Tuesday, April 26, 2011

President Obama Is Ending Oil Industry Subsidies ... A Good Move At Exactly The Wrong Time

What was it that one of President Obama's team said when this last recession began? "Never let an emergency go to waste!" He did NOT mean jump on the problem and fix it correctly and quickly. He DID mean that they should use it as an opportunity to advance the progressive agenda. Whether doing so actually accomplishes much with respect to addressing the current problem is utterly irrelevant.

So, now we have an oil and gas price surge. The price of gas is over twice what it was when Obama took office. What the people need is for the price of oil/gas to decrease. But what is his first action after it finally registers with him that this issue matters to his re-election? He says he's going to eliminate subsidies to the oil companies. How, exactly, will that address the problem we have with oil/gas prices? Answer: it won't.

Think about it. The oil companies are about to lose many billions(!) of dollars in government subsidies. What will that do to the price of oil/gas? Let's see. The oil companies have their income drop by a lot when those subsidies stop but they still want to make the same profit, right? So, how will they accomplish that? By RAISING oil/gas prices!!!

"Progressive Think": The oil companies are, by liberal definition, evil. The price of their product is going through the roof. They must be punished so take away their subsidies. That'll teach them! I guess we showed THEM!

One teenie weenie problem with that. It'll cause an increase in the price of oil/gas and make the problem that the American people want fixed worse!!! What you have to understand is that progressives aren't into fixing problems rationally. The price of oil/gas is rising, on its way to creating a real emergency in our country. Hey, they say, we have an emergency here! How cool! That gives us the opportunity to practice "never let an emergency go to waste" by punishing the evil oil companies and fake The People into thinking we're doing it to fix the oil/gas price problem.

So, this oil/gas price problem comes about and the first thing they do is get out their list of things they want to do TO the evil oil companies when they 'act up'. What's at the top of the 'To Do' list now? Eliminate subsidies to evil oil companies because they have the audacity to actually make a profit! Do our progressive leaders stop to think whether doing this will fix the oil/gas price problem? Of course not ... because it doesn't matter.

Progressives are thinking, well, already checked off the first thing we wanted to do via the previous emergency. Oil was spilled so we stopped the evil oil companies from drilling. What was the second item on our To Do list? Oh, yeah! Stop subsidies to them because industries we want to eliminate shouldn't receive subsidies.

Cool! Two emergencies related to oil happened on our watch and we've gotten our top two 'punish the evil oil companies' items checked off our To Do list: stop drilling and eliminate subsidies. It's been a good year. Yes, indeed, it's been a VERY good year! What, you commoners among the population don't like the fact that those two actions we took increased the price of oil and are driving it even higher? Not our problem ... we have our agenda to worry about. We're going green. Over your dead (economic) bodies.

No comments: