The only way to make the oil companies 'feel the pain' they inflict on the world from their poisonous product, and the drug dealing, intelligence agency operations, assassinations, invasions and environmental destruction that goes with it is to...

... break the corporate charters that create these dystopian entities that are granted 'personhood' under a legal fiction. Deprive them of their lifeblood (profit).

And if we can't do that, or are prevented by the corrupt governments that have been bought off by the oil companies, then perhaps we should start to go after the oil company pipelines and hardware as they are doing in Nigeria.

(Just floating a possible thought experiment here ... you know... the way Hillary speculated she could have the Democratic party nomination by way of a RFK moment happening to Obama)

From an environmental - or even suburban sprawl - point of view, high oil and gasoline prices are the best thing that has happened in a long time. After years of paying lip service to "sustainable development" and other green issues whilst building ever larger houses and driving ever larger cars, finally the American consumer is being forced to pay attention because high prices are hurting his bottom line.
After years of seeing suburbanites leveraging themselves into Ford Explorers and 5000ft McMansions on the back of artificially cheap commodities (usually at the expense of Third World nations) and various financial bubbles (NASDAQ, housing), I for one am celebrating.

It's sad that action only ever seems to happen in response to a crisis, but there you have it. I find it strange to see these left wing commentators talking about global warming and reducing CO2 emissions from one side of their mouth, but bemoan the "price gouging" at the first sign of pain that such a transition requires.

And by the way, oil companies are not gouging. Profit margins are around 10% which is nothing spectacular compared to Microsoft's %30, Intel's 25% for example.

Couldn't agree with you more, sweeve. If not for high oil prices Americans would be clamoring for even bigger vehicles, no doubt, with all the related waste and pollution that goes with it.

sweeve-My teenage daughter and I watched the documentary "End of Suburbia" this weekend and in it (released in 2005) the experts talk of the public reaction and blame on $4/gallon gas on the govt, oil companies, etc. That the public will believe that someone is scamming them. Gotta say, everything they said, is true. It's all a "conspiracy" for most people.

On another note. Went to a parade on Monday and watched loads of folks drive past and park their LARGE SUVs. I saw only a handful of compact cars. Made me wonder about things...

Recycle1 - I remember watching that documentary. I think Jim Kunstler was in there predicting that at some point people will start electing any nutcase who promises to bring down prices again. I can see that happening, especially as nobody on the national stage (Obama, Hillary) is seriously talking about the true causes of the rise of energy prices.

Nancy Pelosi can't take subsidies away from oil? or gas, or nuclear. Put it in the Senate and, for once, let the Repubs filibuster so the whole country can see. Oh no, that would mean the Dems weren't the same shills as the Repubs.

We need a Constitutional Amendment "A corporation is not a Person" (see: Jim Hightower, who's been talking about this for years) and a switch of the corporate income tax to a flat tax on gross revenues, exempt the first $100 million and no other deductions.

As far as I can see, this is the only way to start preventing the gov't from meddling in business to "incentivize" the goal du jour. (Ethanol anyone?) An added bonus would be the disappearance of tax lobbyists and tax accountants and businesses would have to make decisions based on business needs rather than the gov't tax system.

A worthless article that begs "Big Oil" to be like "I feel your pain" Klinton. Care to remove the 71 year ban on Cannabis and let it replace petroleum all the way? Care to give solar, wind, geothermal, tidal, etc ... a fair shot at competing with Big Coal? Care to improve the shoddy public transportation infrastructure that hasn't seen the light of the day since 1980? Of course not. Please, carry on. Keep begging and crying for Big Oil to "feel our pain" like a crybaby. Go right ahead and write off scientific discoveries and possible innovations from non-monied geniuses that could save us from Big Oil anyday. Happy now?

No one can gouge you without your permission.

"… break the corporate charters that create these dystopian entities that are granted 'personhood' under a legal fiction. "

Do you really mean this? Many corporate charters are associated with Mom and Pop business. What legal status should these companies have instead?

"Deprive them of their lifeblood (profit)."

Why would anyone do anything economically worthwhile if they couldn't make a profit?

In Canada the price or gas is higher than the US. You see more 4 cylinder cars on the road than SUV. Plus that SMART car is all over the place. I guess America has to pay a little more before they give up the big SUV.
Truck sales in the US are dead. I do enjoy driving by a SUV or pick up on the highway trying to get better mileage as 5 K under the limit.

