Fix for oil prices

[skeeter@ccia.com]

What would it do to the world if we sold our bushel of wheat for what a barrel of oil cost? Ok I know our newest cost of $105 per barrel is lots due to the fact our dollar isn't worth a dollar anymore and the world bases it's money and market on our dollar value but in order to break the cycle of devaluation of the buck, would it be wise to export our goods this way? The world has to eat and why should we 'give' our goods away while continue to pay more for imports. How do we stop the cycle of America shipping recycle materials to say China so they can turn it back into goods we buy then recycle again back to them. Feeding the circle. What would it take to make the circle (cycle) to go off course in our direction? Would this equal cost of wheat/oil help bring the dollar value back up? Think our government will ever help us with a tax cut at the pumps? I say sell a bushel of wheat for what a barrel of oil cost to those that produce the oil. Even if it doesn't help bring up the value of the dollar. They gotta eat. Fair trade.

[gd357]

Good idea. Also, how about even percentage tariffs? If it costs us 30% to ship something somewhere, where's the sense in letting them send goods here for a fraction of that?

gd

[Brother Rockeye]

that sounds like the ongoing Canadian deal-ship raw resources out and pay exponentially for the manufactured return product...
and you know a bushel of wheat for a barrel of oil would be great,if the wheat producer finally got paid for growing it...
and we pay more for oil and gas than you folks do...and we produce our own too...

sorry...Canadian perspective...:mad:

[skeet]

Canada is where the US imports most of it's oil from. The Canadian gummit has always been rippin y'all a new tail end on taxes on oil. Guess them french canadians got all that tax passed:rolleyes: Man...I hope you ain't french canadian. It really was a joke.

[Andy L]

This whole thing about prices, taxes, gun laws, just socialism in general in Canada, is what makes this election so damned important.

Hillarys Universal Healthcare and Obamas Ban on Handguns.

Who does that sound like?

[skeet]

UHC would cost so blasted much and ya know them politicians and bureaucrats can't keep from makin more and new regulations. It will never work right and as cheaply as it COULD be from the private sector. And a ban on handguns would be a terrible thing as well as a failure for the most part. When will these people ever understand...that it ain't the gun?? I know y'all. They know it but that ain't what they want to hear. I seriously will never give up my guns willingly. They will have to be found and taken.

[DogYeller]

This a major catastrophe. Its driving prices up on every commodity. Its increasing our trade deficit and leading
to further devaluation of the dollar, eroding the buying power and standard of living of all Americans.
We need:

To drill on ANWAR

Drill offshore all over the U.S.

Increase refinery capacity

Switch over to using coal and enhanced air pollution control mechanisms for our power plants

Build more electrical power plants using nuclear power

Explore and encourage development of alternate fuel sources, including exploitation of shale oil.

Do something to negate the nefarious impact of commodity trading in oil futures

Talk turkey to the damn Saudis making it clear to them that there will be consequences if they don't increase oil production until we can deal with this problem.

Congress, both political parties and Bush have been negligent in pursuing the above options. They have buckled under to pressure from environmentalist wackos. Its past time for them to start thinking about America and Americans and not about their own investments.

[Brother Rockeye]

not to worry skeet,I ain't a frog...I'm an Irish Canuck.

i believe the problems in both our countries are the politicians themselves...what happened to them being OUR voice in government?
We've turned into feeder beef that only matter as long as they are makin money off us...burns my arse!

I've been sayin since the long gun registry was rammed down our throats "I'll hand over my guns as long as they don't mind gettin every last round of ammo first"

do whatever you have to to protect your rights as American Citizens-I only wish we had a constitution with some teeth in it!

