that gasoline prices aren’t the result of price gouging, but the natural result of global market forces. If the government gets too involved by taxing and restricting these companies, the consumers are likely to pay the price. Do we not expect the companies to pass a tax along to us? I hope we do hear a lot about ANWR, because having more domestic sources of energy could really help keep our prices down.

  • I’m on the same page as you guys. We can’t allow our government to impose even more taxes on our domestic oil companies. The American people will be the ones hurt not big oil. I hope the American people keep this issue front and center. If we all stick together we can make a difference!

  • I wish I could get excited about high gas prices but the facts are that the price is driven by OPEC and nut jobs like Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and Khatami in Iran. I don’t know what we can do to appease a wacko dictator or a religious zealot. At least with Bush we know he’ll be gone in a couple of years. In the mean time we should be pushing for more domestic energy production and control. Or maybe adding incentives for alternative fuels or tax breaks for people that give up their cars.

    And gas goes up EVERY summer. That’s why I take the train on my vacations…

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