"In Canada the price or gas is higher than the US. "

Don't they have higher taxes on gas?

With oil prices rising exponentially, the oil business is going to be a very profitable one to be in. But Big Oil is not driving the price increases, and most of the increase does not become its profit. What is driving the price increase is a global crisis, the oil peak, with rising demand outstripping supply. Scapegoating the oil giants is not going to resolve the crisis and may divert our attention from what we need to do in response to it.

Here in BC we are paying $1.37+ /litre. That works out to about $5.48 /gallon US. The US price / gallon hasn't even broken $4.00 yet. And we are expecting to pay $1.50/litre before the end of June, which would be $6.00/ gallon for you.

Taxes on gas here are about 15% of the price we pay at the pump.

So, bite me, all you yankee whiners about how bad the gas prices are on your pocketbook or wallet.

Around here, I'm noticing used car lots full of SUVs and pick-up trucks, though we have a lot of farmers. I'm seeing more small cars. There are a lot of folks out at the Toyota plant who do long commutes, and the ones that don't have Priuses are buying motorcycles. There are a lot more motorcycles on the road. I even passed a couple of scooters the other day.

Here is
how to make oil companies the pain

yes we do have higher taxes. If Canada had a Katrina it would step in and help not start a war some place it didn't have to .

Galen:
I filled today at 121.8 for reg. in Ontario.
www.ontariogasprices.com is a good web site to see the prices in Ontario. Maybe have the same out in BC

Good Luck- You don't have to have the SUV go-juice pumped or transported over the Rockies. And if people in Ontario had to pay what we do, Harper would be out on his ass in a heartbeat.

And that 137.whatever for regular is THE AVERAGE price for gas in BC...

moonshadow:
get a scooter or small bike , I have a feeling things are not going to get better. Been looking at a small 200 cc on/off road bike myself. Maybe make an offer next week. It is just hard to put my scuba equipment on the back

Mark Abram The US Military during peace time is the world's single largest consumer of oil. During the concurrent wars against terror the US military is eating up so much more oil that it is no wonder the demand has gone up.

What will happen in peacetime? Why isn't anyone talking about this link to the oil shortage? Bush administration officials ignore such allegations.

Also, the oil companies set prices by
speculating on oil availability as much as the gov regulations allow them to...so blame deregulation. They can "arbitrarily" shut down half of every refinery in the US one month before July 4th if they thought it would drive their profits up.

Watch the film "ENRON; The Smartest Guys in the Room."

Unbelievable! I agree that corporations have either got to go or get rearranged.

The solution is to re-REGULATE their arses bigtime.

I think that oil prices now can be seen as 'NAFTA systemic'.

WTO, IMF, and the Federal Reserve Bank harmonize the inflated 'world oil market' aptly explained by BP Chairman Malone: "Every week I receive letters from consumers about the impact that high energy prices are having on their everyday lives. Unfortunately, I cannot, and we cannot, change the world market on which this nation now relies on."

So he obviously attributes the current monetary/trading system as at least part of the price problem.

I attribute the WTO/ 'NAFTA' assention into the American economy as the major part of the price problems.

The obscene profits made from the assention of this New World Order are fairly obvious, and not just because of the vast volumes traded. It is the exhorbitant profits associated with our predatory WTO/'NAFTA' 'trickle down' structure. And from the WTO/Walmart example we became accustom to the local price blitzkreig of the local mom's & pop's. And now we are stuck with the box stores strategy of today: full retail prices at the full expense of smaller budgeted competitors and the consumer. So the transition goes...world commodities in general: food, water, energy, minerals, & monetary values are on the front lines of the WTO. Fully funded by the consumer, primarily the American consumer that mistakenly thought they were getting a good deal.

I would happily remind you: 'giant sucking sound' (H.R. Perot Reform party) has obviously come to pass. I guess our 'government of no class' that we have now/past...continues to blindly accept our current affairs as 'normal economic trends' . Our government has been bought/bribed pushed out or pushed down just like ole mom & pop. Once they are out of the way, (the government, mom & pop) the predator megacorporations are quick to exact some of the most disgusting trade practices imagineable. Can you hear it now?

I still advocate that the highest position employee should be payed 7 times more than the least position employee, middle mangers would make various multiples (based on whatever) e.g. 4 times the least employee. All directly tied to the top employee's salary*, by American statute...that one provision would govern quite alot of the corruptness in this WTO/'NAFTA system'. I could imagine that would put the wrinkle in for those boards of directors and their mega profits currently funneled to the top. I could imagine Sam Walton only earning 7 times the earnings of the buggy collector guy. Or imagine the local bank CEO values at 7 times the salary of the teller/janitor. Just think of the severance package for the buggy collector, or the lunch allowances, and the stock options for the janitor.....haahahhaa And just for fun, lets say ole Sam likes to play other ventures, like the stock market or whatever, that to should become part of the 'top employee's salary*' yep just that easy, put a little asteric next to his salary and by statute everyone below him gets a multiple of his windfall. And lets say he is a BearStearns kina CEO that can lose billions on 'rumors', then out of business would be the logical thing, do we really need that type of businessman? He obviously couldn't hear the 'giant sucking sound'.

A Common Dream?

wild

I second that recommendation to watch "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room". It will make you furious and suspicious of every refinery "maintenance" shutdown.

And I agree about regulation.

There is only one way to take away the power from any corporation, oil company or otherwise: DON'T BUY THEIR PRODUCT!
Nobody is forcing anyone to pump that gas, drive a dinosaur, live in the exurbs, be a carnivore. It's your lifestyle choices and gasoline addiction, self-inflicted. Look in the mirror. Stop being a petroleum junkie and watch the price go into free fall.
I have been hoping for $5/gallon gas for years, finally it is in sight. Saw a small motorcycle today with a sign on the back: "Ha, Ha, 70mpg". Loved it (as I bicycled past at infinity-mpg)! My motor scooter gets 85mpg and I also thouroughly enjoy long walks.

ANDREW HERMAN: Excellent post.

GALEN: It broke $4 a gallon in N. Florida this week, and a lot of people in my area are low income. Some use heavy farm equipment. When I visit the Florida Keys (just above sea level) I am astounded by how many drive big trucks, SUVS and other ridiculous gas guzzlers... and there they are on the "Front lines" of Global warming... helping to flood their own back yards!

At least your community of commentors is of better quality than your writer. You are simply pandering to the low information voters all too human emotional reaction to "I'm hurting, let me strike out at the people who are happy". In this case the international oil companies. Now these guys may have many things to answer for, such as funneling large amounts of money into our political arena to get overly generous tax breaks. And spreading the rumor, that if only they were allowed to drill more your problems would be solved. But making money because the commodity they produce has become scarce is not one of them.

The real issue, is that oil is a finite resource, and the world has largely tapped out the capability to produce it. Many people have been striving for years to warn that this day would come, but neither the people,nor the powers that be, wanted to have anything to do with that message. I can't have any sympathy for the mother who choose to believe her TV, rather than the many voices of common sense, that becoming dependent on large overpowered gas guzzlers, was not a wise thing to do. Now our country has found itself in a pretty difficult position. Dependent upon huge amounts of oil. Tapped out credit, both family, and government debt, will make mitigation difficult. Stuck with an economic system that thought it could substitute clever financial engineering for the production of actual products. So yes, we are all screwed. Only a toughminded look at the true situation will help us to mitigate our plight.

So lets take a look at those demonnized IOCs. They only control 15% of the world's oil. We invaded Iraq in part to open up some prime oil lands, to their business. I suspect Bush and Cheney didn't even consult them about it. They probably just assumed, that having been handed a golden gift horse, that they would happily funnel vast sums into the republican political machine. Of course the exclusion of the IOCs from most of the world is a self inflicted wound. Foreign countries just don't trust them. The most tragic case is Mexico, whose oil production is dropping so rapidly they are in danger of losing their status as an oil exporter within a few years. Mexico severely needs foreign oil expertise to reverse this situation, but the degree of distrust of the IOCs is so great it is politically impossible to do so.

What should we do? The oil companies no longer need overly generous tax breaks. That should be a no brainer. The country clearly needs alternatives to gasoline (or diesel powered) transportation. The people have to get the message that cheap oil/gas is not coming back, and they had better adjust to that fact. Supporting myths, that shortages/high prices are only caused by the manipulations of a few greedy people, will only delay that adjustment.

jakenewton: Mom and Pop businesses-what would they do if you removed personhood?

