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Friday, April 28, 2006

Bush Rejects Windfall Profits Tax, Denies That There Is Oil Price Gouging

Bush has got this one right.

WASHINGTON -- President Bush rejected calls by some lawmakers for a tax on oil-company windfall profits, saying the industry should reinvest its recent gains into finding and producing more energy.

"The temptation in Washington is to tax everything," Mr. Bush said in an exchange with reporters in the White House Rose Garden. "The answer is for there to be strong reinvestment to make this country more secure from an energy perspective."

With gasoline at over $3 a gallon in some areas, Mr. Bush said there was "no evidence" of price-gouging of consumers.

Mr. Bush said energy companies should use their increased cash flows to build more natural gas pipelines, expand refineries, explore "in environmentally friendly ways," and invest in renewable sources of energy.

"That's what the American people expect. They also expect to be treated fairly at the pump," he said. "These oil prices are a wake-up call. We're dependent on oil. We need to get off oil."

The president announced a series of steps earlier this week designed to slightly ease upward pressure on gasoline prices, including temporarily halting the filling of the government's emergency petroleum reserve and easing environmental standards on gasoline additives.

Mr. Bush said it was "important for the people to understand that one of the reasons why the price of gasoline is up is, there's tight gasoline supplies. And one reason there's tight gasoline supplies is, we haven't built any new refineries since the 1970s."


Exactly.

I've liked Bush's response to gas prices so far. He has quelled complaints about price gouging by ordering an investigation into the matter (though one was already in progress by the FTC) and otherwise responded not by imposing price limits but by asking for a loosening up of regulations that will allow the free market to more easily adapt to changing prices.

This is as it should be. It seems to me that no matter what we do on the gas situation the future is going to be painful. America is very, very dependent on the substance yet consistent supply (thanks to undue regulation and geopolitics) is a problem. The best thing to do is to step back and let the decisions made by citizens in the free market dictate where this country's energy market goes.

Comments

Avatar for FreeRepublicans.com

*Did he Decide theres no gouging? LoL.

FreeRepublicans.com on April 28, 2006 at 11:53 am
Avatar for kbiel

It’s nice to see that Tony Snow is already having a positive effect on Bush!  Now if Tony can just straighten him out on illegal aliens.

kbiel on April 28, 2006 at 01:15 pm
Avatar for diane

"That’s what the American people expect. They also expect to be treated fairly at the pump," he said. "These oil prices are a wake-up call. We’re dependent on oil. We need to get off oil."

That’s like the President of Panera saying people need to give up bread.  LOL

Mr. Bush said it was "important for the people to understand that one of the reasons why the price of gasoline is up is, there’s tight gasoline supplies. And one reason there’s tight gasoline supplies is, we haven’t built any new refineries since the 1970s."

I’m glad he qualified that as ‘one’ of the reasons.  One of the others?  Because oilmen CAN screw us into the ground because some members of the general populace are clueless followers.  Because the market is manipulated. 

The best thing to do is to step back and let the decisions made by citizens in the free market dictate where this country’s energy market goes.

And just what decisions would those be?  Not to go out of town on vacation this year like some will decide, to take the bus to work, to take less pay by working closer to home.  None of those decisions will mean anything because the oil companies just have to tighten the supply further by more phony excuses and it doesn’t matter how much we conserve, they will outsmart ‘us’/you.

The truth is, we’re victims of the big oil companies.  Plain and simple.

diane on April 28, 2006 at 03:14 pm
Avatar for diane

Too bad he didn’t say why no new refineries haven’t been built since the 70s.  It’s because of the fricken environmentalists.

Hey, Dave.  Have you ever been to places where there are polluting industries and taken a deep breath around one of their facilities?

Ah.....the smell of carbon monoxide and sludge in the morning.  Makes you want to get a nice lungful and go out and run a mile or so, doesn’t it?

If you don’t like clean air, Dave, then you’d better make sure you have your portable oxygen tanks fired up and ready for action. 

diane on April 28, 2006 at 03:18 pm
Avatar for FreeRepublicans.com

That’s like the President of Panera saying people need to give up bread.  LOL

Mmmmmm.  Panera Bread. 

