Re: Motivation for the Oil Barons

On Jun 7, 11:10=A0am, The Trucker <mik...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> On Fri, 06 Jun 2008 18:24:56 -0700, Fred Weiss wrote:
> > On Jun 6, 11:32 am, DB <a...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
> >> Perhaps you are not getting this. The industry has the capacity they
> >> want. If they don't apply for expansions and act on them, this is
what
> >> you get.
>
> > This of course entirely begs the question as to *why*.
>
> >> Counting refineries is stupid on its face. With half the
> >> refineries that existed 20 some years ago, capacity is down 8%...
>
> > Which, considering the significant *increase* in demand, is hardly
> > impressive - and thus it makes my point, not yours.
>
> >> ...But all you see is the Environmental boggy man...
>
> > It's not I who see it. It is clearly industry itself, just as other
> > industries have fled the country entirely or outsourced - or in some
> > cases forced out of business entirely.
>
> > But in a way it always surprises me when enviroNazis shrink at
> > cheering their accomplishments. If their objective is to strangle
> > industry - especially the energy industry - they are doing precisely
> > what they set out to do.
>
> > It is we of course who now have to endure the results.
>
> I am not a granola fascist. =A0But industry is simply not a bunch of boy
> scouts. =A0I have no idea what environmental safeguards are necessary to
t=
he
> construction of an oil refinery. =A0But whatever they are a profit
> maximizing firm is not going to do them unless they are forced to do so.
> That is the way it should be. =A0The firms have a fiduciary
responsibility=

> to the stockholders. =A0And the government has a responsibility to the
> people to insure that the cor****ations don't get out of hand destroying
> the planet in their lust for more profits and rent. We have lost a lot
of
> that in the last 28 years and it is time to get it back. =A0If that
means =
I
> can only drive to the store every 2 weeks as opposed to one and wear a
> jacket in the house in the winter then so be it. =A0I can stand on my
fron=
t
> ****ch and hear the sea lions down at the inlet and every now and again a
> deer will wander up the road. =A0I like it the way it is.
>
> Bur it is not environmentalists that prevent refining capacity. =A0It is
> simply the cost of constructing new refineries as opposed to
> consolidating personnel and enlarging the current refineries.

Yes, this is hardly rocket science but basic economic theory. Soros
pointed out in his testimony that *not* pumping oil was a much better
investment than turning it into dollars, since the value increases in
the first case and decreases in the second. Why spend money even on
increasing refinery capacity when there is more profit to be made from
increased prices driven by demand?

-tg





>=A0All persons
> who want to drill the ANWR are lined up croaking about the
> environmentalists. =A0These are the typical fascist Republicans. =A0They
h=
ate
> democracy much more than do the fascist environmental weenies. The ANWR
> deal as currently structured seems to _GIVE_ the oil companies 1.3
> trillion dollars worth of oil that rightfully belongs to the people of
the=

> United States. =A0And on the way to doing that it gives the Alaskans
$20B.=

> The rest of the people in the nation will share a mere $20B in chump
> change. ANWR is probably the biggest rip off in the history of America.
> And the Republicans just want the smoke screen of the moonbat left to
> distract from that reality.
>
> --
> "I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers
> of society but the people themselves; and
> if we think them not enlightened enough to
> exercise their control with a wholesome
> discretion, the remedy is not to take it from
> them, but to inform their discretion by
> education." - Thomas Jeffersonhttp://GreaterVoice.org/extend