1--You can be specific in what rights are limited (e.g., "speech will be limited to truthful, commercial speech" which would remove their right to lobby and be involved in politics). This would also apply to non-profit corporations. Individuals could still take out political ads, but as individuals or members of a non-corporate group.

2. A corporation is granted, by law, a very special right-owners are not responsible for the debts and liabilities of the business. They can lose their personal investment the way Enron shareholders did but they don't have to pay off the debt. By granting that special right, they have to give something up to keep a balance and temper the moral hazard the law creates. If you own a small business and are not incorporated, you can lose your personal property in a bankruptcy, but not if you are incorporated.

Another rant sans potential solutions. Lemme help y'all out with that.

First, assume "our" government is NOT here to help.

Then, react accordingly. Drive less; get the cheapest, most efficient vehicle you can find; buy Citgo whenever possible and never, ever give Exxon a dime ever again; go as green as you are able; organize car teams to/from work; encourage friends/family to do all of the above.

Or wait for "our" government to do the right thing for the first time since, er, when was that again? That's a good plan...

Galen. Our gallon is 4.54 liters. The US is 3.78 liters. OUR TAXES ARE FAR GREATER THAN 15%

High oil prices are the result of a financial system crisis, and the oil companies are just happily going along for the ride.

The Website of Senator Levine has a good report about the role of speculators in the price of oil written in 2006.

Does anyone not recall the 1970's and 80.00/barrel oil? ten years later it was down to 28.00barrel. Demand has always been growing, and there was far more oil in the ground in 1970 then there is now.

OF course everyone forgets that at the exact same time Nixon had to deal with a financial crisis of massive proportions which related to an old linkage between Gold and the US dollar.

Today, the Enron loophole, the deregulation of the commodities markets, the ability of investement banks and hedge funds to buy oil and only put up 1/16th of the price in cash, the pricing of oil in US dollars, and the Federal Reserve dropping US interest rates from 5.25 to 2% in short order results in high oil prices.

In the UK, the price of gas is now above $11 per gallon. It will get to this here in America too, as OPEC finds it can now buy what it wants from other producers in Europe and Asia, so does not need American currency. OPEC members are incentivized to do this also because its members are getting madder and madder at America's current foreign policies.

But our own domestic transnational oil companies sure won't suffer with gas at $11 a gallon, so they have zero incentive to work against this. Their profits are international anyway, so the fungible American people are now just a slice of their total pie, and their profits are global and internationalized to save on US taxes, thus evading payment for services rendered by the US government, like roads, like schools, like even the Iraq BushWar.

The price of gas here is also partly due to the collapse of the value of the USD. This was Engineered by the current political fascist regime, in tandem with Alan Greenspan, Benjamin Bernanke, and the Federal Reserve. The same gangsters, that drove the dotstock and housing bubbles and that created the current American multi-layered catastrophic compound interest debt-bomb, have now devalued America and Americans by half. The US is now on sale at half-off for the rest of the world. So are all Americans.

All, that is, except the Kissinger Internationalists, the HyperCapitalists, the CEOs, the Hedge Fund Manipulators, the Stock Operators, and the Friedmanite 'FreeTrade' Flat-Worlders- i.e, the Corpo-Fascists.

And they have used the power of the Federal Debt Burden Donkey and the Federal Reserve Money Machine and the joke of home 'ownership (of massive debt)' and of course the ubiquitous and ever-useful 'Terrorist Security Threat' to scam the American people and siphon off massive treasure for themselves. Leaving the rest of all of us the bill, in the rapid decline of the value (buying power) of the dollar, horribly increased individual debt, and the obscene debt of the government, to be paid by the American people and the American tax payers and their children to the seventh generation (if there is one) one way or another.

We are being Mexico'd. The protections and very creation mechanisms of the Middle Class are being stripped away by the new ability to evade and ignore all the laws of any country by transnational (ubernational- good citizens of NO nation) corporations, especially those laws protecting labor and environment and representation and health and safety and standard of living. This guarantees a race to the bottom, for most everyone.

In America, there will finally only be the rich... and the poor. Nothing in-between. And costs will be passed along until it stops with those who can't pass it along. These will pay for it all, along with suffering savagely-reduced living standards.

