What's up with price of solvents?

[Sailaway]

George E Cawthon wrote: >We don't have to buy it at all, it is just a choice. >

For all *practical* purposes, it is not a choice. We have to work, our jobs are more often than not way past walking distance, public transportation is scarce in most of the country, etc. That's just scratching the surface. Unless of course you want to suggest we just lay down and starve to death by choice.

My point was about today, not ten years from now. There are all kinds of technologies out there that will *one day* be useful, but in the U.S., today, none of these are ready for widespread market, or at least not cheaper than oil. Since people are driven by the concept of "What's in it for me", you would find people abandoning oil in a heartbeat for something cheaper/better. Brazil may have something, but here in the U.S. you would have to have it in place and sell it at least as cheaply as gas for it to fly. Ya think that's gonna happen? Don't care what it sells for in Brazil, when it hits here, (if it ever does) it'll probably be a buck higher than gas, or will bring on a double whammy of bringing gas prices up because some government idiot mandates it to be added to gas. And that doesn't even solve the problem of replacing diesel. Biodiesel is still not commercially practical. If you want to run it exclusively, you will fork out a mountain of cash to convert your truck, and even more for maintenance.

[Sailaway]

George wrote: You need to read up on a seventy-year experiment in command economy in a country with natural resources of all sorts so abundant they still haven't been properly cataloged - which couldn't heat water for a shower, if there _were_ a shower, for the "sheeple".

Be careful of what you wish for.

If you are referring to socialist/communist societies, that is not at all what I was getting at, George, nor is it what I wish for at all. What I was lamenting was the fact that we have a system in which free markets are a very good thing, but that some products that have gone beyond just being a luxury into being a necessity, have fostered such greed by the companies, that they have entered into collusion to force artificially usury-high prices on the public. I have no qualm at all with making a good honest profit, after all that is precisely what a business is in business to generate and rightly so. But if there were no shady deals going on I believe completely that we would not have had much if any higher price on any fuels due to the relatively small hike in price per barrel recently, and none at all during Katrina. There was simply no shortage here. Maybe in the Gulf region, but not here. Here in the Northeast during the Katrina aftermath, our fuel prices were going up daily, and even sometimes several times per day. Yet if you find out where our Northeastern oil supplies come from it would not be from the Gulf region. California's gas prices were even more out of control - do you think they get gas from the Gulf? NO. It was usury, pure and simple, to take advantage of Americans during a crisis. They did it again during both Gulf (that *other* gulf) wars. Sorta makes that economic terrorism, doesn't it?

So what my point was about our "sheeple" here, and in Europe, was that few are willing to do anything at all to force - through the marketplace, and through our government prosecuting the crimes that are committed according to Federal law, like with the Windfall Profits Tax Act which was enacted to prevent or punish for this very thing. That ain't socialism. Its just common sense and it protects the country, the economy, and us - the sheeple.

I apologize if I may be imprecise in my ability to get my argument across clearly, been running on little sleep for the last week.

[Mark & Juanita]

Before you lay this all at the feet of the "greedy" oil companies, you need to lay some of that blame on the so-called sheeple who are ready to jump at every whim of the environmental whackos, the NIMBY crowd, and other anti-growth, anti-capitalism crowd who have been responsible for assuring that no new refineries have been built in this country in the past 30 years, who are assuring that it is so costly and expensive to explore and drill for new oil, and who are shutting out entire oil fields for development. That same crowd is responsible in large part high prices due to the seasonal "cafe" blends of gasoline required by each and every large municipality and region. Which means that just because there is plenty of gas in one region, because of those blending requirements, it can't be shipped to a different region that has had its supply disrupted because a refinery has had to be shut down since the gas in region A doesn't meet the blend requirements of region B. Monopolies are bad, but effectively throttling growth via legislative and judicial fiat is just as bad and causes equivalent upsets.

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ If you're gonna be dumb, you better be tough +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

[George E. Cawthon]

Then say the only practical choice is to buy it, don't say you have to buy it.

My discussion of Brazil was just for information. And it isn't that Brazil MAY have something, they DO have a program, have been working on it for years, and will fully implement it by the end of this year. If Brazil can become independent of gasoline, we sure as hell can reduce our oil consumption. Alcohol production may not be the solution in the U.S. but standing around wringing your hands sure as hell isn't the solution.

[George]

Once again I see you use the word force. Force is not freedom. Be careful what you wish for.

You see, in socialist economies it's not so much that there is no way to succeed (windfall profits?) that holds good people back, as it is that no one can fail. That's what makes a sheep, the protection of the shepherd, the dog and the fold, all of which confine, though they may comfort.

[Sailaway]

Mark and Juanita wrote: > Before you lay this all at the feet of the "greedy" oil companies, you >need to lay some of that blame on the so-called sheeple who are ready >to >jump at every whim of the environmental whackos, the NIMBY crowd, and >other anti-growth, anti-capitalism crowd who have been responsible for >assuring that no new refineries have been built in this country in the >past 30 years, who are assuring that it is so costly and expensive to >explore and drill for new oil, and who are shutting out entire oil >fields for development. That same crowd is responsible in large part >high prices due to the seasonal "cafe" blends of gasoline required by >each and every large municipality and region. Which means that just >because there is plenty of gas in one region, because of those blending >requirements, it can't be shipped to a different region that has had >its supply disrupted because a refinery has had to be shut down since >the gas in region A doesn't meet the blend requirements of region B. >Monopolies are bad, but effectively throttling growth via legislative >and judicial fiat is just as bad and causes equivalent upsets.