[fabsroman]

Uh, the problems aren't just the politicians, but the people. I still see plenty of big cars and SUVs on the road with only one person in them. Obviously, gas isn't too expensive yet. Don't worry, this problem will fix itself right up. Just like in the 80's when people were looking for more economical cars, out came the Honda Civic. That POS small little car that got a million miles to the gallon compared to the American boats. Now, Honda has a fuel cell vehicle that it introduced this year to fleet owners, and if it all works out, it will be available to the public soon. The fuel cell vehicle uses hydrogen gas and it only emits water. It is win win on all accounts. Sad thing is that Ford won't have one ready for production until 2012. I am hoping that our cars can last that long, but who knows. If the fuel cell technology is out for a couple of years and they get the bugs out of it, the next problem will be with supplying the fuel. That is where Congress can come to the rescue. They can essentially give station owners a huge tax break for installing fuel cell "pumps" or whatever you need to fuel these vehicles.

There is also another alternative out there right now for you commuters. It is a vehicle that runs on natural gas and it has a 250 mile range. Problem is, finding fueling stations. To own one, you have to have a dispensing unit put in at your place and you have to have a natural gas line at your place.

Then there is another solution, moving closer to work.

Everybody stop crying a river and find an alternative to the problem instead. Once gas gets way too high, then I'm willing to bet that people will be finding alternatives instead of just complaining about it.

Oh yeah, I read somewhere that if ALL Americans traded their vehicles in on vehicles that got just 5 mpg better than what they currently own, we would have absolutely no dependence on foreign oil. I bet there would be no issue if all the vehicles I saw on the road were Ford Focus, Chevy Cobalt, Honda Civic, Toyota Corollas, etc. However, we Americans want our Cadillacs, our Corvettes, our Mustangs, and we want to complain about gas prices.

[Jack]

Fabs, take a look at what Brazil did.
Because they have an enormous amount of sugar cane, they were able to make enough ethanol to switch to using ethanol instead of gasoline. Now they import zero petroleum.
One problem they had in doing this was the old chicken and egg thing. Car makers said "we'll build the cars when there's stations everywhere where drivers can get ethanol."
Gas station owners said "It's too expensive to put in a new pump and tank for ethanol when there aren't cars to use it."
And so things sat for a year or so. Finally the Brazilian government employed one of those evil 'government mandates' and said, by a certain date, every fuel station had to have an ethanol pump.
Now, for us, I doubt ethanol is the long range solution. My point is,government does sometimes need to nudge things along.
For example, one factor that drives up gasoline prices is a 'shortage' of refinery capacity. Who owns the refineries? The companies that drill for oil and sell gasoline. The petroleum companies like the 'shortage' of refineries just fine- it drives up gas prices, increasing their profit.
If refineries were owned by independent operators, you can bet the 'shortage' of refinery capacity would soon disappear, and gas prices would come down a little.

[skeet]

You just hit every sacred cow of the greenies and it'll make 'em bleed green if all that stuff went through ceptin the alternative energy thingies. The NIMBY groups would come outta the wood works. Environmental disaster would soon follow and the human race would either die off completely like the dinosaurs...or they would be irradiated and change into some ungodly monsterous creature that would live in the world and probably prosper. I'm talking of the ungodly creature ...the conservative!!:D Oh horrors

[DogYeller]

Let 'em come, it's time to stand up and say "I'm mad as hell and I'm not gonna take it any more".

[skeeter@ccia.com]

Fabs, you are just starting your family. Wait till you have a few kids and a dog. Then take a ride in a VW beetle to the ocean for a vacation. (7 hrs). Add all your clothes, food, snacks, tents etc etc ..oh where did the kids go?...Under the pile or rubble...Have to go back, forgot the wife...now she has to get in too..Na the small cars are fine and needed but not in every situation. I hope to be around down the road when you have to scoot your driver seat up so far your knees are in your chest and you need a bubble in the windshield for your face to stick in so you can stuff your little ones and gear in the back seat and drive for miles..lol or when you have to tote them and their friends to their ball game at school or other school activities like band with their gear..yes you would want to leave the gas hog SUV home for that one......does make for fun days...sort of miss them since the little ones are grown now but those were the days...I can average 19 MPG out of my Hemi in town and up to 23 mpg on the big road..mind you now that is 60mph..if do 70mph..only will get about 21...so yes we all do need to change a few things..but still need the quad cab with bed on back...tools etc etc....Been there...done that...Life is still grand..We have to get America back to the American people. VOTE VOTE VOTE.. Does membership in HC or the NRA count as belonging to a well formed group? I also took and oath when I was drafted but never took an oath to get out..I feel that still makes me part of our well formed Military...and shouldn't be bothered by the 2nd. hummm

[fabsroman]

Skeeter,

You are right about needing a bigger vehicle once our family gets bigger, but there are ways around that too. The bigger vehicle doesn't always have to be the one being used. I find it kind of moronic that people buy a $50,000 SUV and have no other car to use other than the SUV. So, they commute in the SUV too. Their gas bill is insane. Then, they wonder why their SUV has 150,000 miles on it in 6 years and they have to buy a new one. I'm willing to bet that most of those SUV's I see in rush hour are headed to work, and not to drop off 3 kids at school or soccer practice. Even if you have 3 kids, why can't you drive a car to drop them off? I'm also willing to bet that those SUV's are not headed on vacation every morning packed full of stuff.

My wife and I have talked about getting an SUV down the road, but way down the road. Right now, I have the Taurus that can fit two baby seats in the back, it has a decent size trunk, and I have a storage container on the top. That should get us along just fine for several more years. Then, there is the F-350 crew cab that can be used when we really need it. I don't see another SUV or large truck purchase any time in the next 5 years.

My parents had 5 kids and somehow, we managed in a little FIAT hatchback from 1976 to 1980, and then they bought the Ford Fairmont, which wasn't a large station wagon by any means. Finally, in 1987, when I was 16 years old, my dad finally got a full size Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser station wagon.

Then, with family size being what it is today (i.e., 2 kids), how many people really NEED that SUV?

The conservatives complain about gas like the democrats complain about health care. Then, we buy SUV's, eat trans fat, smoke, and drink and get mad at the government when they cannot help us out of our situation. Don't even get me started on us Americans and TV.

[M.T. Pockets]

Fabs, I agree. I hate paying this much for fuel as much as anyone, but I don't see any fewer cars on the road. When I was a kid I rode the bus to school. Today, the same school had to build a parking lot and add onto is to make room for all the kids driving pickup trucks to school.

I remember past Presidents telling us to keep our thermostats at 65 and they reduced the speed limit to 55.

The price of fuel is plenty high, but it must not be high enough to hurt yet.

Be careful if you want the gov't to step in and control prices, this is just an example of free enterprise at work, like it or not.

[Brother Rockeye]

I totally agree with the vehicle use argument.We have a mid size car that gets 32 mpg that I hate to drive but do when going any distance.When the whole family(3 kids)goes to the city for supplies we take the bus(Suburban)because it will hold all of us and groceries etc. SAFELY and in comfort.
I don't drive my Ford diesel unless I'm hauling cattle or NEED it for work even tho it's respectable on fuel.My minor ranch related driving that requires a pickup is done with an old Ranger 1/4 ton.
Having said that,I can't run the baler with the car or ranger,and pay almost the same price for farm fuel.
On alternative fuels...
if you had an elevator full of wheat @ $5 a bushel,and an elevator full of modified wheat @ $2.50 would you clean out the $5 wheat before selling the $ 2.50 wheat?
you don't feed the new grain til the old grain is gone,especially when it was twice as much per bushel.

that's another "Canadian" perspective,might not apply to US folks.

(I still think politicians are a pack of self serving liars and thieves...but thats just my opinion.)

:D

[fabsroman]

The one thing I don't understand, is why none of the large oil companies compete against one another on price? If there isn't enough supply because there aren't enough refineries, why can't somebody step in and build more refineries? Why isn't Chavez and Citgo undercutting the rest of the American oil companies?

Could the shortage issue be a result of OPEC, Chavez, and others rationing what they have? It is a limited resource, so I don't blame them for rationing.

Talk about price fixing, how about DeBeers. If there is ever price fixing, it has to be on diamonds. DeBeers and Russia are holding such a stock pile of diamonds that if they were released to the public the supply would far outweigh demand and the price would plunge.