When Sen. Feinstein and Sen. Larry 'Wide-Stance' Craig, want to allow over one million field workers into the US to pick crops, they are doing Big Agro's bidding, as Big Agro needs slaves three months a year. But they do not care about the workers themselves, and whether the entry of thousands of desperate people into America actually prevents a viable wage for field workers (as Cesar Chavez himself believed), and so continues the downward spiral for all but the rich.

When NAFTA allows illegally-made (in US law) goods into the country, even criminally-made goods, how can a domestic law-abiding company compete? They eventually cannot. Or the laws cannot. This drives down the value of the American people themselves. Your Pols have sold you out.

But since there will be only rich and poor, the Pols sure want to come down on the rich side, as for example the Clintons sure have, since, as someone once said, there will come a time when one-half of the poor are going to be paid to kill the other half. A preview of that time has already arrived, in Rwanda, last decade.

Oh, and that gas price. Well, for example, the state of California could have GIVEN AWAY solar collectors for every home in California for the same money that was extorted back at the beginning of the current Bush Fascist Junta by the criminal enterprise that was Enron, which is just a typical big corporation that happened to get caught (see www.corporatecrimereporter.com)

That action by California, had it been done (against the will of the capitalist class, thus it was not) would have been better, given the energy crisis, than paying a bunch of financial schemers, hucksters and hustlers.

And we need to turn away from admiration of such folk if we want to make a better world in the coming energy squeeze, and make any progress in preventing the destruction of the biosphere that supports life itself. How we do that, when these kind of folk are actually in control of the all-worshipped god of 'money' itself, is a real critical problem.

" Galen May 27th, 2008 5:48 pm

Here in BC we are paying $1.37+ /litre. That works out to about $5.48 /gallon US. The US price / gallon hasn't even broken $4.00 yet. And we are expecting to pay $1.50/litre before the end of June, which would be $6.00/ gallon for you.

Taxes on gas here are about 15% of the price we pay at the pump."

We're paying $1.35 per litre in Sherbrooke, Quebec, this area, and for the lowest grade, so reg., not the middle grade at stations that provide three, instead of two grades, so tack on another roughly 5 cents a litre for me.

15% provincial tax is a gift; Quebec's is nearly 40%. Or maybe that is a combination of provincial and federal taxes. Works out to close to 40% anyway.

In a sense it's good, but the govts don't apply the measures that would make such taxation good. When prices per barrel rise, then the govt taxation to consumers should be lowered. Otherwise, and we particularly find this with people whose employment requires a lot of driving, the high taxation be maintained while barrel prices rise, this can even put small businesses OUT of business.

We're paying only a little more than people in France were paying during the first half of the 1990s, or maybe that was only in the cities. It's what I learned, back then, from a guy who came back to work at a company I worked for in Ottawa, Ontario, anyway. He said they paid $5 per gallon back then.

Canada isn't the cheapest place in the world to live but it has so many other benefits over America it is worth every penny.
Galen :
With any hope we will get Harper out. Don't like his views or secret way of doing things.

Galen, gas at $1.37 /litre is $5.19 /U.S. gallon, still a big number for sure :).

I don't believe the oil companies are gouging us overall. The price of oil, wholesale gasoline, wholesale heating fuel etc. are traded commodities. The 2 "financial" items which are having the greatest impact right now are the speculation dollars and the severe decline of the U.S. greenback over the last 6 years. My guess is that, between the two of them, they account for approximately $55.00 /per barrel. The non-financial item is more severe, this being world consumption vs. world production. This is what scares me the most.

As for the big multinational oil companies, they are in for a world of hurt and they know it. Together they produce a small portion of world production and more importantly, their "bathtubs" of reserves owned and/or controlled by them are shrinking. This is the main reason behind the mergers of "big oil" and for the massive share buybacks. In 20 years or so, if things keep going the same way, some of these companies will not exist.

Galen:
Those are gas prices in southern Ontario. You start to drive north and 1.35 would be a deal.

FV HORN: Excellent post.

Can someone respond to MiMiccs's assertion that the "end of oil" is just a myth or hoax to raise prices now? I have an otherwise intelligent male friend (maybe they both listen to the same late night radio host, right wing?) who is telling me the same thing--that they just discovered this huge oil reserve and that there is much more oil where it was once thought NOT to exist, etc.

