Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Oil Things Must Pass


I went to the beach last weekend and stepped in a pile of asphalt that had been floating in Santa Monica Bay and had washed ashore after being dumped by a tanker at the oil refineries south of LAX. It made me mad. Oil companies get away with everything, including soiling my shoes.

Last week, the CEOs of the big five oil companies testified before Congress about why they needed their welfare checks while making record money from gambling. Because of Wall Street oil speculators, the price of a barrel of oil is driven up (in some estimates) $44 a barrel to about $100 a barrel.

Speculation has nothing to do with the hands on exploration and production of oil, nor does it have to do with supply and demand. Speculation should be made illegal or heavily regulated. Obama needs to rein in these speculators. He promised in June 2008 that he would do so. Do you think he will now?

Right. On to the next paragraph.

I believe big oil’s Gang of Five should pay for all wars fought in the Middle East. It is as obvious that Libya is not about human rights as it was that Iraq was not about WMD.

I also believe that in wars fought for oil by governments on behalf of oil corporations, the corporations should not only pay for the wars like a business expense, but they and their proxy governments should be liable for damages just like in business, but not like in oil spills. These are blood spills, so they would not be able to be passed on to the taxpayer, consumer and next generation American like BP is doing in the Gulf. Talk about your entitlements!

This means that killing innocent children in their profiteering wars would cost them monetarily in amounts much greater than the 1-2% taxpayer welfare they so hate to lose. One oil executive threatened to move their operation out of the US. I say “Go ahead! Leave! And don’t let your rig hit you in the ass on the way out!”

Necessity is the mother of invention and if America needs to invent a better way to do everything without oil and gas we will.

In fact, is it not a good idea to start a boycott of one of the big five to send a message and scare the hell out of the other four? Of course it is.

And hey, what about the sequel to Who Killed the Electric Car called Revenge of the Electric Car? Try to see it if you can. We need to change the world we live in. Maybe this is a way.