FreeRepublicans.com on April 28, 2006 at 04:41 pm
Avatar for robert108

"The truth is, we’re victims of the big oil companies."

Speak for yourself. 

robert108 on April 28, 2006 at 07:22 pm
Avatar for FreeRepublicans.com

"The truth is, we’re victims of the big oil companies."

I like to think of myself as more of an Enabler. 

I Enable the oil companies to turn around and rip me and my fellow countrymen off.

It’s my fault that I have to drive to work (if I could find a job).

It’s my fault that everything in the world is horrible.

It’s not the oil companies fault that they make more money than both God and Bill Gates combined.

No, thats my fault.  

And you wanna know why it’s my fault?

It’s because I didn’t win the lottery.

Yes, thats right, it’s not the oil companies fault that I am going broke.

It’s Powerball’s fault for not picking my numbers. 

Down with Big Lotto! 

FreeRepublicans.com on April 28, 2006 at 08:13 pm
Avatar for robert108

Pathetic.

robert108 on April 28, 2006 at 09:32 pm
Avatar for Bat One

Robert108,

Don’t let it bother you.  They’ll be back under their respective rocks by sunrise. 

Bat One on April 28, 2006 at 09:37 pm
Avatar for diane

Such deep insights from such shallow minds.

diane on April 28, 2006 at 09:58 pm
Avatar for robert108

Bat: True that.

robert108 on April 28, 2006 at 10:35 pm
Avatar for diane

Hate to interrupt the meaningless chit chat, but back to on topic:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060429/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush&printer=1;_ylt=AuRhMXGj7jeGqf2pwlqMCiwGw_IE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE-

Some highlights:

President Bush said Friday that taxing enormous oil industry profits is not the way to calm Americans’ anxieties about pain at the gas pump, and that his "inclination and instincts" are that major oil companies are not intentionally overcharging drivers.

Bush’s remarks suggested the former Texas oilman is unlikely to take harsh action against oil companies despite public anger about the rising cost of fuel. Gasoline is averaging $2.92 a gallon across the country, up 69 cents from a year ago, according to AAA’s daily fuel gauge report.

..."I have no evidence that there’s any rip-off taking place," Bush said. "It’s the role of the Federal Trade Commission to assure me that my inclination and instincts is right."

(LOL!  I doubt they is right, Mr. President.)

...Bush called reporters to the Rose Garden to trumpet recent positive economic reports. But, aware that high gas prices are one of the reasons that good news hasn’t sunk in with much of the public, he acknowledged fuel costs threaten to derail economic progress

 

 

 

diane on April 28, 2006 at 10:42 pm
Avatar for robert108

I don’t like it when he panders to the fear-based lefties, but that’s politics in this MSM-agendized world, I guess.

robert108 on April 28, 2006 at 10:52 pm
Avatar for diane

I don’t like it when he panders to the fear-based lefties, but that’s politics in this MSM-agendized world, I guess.

He’s a panderer all right, but mostly it’s to his mindless NeoCON sheepbase, so once in awhile let us ‘fear-base lefties’ get a crack at being the panderees, willya???

diane on April 28, 2006 at 11:11 pm
Avatar for robert108

"...mindless NeoCON sheepbase..."?  Do you mean the Jews who have left the Dem plantation to become conservatives?  Nice antisemitism.

robert108 on April 29, 2006 at 07:52 am
Avatar for realitybasedbob

Oops another bush-pick is under criminal investigation

WASHINGTON, April 28 — Dr. Lester M. Crawford, the former commissioner of food and drugs, is under criminal investigation by a federal grand jury over accusations of financial improprieties and false statements to Congress, his lawyer said Friday.

 

…Dr. Crawford resigned in September, fewer than three months after the Senate confirmed him. He said then that it was time for someone else to lead the agency.

Ex-Head of F.D.A. Faces Criminal Inquiry - New York Times

Boy, that shrub can really pick em can’t he!