Actually, that is a part of what I was getting at. If people don't actively do something to stop all the whacko's as well as the price-gouging companies then we end up in the same boat, just by 2 different paths. But that is still no excuse for oil companies to take advantage of the public through price-gouging, period. Bureaucrats and politicians can be reigned-in through strong grass-roots response. But the only way to stop and oil company is to either not buy that one company's products, or get the government to apply the law as written to stop them from breaking it. We can't actually get anywhere by singling out one company, because they have been working in collusion to force artificially high prices across the board, and which also means they have broken several Federal laws. This in effect makes them (all the oil companies who are participating) a monopoly, and should be regulated as such, just as the Feds/states, etc. regulate the power companies. If they didn't regulate the power companies, it wouldn't be long before only the rich could afford to have electricity. Any time a company can drastically reduce costs, and at the same increase profit by raising prices, it will most likely do that. The oil companies have no incentive to flood the market with fuel, because that would represent a large increase in manufacturing and related costs, and would result in lower prices per unit sold. What is the incentive? Instead, they raise fears about so-called "shortages" and drastically raise prices. You may remember that after a gas station purchased a truckload of fuel just before Katrina and priced the gas at the pump accordingly, then immediately after learning about the storm the same fuel he just paid for was suddenly priced higher at the pump, and just kept going up. If it an independant station we can boycott that station (as I do now). But when all the stations do it, including the company-owned ones (the independents usually just follow along, cause they can) then we have a problem. If you don't agree with Federal law, then you can write your congressman to get it changed. I happen to agree with that one law I referenced, just as I agree with the original purpose for unions. Unlike what most unions have done recently, when unions were originally formed in this country it was because the workers were being unfairly taken advantage of. There was no protection for them when all they wanted was a fair deal. And now we have Federal laws that protect people's right to have union protection. Here I am talking about the same thing, just a fair price for a necessary utility.

So I am not at all talking about throttling growth. Exxon had a ten billion dollar profit in just one quarter - three months, of last year. Yes, you read it right, ten Billion (I believe they had an even larger quarter than that since). That was net profit, not gross - is that throttling growth? Did they use that profit to open new refineries? Nope! The shareholders got some, and the rest (and quite a large chunk) went to the people who run it. And trust me, I have no problem with people getting wealthy. I DO have a problem with people breaking the law to get wealthy, and hurting us at the same time. The law was enacted to protect us from manopoly-like behavior, and the resulting illicitly gained excess profits.

Oil companies have been in no hurry to open new refineries because they have been busy raising prices instead to get profit. They understand that they can make more pure-profit by charging more per-unit without the expense of manufacturing and selling more units at a lower price per-unit. The Feds have been pushing the oil companies for years to open new ones. But as long as they keep feeding them huge taxpayer dollar subsidies and almost total tax relief, they aren't gonna change.

I did cover something in a previous post about the price of fuels being affected by idiotic government mandates like additives. And yes, I could rant on about all the rest of the whacko's out there, (which most people aren't aware that New Jersey has nearly as many as California and DC) but that is still not the problem, its the whacko's in our governments that we need to deal with, and unfortunately, there are too many European-thinking individuals in our country for us to really have much chance of changing anything. And my point about the sheeple in Europe was that they seem have a much larger pain threshold than us. They seem to actually *want* their pain.

Rant mode off, I'm through with this thread.

[Sailaway]

George Cawthon Wrote: Snip If Brazil can become independent of gasoline, we sure as hell can reduce our oil consumption. Alcohol production may not be the solution in the U.S. but standing around wringing your hands sure as hell isn't the solution.

I agree. But until more people are aware that they *can* make a difference, and are also willing to do so, then there will be no difference. My self-appointed job in this life is to educate people that they can make a dent.

FWIW, I'd switch to Alcohol or any other fuel if my diesel would run it. And BTW, I do write my elected rep's frequently and am active in trying to get others to stay active in making positive changes in our governments. Hand wringing is just a sideline.

[Sailaway]

George wrote: >Once again I see you use the word force. Force is not freedom. Be >careful >what you wish for. >

Once again I'll agree with you, but it was a poor choice of a word. I do not mean force as in make them comply through *actual* force when I was referencing using the marketplace. I meant getting together in some way that changes the dynamics of that marketplace in our favor, such that the result would be the oil companies would not try to take advantage of us without resulting in lower or stagnant profits or unrecoverable higher costs for them. This is not socialism, any more than unions are socialism. It is our right to change the marketplace.

On the other hand, governments exist to protect its people. And to do that they enact laws. And when the law is broken, the government has the obligation to apply the appropriate jurisprudence. Once again, this is not socialism. In the case of which we have been discussing, several laws were broken. Windfall profits, in this case, refers to illegally-obtained excess profit garnered by breaking the law. And they did that during a time of crisis, that's just plain un-American. (well, ok, maybe todays *new* America might like it - greed, corruption, etc.)

Whew! And I thought I was finished with this thread...