Inspired by a comment Daniel made I felt the need to tell you folks some things.
The reason our gas has been so expensive the past few months has literally nothing to do with any war or supply and demand. It has everything to do with Futures traders that are unregulated in their trading. These are people who are basically purchasing oil at higher and higher prices simply because they feel they can still make a profit off of it at those high prices. These people/companies kept upping the price of oil by bidding against each other knowing that the American people would pay. Once gas started hitting the $4/gallon mark American citizens took notice and discovered the main issue. A bill was placed before our government that would put regulation on these folks (also the reason gas has dropped in price lately). I, for one, am not the type of person that believes our government should regulate our entire lives…I do, however, believe it needs to look to the overall wellbeing of our citizenry and this is a case where the government should step in.
Sadly, this bill did not pass and you can fully expect gas to start going back up in price in a few months time.
As for the access we have to “our own oil”. The truth of the matter is that this is only a half truth.
First off, the “oil” that we have on our land is actually something called Shale Oil. It is a rock, not a liquid. This rock can be processed to create fossil fuels like oil, however the process is expensive and time consuming.
As for the other oil that is being talked about. This is actually oil found off the coasts of the U.S. Mostly in the gulf of Mexico (though some is off of California). This oil is to be found in international waters and anyone who wants it can claim it. So far, no one has because it is closest to us and we have put sanctions in place against ourselves in order to “preserve the environment”. These sanctions keep other countries (like Cuba) from going after the oil because they don’t want to piss off the U.S.
The truth about this oil is that it is not easily accessible. We would need to build oil platforms (these platforms half-exist off of California already). We would also need to pass laws to take the sanctions we put in place away (which would be very hard because of environmentalists). The best cast scenario for having access to this oil is 5-7 years with the more likely case going over 10 years if we start the process right now.
Neither of these solutions will fix the longterm problem. The oil in this world is going to run out. We need to figure out other means of energy. Hybrid cars are only a stopgap…they are not a solution either. Sadly, this won’t happen in our lifetimes unless our government changes the way it works. The truth is that we run a corporate government. Meaning businesses decide what truly happens in our government. Ever heard of “lobbyists”? These are people paid by corporations (though sometimes they work for non-profit organizations too) to influence government officials into passing laws and policies to improve the profits of their respective organization. The oil industry has TONS of lobbyists in Washington.
For reference sake:
Current government officials that worked in the oil industry: George W. Bush, Dick Cheeney, Condoleeza Rice, Joseph Lieberman and others.
The U.S. imports 65% of its oil. A large portion of this does not come from the Middle East as most people believe. It actually comes these countries: Canada, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Venezuela, and Nigeria. One of those 5 is in the Middle East (and it’s not Iraq)
The United States actually has a lower consumption rate per person than the European Union. (5% of the worlds population accounts for 25% of the worlds oil usage)
The U.S. actually only uses oil for about 40% of its energy consumption.
Ok…I’ll stop now. Obviously I’m opinionated and fully am open to saying I could be wrong…after all, this is a very “opinion based” subject.
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