Happy thoughts on oil
The following is a responce to a friend's recent e-mail in regards to Phillip Hollsworth's suposed proposel to boycott EXXON and MOBIL in hopes to have the oil giants reduce their prices. To read the e-mail that spawned simpleton thoughts from my grey matter straight to this blog, go here. Do you agree or no? Let me know...
Happy thoughts on oil
I want to join the Resistance! I want to cripple our dependence on oil just like the next guy. I want to stick it to the proverbial corporate fat-man with his wars and ridiculous high consumer prices (especially oil), but alas, I don't think this plan will work. This site says it best when it says:
"A boycott of a couple of brands of gasoline won't result in lower overall prices. Prices at all the non-boycotted outlets would rise due to the temporarily limited supply and increased demand, making the original prices look cheap by comparison."
Unfortunately big business wins again and screws the middleman. It sucks and it's totally disheartening. Especially when you see the earnings for the gas companies the last few years and that fat evil creeps like Lee Raymond (ex-chairman of Exxon/Mobil) are retiring with enough money to wipe out world hunger for weeks! It’s also so sad that the deaths of thousands of people the last two years is a direct result of these record profits. Karma, anyone?
The sad reality is that big business will always win because they have the money to make us trust them and money is all that seems to matters in this system. But by "winning" I mean that big business will have all the earthly money and power to destroy all of our resources and drive us to Armageddon. Sorry, I'm not that optimistic about big business.
I don’t know the answers here except to press our government for more research dollars for this new ethanol from corn/switch grass idea, put pressure on the car manufactures to sell affordable cars not dependant on oil, take public transportation when at all possible, stop buying these big-ass SUV’s and, of course, BUY LESS GAS!!! This company makes sense on the matter.
Also, since I have you captive…I’m not a political person and I have no hidden political agendas here, but... Let’s acknowledge that the current administration of our government has made untold millions in one industry. The industry is called oil. President Bush called for a 22 percent increase in clean energy research at the Department of Energy (research into solar and wind power, ways to produce ethanol, nuclear power, and cleaner coal) however he also cut spending for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory by $28 million. Thirty to forty of the lab’s employees will be laid off (NPR’s Talk of the Nation March 3rd, 2006). Anyway, I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist to understand why more government dollars aren’t spent on researching alternate oil options do you? To be fair to the Bush’s, the problem has existed for years! Clinton could have done more as well. But the bottom line is that Big business has the money and money is our god. Money runs this country and the world. Money could be used for good, but it's almost always used for evil. Why? Because we are fundamentally flawed people. We aren't perfect. We have never been. All though history we have destroyed everything in our path. From neighboring tribes to the ozone layer. Unfortunately, the capitalism and consumption of oil is no different.
The whole thing is sad and hard to comprehend. I hope it is dealt with soon. E-mails like yours help with the dialog, which needs to continue. All I can say is, Thank God Jesus exists, otherwise I might be that guy with a twitch in his eye, buying a used Uzi to “get better gas prices”!
Sorry for the rant. Have a good Monday!
-Optomistic Steve
Happy thoughts on oil
I want to join the Resistance! I want to cripple our dependence on oil just like the next guy. I want to stick it to the proverbial corporate fat-man with his wars and ridiculous high consumer prices (especially oil), but alas, I don't think this plan will work. This site says it best when it says:
"A boycott of a couple of brands of gasoline won't result in lower overall prices. Prices at all the non-boycotted outlets would rise due to the temporarily limited supply and increased demand, making the original prices look cheap by comparison."
Unfortunately big business wins again and screws the middleman. It sucks and it's totally disheartening. Especially when you see the earnings for the gas companies the last few years and that fat evil creeps like Lee Raymond (ex-chairman of Exxon/Mobil) are retiring with enough money to wipe out world hunger for weeks! It’s also so sad that the deaths of thousands of people the last two years is a direct result of these record profits. Karma, anyone?
The sad reality is that big business will always win because they have the money to make us trust them and money is all that seems to matters in this system. But by "winning" I mean that big business will have all the earthly money and power to destroy all of our resources and drive us to Armageddon. Sorry, I'm not that optimistic about big business.
I don’t know the answers here except to press our government for more research dollars for this new ethanol from corn/switch grass idea, put pressure on the car manufactures to sell affordable cars not dependant on oil, take public transportation when at all possible, stop buying these big-ass SUV’s and, of course, BUY LESS GAS!!! This company makes sense on the matter.