 

realitybasedbob on April 29, 2006 at 08:03 am
Avatar for robert108

Off-topic.

robert108 on April 29, 2006 at 08:14 am
Avatar for realitybasedbob

say anything

realitybasedbob on April 29, 2006 at 08:17 am
Avatar for robert108

say anything stupid.

robert108 on April 29, 2006 at 09:01 am
Avatar for FreeRepublicans.com

Simon says say anything stupid.

FreeRepublicans.com on April 29, 2006 at 11:55 am
Avatar for Bat One

Robert108,

You missed a comma. 

Bat One on April 29, 2006 at 12:00 pm

Nice antisemitism.

The word "neoconservative" is an antisemitic slur?

Help! I’m being attacked by the PC Police!!!

Dave on April 29, 2006 at 12:11 pm
Avatar for robert108

Before you try to be cute, look it up.

neo=new

con=conservative

They are former liberals who have seen the light and are now off the leftie plantation.  The lefties hate them and blame them for all the world’s problems, and they are largely Jewish.  You figure it out.

After the initial labeling of formerly liberal Jews, the lefties have extended the meaning to include anyone they want to smear as embracing this "philosophy" they themselves invented. 

robert108 on April 29, 2006 at 12:19 pm
Avatar for robert108

Bat: That would have been personal.

robert108 on April 29, 2006 at 12:28 pm
Avatar for Bat One

Robert108,

Yep! 

Bat One on April 29, 2006 at 12:38 pm
Avatar for diane

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL.  Bobby, this is just precious:

Before you try to be cute, look it up.

neo=new

con=conservative

They are former liberals who have seen the light and are now off the leftie plantation.  The lefties hate them and blame them for all the world’s problems, and they are largely Jewish. (Link to these statistics please, Bobby.   LOL)   You figure it out.  (Not too difficult really, is it?)

After the initial labeling of formerly liberal Jews, the lefties have extended the meaning to include anyone they want to smear as embracing this "philosophy" they themselves invented. 

Honestly, that is one of the funniest things I’ve read here, even from you. 

Wanna hear the real explanation of what we (’leftie/commie/Marxists) mean when we say NeoCONservatives?  Wikipedia will do:

Neoconservatism (or neocon) refers to the political movement, ideology, and public policy goals of "new conservatives" in the United States, that are relatively unopposed to "big government" principles and restrictions on social spending, when compared with other American conservatives such as traditional or paleoconservatives. [citation needed]

In the context of United States foreign policy, neoconservative has another, narrower definition. Critics [citation needed] (PEOPLE LIKE ME)  define it as interventionist with hawkish views on foreign policy. Supporters define it as advocating the use of military force, unilaterally if necessary, to replace autocratic regimes with democratic ones. This view competes with liberal internationalism, realism, and non-interventionism.

The prefix "neo" can denote that many of the movement’s founders, originally liberals, Democrats or from socialist backgrounds, were new to conservatism, but can also refer to the comparatively recent emergence of this "new wave" of conservative thought, which coalesced in the early 1970s from a variety of intellectual roots in the decades following World War II. It also serves to distinguish the ideology from the viewpoints of "old" or traditional American conservatism.

Modern neoconservatism is associated with periodicals such as Commentary and The Weekly Standard and some of the foreign policy initiatives of think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and the Project for the New American Century (PNAC). Neoconservative journalists, pundits, policy analysts, and politicians, often dubbed "neocons" by supporters and critics alike, have been credited with (or blamed for) their influence on U.S. foreign policy, especially under the administrations of Ronald Reagan (1981-1989) and George W. Bush (2001-present), and are particularly noted for their association with and support for the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

*******

Hmmm.....I never saw the word ‘Jew’ mentioned in that definition. 

Do you have some links or solid statistics/numbers to prove that neocons are largely Jewish? 

 

diane on April 29, 2006 at 03:17 pm
Avatar for robert108

Funny.  I guess the lefties have edited Wikipedia to remove all the references to the Jews smeared with the label "neocon".  It used to be there.  Try an unbiased source; you might learn something.  Then again, you probably won’t.  You are simply out of touch with what you are saying.  That hate is clouding your mind, as usual.

robert108 on April 29, 2006 at 04:00 pm
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