I still cannot understand how the oil companies are making huge profits without some type of price fixing, or maybe they just know we will pay whatever for gas and they let the futures market figure everything out. It seems as though when the price for a future barrel of oil goes up, the next morning I see a price increase at the pump. We just hit a record high of $106 a barrel today, and that is traders trading in oil futures all over the world. Keep in mind that our weak dollar needs to compete with everybody else out there that wants oil.

[DogYeller]

Good news, maybe.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080306.r-oil07/BNStory/energy/home

[skeeter@ccia.com]

We all know that once the demand for oil goes away...and oil isn't needed anymore...the price will have to go up again because now...the demand isn't there....so just like our taxing ..once people move out of an area because of taxes...the rest of the people that stick it out end up with a tax increase to cover the cost...yes...it happened here in the steel mill industry..they closed the mills..(not only closed the doors but tore to the ground to make darn sure they would not be opened again to make tanks, etc etc in case of war here..) .people lost their houses..moved away and the property tax increased by 3 x....yes...three times....one year they were a grand the next year they were 3 grand....and that made even more people loose their homes...so oil price here will still work out the same..they will only say there isn't the demand anymore so have to charge more..oh well...the way of the world...

[fabsroman]

Skeeter,

It just cannot work the way you think it does for oil. With property taxes, I guess it is possible because those are government driven, but who elected those government officials? You guys still had some control over that one, and probably more than over the price of oil.

If supply becomes too high and there isn't enough demand for oil, assuming that there is more than one supplier, the price has to come down. The suppliers don't want to store oil and pay for storage. If a bunch of suppliers have a lot of product and nobody to sell it to, you can bet that prices will be coming down. If people are moving away from oil, raising prices will only encourage more people to find an alternative.

[skeeter@ccia.com]

I agree Fabs in electing the people that raised the taxes in the first place but...they were already in office when the mills went down and that was their answer..raise taxes...sort of like all the promises we hear now from the politicians...but when they get in ...they wont do 1/2 they say...they will just blame it on the other party blocking it...but it sure would be nice if the oil prices did come down...the cheapest I pumped gas when I was a kid working in a gas station was 19 cents...during the gas wars...what happened to them?...I figured if Kwikfill was American oil and made gas in America...why couldn't' they just sell it at a buck fifty a gallon?..(isn't any gov minimum prices for gas is there?)..then create the gas wars like the 60's. I was a senior at high school with a GTO that was only 1 1/2 yrs old and made pmts by working at a gas station...wow...lost it when got drafted though..got a vw beetle when got out...never even think of that one now days. cars were cheap...gas was cheap...everything was cheap...and made in America.....oh well...have a nice day all...going ice fishing...won't be long ice gone...yee ha too...

[petey]

Blame the white collar stock traders in NYC that run the NYMEX up. They are the ones that set the price, not the oil producers, not the president, not congress. Same guys that set the price on pork bellies and orange juice

Smack a few of them around and maybe you'll pay less next week ;)

[fabsroman]

Petey,

You have it absolutely right. These morons are speculating on oil prices. However, I'm betting that the American public can do it too. With the invent of the internet, the public in general has been able to put its hands in places that it shouldn't. One place is the stock market. Look at the fall that suffered 6 to 7 years ago. After that, people were feeding off the real estate boom and putting their money in real estate. Now, since nobody wants to touch the stock market or real estate because people got burned, how about the futures market. I have a client that decided to test the currency trading market, after her and her husband got burned on the real estate market. They bought a condo in Miami for $220K in 2005 and now it is only worth $180K. On top of that, they financed the entire thing. Guess what, she lost $3K on currency trading last year. When are people going to learn that getting rich quick isn't the norm, but usually happens over a lifetime. This is why we have the mess we currently have.

Wait until the demand for oil goes down and all these idiots are left holding futures that they cannot break even on. Gas will be really cheap then, but we probably won't need it that bad anyway.

[Valigator]

Fabs you always know how to get the blood moving dont ya. Well we can make this as complicated or as easy as ya want.

Rolling Stones........

I saw her today at a reception
A glass of wine in her hand
I knew she would meet her connection
At her feet was her footloose man

No, you can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
And if you try sometime you find
You get what you need

What might be parmount to one isnt always the way it is for everyone, life brings different priorities and needs, what might be important to you isnt always whats important to me, doesnt make it right ...doesnt make it wrong, just the way it is...

