factsonfuel.org: America's Oil & Natural Gas Industry

Have you seen the latest treaty from the energy industry bigwigs? It literally begs us all to question them on why we’re paying so much for gas, what the industry is doing to develop alternative and renewable energy sources.

It’s a brilliant piece of propaganda. It does exactly what any piece of persuasive media should do: lull its audience into a stupor and create a sense of trust. If we can’t ask the industry directly, who can we ask? If we can’t trust American companies to take care of us in the future, who can we trust? (Obviously not the Saudis.)

But really how dull witted can we be? It seems a thinly veiled attempt to justify the gross profits experienced by the oil industry over the last year and a half. Yes, most of us are aware that they make only 7-8¢ per gallon and that a substantial percentage of the price of gas is comprised of state and federal taxes. But considering recent allegations on price gauging at the pumps, it seems difficult to swallow any justification for such bloated profits. (I’m not dismissing the contribution of the oil companies profits to the greater-than-anticipated GDP growth for the first quarter of 2006 – 5.3% - and of course those publicly traded conglomerates have an obligation to their shareholders to hunt down profits to ensure their stock prices justify investment.)

But those profits come at what social cost?

Ever heard of externalities?

Inflation, a rising consumer price index, negative personal savings rates: all factors playing into the 16th consecutive raise in the Federal Reserves’ prime rate. All potentially crippling components to future economic growth. Did we all forget what effect these numbers had on the stock "adjustment" last week, when the Dow Jones dropped 200 points in one day?
And now the Fed’s Bernake’s cryptic communication style has the market getting jittery, when the Fed is supposed to create a climate conducive to reasonable growth and checked inflation.
But back to the propaganda. The commercial is simple, stripped down to the basics: a current of diverse faces streams across the screen demanding to know what we pay what we do at the pump. Talk about a message claiming corporate responsibility and demanding social justice.

It’s brilliant. But I just don’t buy it.