Of course these two also seem to think ALL planets are heating up, thus disavowing the consensus of key scientists on the issue of industrialization wtih respect to the human imprint upon global warming.

Oh... MiMiCCS made this assertion on the NEXT article, "Please, your majesty..."

" Hollow point May 28th, 2008 7:58 am

Canada isn't the cheapest place in the world to live but it has so many other benefits over America it is worth every penny."

NEVER FORGET about independently or self-employed people whose work requires a lot of road travel and who cover their fuel as well as all other operating costs; and then others like farmers who use considerable amounts of fuel for their operations, f.e. They, the former category of workers anyway, don't, or usually don't bill higher in Quebec because prices of oil and fuel skyrocket, and can be driven right out of business. Plenty spoke out well enough, if not screamed (screaming SOS, say) when fuel prices rose to around $1.17 per litre in Quebec over the past two or three years, or so; therefore, $1.35 and higher is definitely going to be more than unwelcome to them. Or maybe the Quebec govt reacted as needed and provided a means for such people to immediately get a good portion of these taxes back; instead of a deduction or credit through the income tax procedure when filing these taxes, [annually]. Some, if not many, self-employed people pay those taxes on a quarterly basis, sure; but that may not be adequate for all of these people.

And then their are the many low-income earners among Canadians. They'll notice a real difference; while people earning enough for income can bear the increases.

The fuel taxation can certainly be significantly improved upon anyway. F.e., and hypothetically speaking (not basing this on any actually performed calculations), in addition to lowering the taxation, it could be additionally changed to a flat charge; instead of one based on percentage and which therefore has increased a lot with the increases of prices of oil per barrel we've been paying for. In Quebec, we pay nearly 40%, and that is too high at times like the present. 40% of $1.35 is HIGH.

Maybe a flat 20 cents per litre would be more than enough.

Even 84 cents a litre was high enough for some of us, so 50 cents more definitely is not perceived as rewarding.

That's particularly and all the more true when a LOT of the tax dollars paid in Canada, Quebec and some other provinces anyway, goes to bs waste, basically thievery; like huge subsidies to large and rich corporations, f.e. Another and far larger amount goes to paying for partnering in wars of totally criminal aggression on the side of the aggression, not the side opposing it; and enrichening the literally war-profiteering corporations. And then there are other major Canadian federal and provincial govt crimes that taxpayers are made to pay for whether they realise these crimes are happening or not. F.e., the continuing genocidal expropriation of First Nations Canadians whereever they are on lands rich in natural resources the imperialist, ... pigs of the West want to STEAL; and many other crimes which aren't to be overlooked or ignored, even if they are of lesser scale. When diseased, we normally don't want to do anything to make the condition worse, much less also pay for it; instead, we prefer, the sane among us anyway, to pay for curbing the crimes and for due reparations to be provided.

Canada and Canadian provinces, if justly and sanely governed could do as well as and better than presently; if all the bs govt waste, thievery, and crimes were all ceased. It'd provide big savings to taxpayers, and only jerks support crimes against human rights and dignity.

Their crimes make the Hells Angels and Mafia appear junior in scale; although some of these racketeers also profit from govt criminality. Gangster unit known as the RCMP costs Canadian taxpayers PLENTY, and there's no real justification for such a police force to begin with, perhaps except in remote areas and where residents can't afford their own police forces; maybe.

Etcetera, and IMO.

================================

"BobBeaSea May 28th, 2008 8:01 am

Galen, gas at $1.37 /litre is $5.19 /U.S. gallon, still a big number for sure :)."

I suppose you performed the calculation based on a litre consisting of 33.8oz, instead of 32oz (a US quart); or rounded the 7.2oz difference up to 8oz (half a pint) to make the calculation accurate enough while also a "tad" easier.

"I don't believe the oil companies are gouging us overall. The price of oil, wholesale gasoline, wholesale heating fuel etc. are traded commodities. ..."

My above or first-above post provides links to good articles by F. William Engdahl.

"As for the big multinational oil companies, they are in for a world of hurt and they know it. Together they produce a small portion of world production and more importantly, their "bathtubs" of reserves owned and/or controlled by them are shrinking. ..."

I can't specifically comment on that view, however, and as I read yesterday, the U.S. military is the largest oil consumer in (I believe the article said) the world; oil and derived products, or just oil for fuel, instead of additional products.