[fabsroman]

Yeah, but you won't hear me crying about the price of gas or the price of housing. It is what it is. Neither you nor I can change either, so make do with what you have.

You can't always get what you want,
So make do with what you have.

You and I can agree on that at least.

[Lilred]

I got a fix fer the oil prices...I got my beady lil eyes on a perty roan mare...lol

[PJgunner]

What with gas prices being what they are, and was I'm afraid they soon will be, I have been giving thought toward buying some little roller skate, probably a Toyota Corolla. I dunno if they make them with a flex-fuel option, but if ethanol gets shoved down my throat, our current two vehicles will either have to sit and rot or have certain part destroyed due to the corrossiveness of ethenol on certain plastic and rubber parts. it would probably cost a young fortune to get all those changed over, even if they were available. :rolleyes: :mad:
So I have to weight the cost of a new vehicle over what it might save me in fuel costs over possibly having to convert my current paid for vehicles to a fuel I don't want. :mad:
My 93 toyota 4x4 pick up truck averages about 21 MPG. It has all of 84,271 miles on the odometer(I just checked) . That's 5,618 miles a year average on that one.:D The 1998 Ford Explorer is a bit more hungry at 15.9 city and 20.5 highway the last time I checked. It has a whopping 37,067 miles on the odometer which works out to 3,707 miles per year. We bought it to take trips to visit the kids that live out of state in Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Texas. Now, about the only time it gets used is when my wife goes to church. FWIW, that 20.5 MPG is with the cruise control set at 65 MPH. At a legal 75 MPH. it drops to about 19.1 MPG.
I used to go to the range two or three times a week, but now it's been more like twice a month. :( Those 50 mile round trips to the range can add up when you have to fill up the tank.
Paul B.

[DON WALKUP]

congress ain't gonna do anything about the high price of gasoline/diesel...they reap too much revenue from it. both for the federal gov't and to amass personal fortunes. same goes for state legislators and legislatures.

insofar as trading into a vehicle that gets better milage...well... my jeep rubicon gets 23 MPG and my toyota tacoma gets the same. i cannot afford to trade ANYTHING right now...i'm retired and live on a fixed income. we recently towed our trailer from here in kaliphornistan to ohio and got averages ranging from nine to fourteen MPG from our toyota.

diesel is now $4.26 per gallon here...unleaded regular is $3.68 per gallon.

the oil companies and all associated with them will bring this country to dead standstill if we are not permitted to drill and use our own sources.

another problem is it takes so many years to get things like an oil refinery/power plant up and running. by the time congress gets offa its collective arse (if they ever do!)...fuel will probably be five or more dollars per gallon.

congress could have headed this off years ago but refused to do so! d*&^%$ near every one of them should be replaced!

:mad:

[Valigator]

Gas prices will do some huge damage in the next years from within. Did any of you watch the Ethanol issue on various programs? Corn is in most every thing we use in one form or another. Before the seed goes in the ground the price doubles now. Soon we will see desperation in lower income families. Soon every household will start to see their gas tanks drained in the middle of the night. Then we will see hunger in families who cant afford hamburger....then we will see hi-jacking and women become victims more and more because men see them as targets for their purses and valuables. Home envasions will become more common place. Thefts of property and persons will become common place and more and more deadly. It will get worse before it gets better. My suggestion is enhance your personal security in whatever means you can afford....only the prepared will survive......

[skeeter@ccia.com]

Hey lilred...I like your idea too....in fact they make their own gas....who can say they drive something that does that.

[fabsroman]

Don,

If you do some calculations, it might actually cost you less to trade one of your current vehicles for a vehicle with better gas mileage. It all depends on how much you drive. I did the calculation and my wife and I are borderline. However, when we move in a year or two to be closer to her work and my parents, then it will not make any sense for us unless gas is $10+ a gallon. Now, if one of the cars needs to be replaced, you can bet it will be replaced with something that gets much better gas mileage.