Also, since I have you captive…I’m not a political person and I have no hidden political agendas here, but... Let’s acknowledge that the current administration of our government has made untold millions in one industry. The industry is called oil. President Bush called for a 22 percent increase in clean energy research at the Department of Energy (research into solar and wind power, ways to produce ethanol, nuclear power, and cleaner coal) however he also cut spending for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory by $28 million. Thirty to forty of the lab’s employees will be laid off (NPR’s Talk of the Nation March 3rd, 2006). Anyway, I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist to understand why more government dollars aren’t spent on researching alternate oil options do you? To be fair to the Bush’s, the problem has existed for years! Clinton could have done more as well. But the bottom line is that Big business has the money and money is our god. Money runs this country and the world. Money could be used for good, but it's almost always used for evil. Why? Because we are fundamentally flawed people. We aren't perfect. We have never been. All though history we have destroyed everything in our path. From neighboring tribes to the ozone layer. Unfortunately, the capitalism and consumption of oil is no different.
The whole thing is sad and hard to comprehend. I hope it is dealt with soon. E-mails like yours help with the dialog, which needs to continue. All I can say is, Thank God Jesus exists, otherwise I might be that guy with a twitch in his eye, buying a used Uzi to “get better gas prices”!
Sorry for the rant. Have a good Monday!
-Optomistic Steve
posted by Steve at 11:16 AM
5 Comments:
Let's say, just for fun, that a boycott works and a big oil company is deeply impacted. And this deep impact causes this oil company go out of business....what will happen? Will it make oil prices go down? No, if anything it will make prices RISE. Call me a capitalist (go head, I am one) but good old fashioned competion is good for the consumer (that’s US…the “little man”) because competition drives prices DOWN (see the Bell phone company) I wish I had THE answer. I just know that boycotts aren’t one in this situation.
Well, if consumerism rules, where are the alternate energy cars? I heard there are deeper political reasons why these new companies aren't happening. Electro magnetic cars and trains (no fuel needed) have been marketable since the early 80's. I saw the ideas at Epcot center of all places, when I was a kid. Oh well, it may not work yet, but oil will run out, and then... we'll just have to. But someone will capitolize on that too.
I'm still waiting on my car that will run on used vegtable oil that McDonald's fries their french fries in.
I agree that money is our god. I agree that whenever possible we should use public transport. In Denver the price of using the bus or riding the light rail is more expensive than driving and unless you live right in the middle of the city, the available routes are either extremely inconvenient or absolutely unable to get me to my destination. This is very frustrating to me because I would like to sell my car and buy a RTD pass but I’m stuck.
I don’t understand why our government is so slow to address the issues of poor gas mileage. The Bush administration has finally issued some new rules for automakers. These new rules will require the average gas mileage for pickup trucks, SUVs and minivans to rise to 24 miles per gallon by 2011, up from the current average of 21.6 mpg. I can’t believe they have 5 years to increase mileage by 3.4 mpg!!! I’m not an engineer and I’ve never designed or built a car, but this just seems like a small slap on the hand rather than the kind of effort we should be making.
And what bothers me ever more than this is that Sport Utility Vehicles are driven mostly by those who don’t Sport or Utilitize (that’s not a word but I made it up). If you’re not Sporting or Utilitizing, this only leaves the word Vehicle - therefore most of us simply need V - a vehicle. Buy a vehicle not a freakin’ movie theatre and concert hall that 6 cows had to die for to make your seats.
Yeah, SUV's are the ruin of us all! Check this out http://money.howstuffworks.com/gas-price.htm. “Americans drive more than 2.5 trillion miles per year in automobiles, light trucks and SUVs, according to a MEMA report. That's equal to 14,000 round trips to the sun. Today, we drive almost twice as much as we did in 1980 (1.5 trillion miles).”
I was talking with my buddy Brett and he made a good point about America’s gas problem (no, not that kinda gas!). He said that we should tax gas to an extremely high amount like it is in England ($6.00 gallon). That way people would HAVE to take public transportation. However, as you pointed out, public transportation is not ready for this huge influx of sweaty bodies. But why you ask? I think we all know the answer to that one. Because oil is making people rich and public transportation is not. Again, it comes down to money. And oh yeah, leather seats suck!
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