We know that it's all paid for with taxpayer dollars, and perhaps the combination of these two factors makes a (very) sufficiently significant difference.

If it's not the largest consumer in the world, then it's either the USA and/or all of North America that the article stated; not precisely recalling which of these three scales was stated.

Re: Post by FVHorn May 28th, 2008 7:21 am

Whew!!

Excellent post!

Re: Post by Siouxrose May 28th, 2008 11:21 am
.....I have an otherwise intelligent male friend (maybe they both listen to the same late night radio host, right wing?) who is telling me the same thing–that they just discovered this huge oil reserve and that there is much more oil where it was once thought NOT to exist, etc.....

Yeah, I just heard that, too, last week (I live on the northeast coast) and it (word of the "discovery") sure feels like desperation to me.

I think we already know the truth of the matter. It's going to take just a little more time for it to sink in. It might be helpful to remind ourselves that we're all in the same boat in the end. The ride itself is in our hands. We can choose to acknowledge reality and work with the changes - or keep on resisting the inevitable and allow our individual and shared creativity to be drained accordingly.

We don't HAVE to go under.

*;-)

Moonshadow May 27th, 2008 6:42 pm

I posted this on another article but I didn't want anybody to miss this. Sorry if I'm out of line.

I wanted to share part of an article in the paper this morning so you would know that there are people doing their part to "conserve" energy. I doubt this is the scooter you had in mind.

Under the title "The Scooterists"

"Kim Hale figures sometimes you have to spend money to save a money.

So, a few weeks ago, as her T-Rex-sized GMC Denali continued to chew through $100 bills at the gas station, the Flower Mound stay-at-home mom decided to submit to the economy of scale.

She and her Porsche-driving husband, Jim, bought scooters.

Not any scooters, mind you, but trendy, Italian, I-shop-for-sushi-with-a-burlap-bag Vespas. With custom paint, the pair cost just north of $15,000. The environmental panache came free.

"We figure they'll pay for themselves in no time," said Mrs. Hale, 40. "It cost $14 to fill them both up and they get 60 miles per gallon."

The fuzzy math goes something like this – Mrs. Hale spends about $400 a month quenching the thirst of her SUV. This summer, she plans to roll around Flower Mound on her Vespa instead. She said the savings should make the payment on their scooters.

Last weekend was a good example. She and her 43-year-old husband took the scooter to the grocery store, to dinner and to Target.

"I was joking with my husband," she said. "We probably saved $30 this weekend in gasoline alone, and that's just driving around town"

It was even worse when I noticed they are making payments on the scooters. Sometimes I wonder.

Before you can get big oil to feel the pain, consumers have to feel it and quite frankly I don't see it. At any given time on the highway, 4 our 5 vehicles are SUVs. People still let their kids ride around on ATVs for recreation and this weekend, people were filling up their boats for fun on the lakes. Unless consumers develop the consciousness to find a new and better way, they'll just keep paying at the pump, because after all we are Americans and we are entitled. Sacrifice is not the American way. Oh yes, we glorified sacrifice over the holiday weekend, but to put words into action is another thing. Don't count on seeing all the gas guzzling toys and tools out on the curb at yard sales.

It is amazing that there are those here given the impending environmental collapse as a result of burning fossil fuels would cry about a cut-back in driving their monster machines. I hope the price goes to $6.00 per gallon soon or more so that Americans are forced to look at public transportation and fuel efficient vehicles.

It is time for both the United States and China — the world's two biggest polluters — " start playing a more constructive role " in vital new negotiations on tackling climate change but the meetings recently didn't hold much promise. George Bush has been tolling the bell for the environment since he assumed office. He supports big oil and many of the Repugninant party hold his view.

This current primary given voice to candidates adopting the obvious but few with the exception of Obama have begun to spell out the implications on economic as well as the environmental changes that will be necessary. The new IPCC report, which is designed to give impetus to the negotiations, highlights the little-known acidification of the oceans - the ocean is losing its ability as a means to absorb carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide — the main cause of global warming — have already increased the acidity of ocean surface water by 30 per cent, and threaten to treble it by the end of the century. My friends we don't have the end of the century to change our ways, we have ten years to make major changes

Achim Steiner, the executive director of the United Nations Environment
Program (UNEP), said recently: "The report has put a spotlight on a threat to the marine environment that the world has hardly yet realized. The threat is immense as it can fundamentally alter the life of the seas, reducing the productivity of the oceans, while reinforcing global warming."

Scientists have found that the seas have already absorbed about half of all the carbon dioxide emitted by humanity since the start of the industrial revolution, a staggering 500 billion tons of it. This has so far helped slow global warming — which would have accelerated even faster if all this pollution had stayed in the atmosphere, already causing catastrophe — but at an increasingly severe cost.

Does anyone really believe that the corporate nightmare will end? Does anyone think that that the profit motive as it is constituted in the "Free Market System" will somehow be modified by the need to save the planet? We are entering a phase of the final meltdown of the planet. The poles are beginning to break up but that has not deterred the oil market or has it lead to the kind of conservation necessary, at the speed necessary, in the face of this catastrophe taking shape. Science is way behind reality because it must be certain therefore all the claims one hears 
are woefully conservative.

There are still people out there, like George Will and the Republican menace that will continue the objection to scientific reality, some of the scientists saying that we are already in feedback mode the above is clearly one of the examples as well as the softening tundra and the release of Methane fifteen times as potent a greenhouse gas. 


James Lovelock says that there will be about 500 million left at the poles for a few hundred thousand years until the planet rights itself and begins to cool or it might continue to heat until all life is finished. This small period of time in Earth's evolution and geology and climate has been set in motion for another life extinction episode.

This time we are the catalyst for our own extinction. The Chinese are producing more coal plants that will substantially diminish their fresh water supplies as well as adding to the globes greenhouse gasses, is a grand example of this environment be damned global economy. The ethanol versus food production shows us that the chance to change rapidly is out of our grasp. We have all done it!

Who has turned off their life style or their 401ks? America's selfish opportunism has turned love to stone? Will we spin to oblivion on a dead planet, probably? Where is the profit to be found here can someone from Wall Street explain this? 
Their is a fundamental feedback problem between the economic style that Americans are trying to get the world to accept; a consumer disposable auto centered existence, and its affect on continued life.

Lester Brown has been saying this for to many years with no one really taking him seriously. I have been fighting climate change in my work since my film, about Acid Rain, produced in 1980. Its the same problem, for the same reasons that has now become the basis for this catastrophe now impacting on humanity.

All the above, while the nations of the world argue about who will have the Lion's share of the oil and gas reserves in the waters now opened by global warming in the Arctic. This is the absolute absurdity, the absolute paradox no one cares about anything else but money, it's all about greed and money, the future generations be damned!

big oil...
big cars...
big egos
the big COOL life style glorious in it's uncaring glamour and sophisticated apathy....it's just NOT COOL TO CARE
it's that simple...marketing
make small economic cars COOL
not NICE CUDDLY
or FAIR or ECO FRIENDLY
but COOL.. in seventy foot tall letters
in the same way that a ferrari or a vintage mustang is cool
then the world will change...change that which is percieved to be cool and people will chase the dream till they drop (as they are doing right now)
it will just be a better dream...
after all as sad as it seems no-one wants to be un-cool
maddeningly straight forward answer utterly bewilderingly impossible of course as our entire culture and media driven society is obsessed with all the wrong things..why? COOL

There are dozens of things that consumers can do but it has to be organized nationwide. Anything from rotating "no buy" days to snarl their delivery system to selective boycotts. Boycott one company nationwide until they lower their prices....go on to the next.
Since energy is a necessary commodity in our society, there is a strong argument for making these companies public.
At the very least you'd think congress would cut subsidies and redistribute the money and pressure the DOJ to open investigations into monopolistic practices, but no. No wonder congress's approval ratings are in Cheney territory.
You could try attacking their charters but they might move offshore. Maybe that's a good thing. It would make it harder for them to co-opt the US military to fight their commodity wars and they don't pay much in taxes anyway.
I was hoping you would have some ideas. We certainly can't count on congress or the next president who will be awash in oil money, stolen from the pockets of working Americans, disproportionately the working poor.
Publicly funding elections will change the political landscape more than any other single thing we can do. Getting members of congress to act is almost impossible. They won't fight the system that gave them power and privilege. There has been modest success at the State level, but not enough.
I hope you will keep this discussion going. It's up to us to help ourselves. There is no one else.