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May 15, 2008

The Democrat's Energy Plan Took Us From $57 To $126 A Barrel

How's the Democrat's "common sense" energy plan working?

As Charles Reichley points out in his opinion piece at InsideNova.com, in the six years before they took control, oil increased an average of about $5 a year. But in the 16 months the Democrats have been responsible for the nation's energy policy, the price of oil has risen to $126 -- an increase of almost $70 a barrel or $5 each month:

[...] ... gas prices on the Democrat's watch went from $2.20 a gallon to $3.67, an increase of almost 10 cents a month. The Democrat's plan isn't working, unless their plan was to decrease our dependence on oil by making it so expensive we can't afford to buy it.

It's clear the Democrats are fumbling our energy policy. Last week Speaker Nancy Pelosi urged President Bush to get Saudi Arabia to drill more oil so prices would go down. But at the same time, she rejected drilling for domestic oil, claiming that increasing domestic supplies won't lower the price we pay.

So which is it? Do we want more oil or not? How do we decrease our dependence on foreign oil if we reject domestic oil and increase foreign oil?

While claiming oil drilling won't help, the Democrats said we should stop filling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which will increase supplies by 70,000 barrels a day. They say this will decrease gas prices by up to 24 cents a gallon. Economists say the effect will be negligible.

Meanwhile, Democrats reject drilling in ANWR because they say adding a million barrels a day would only drop the oil prices about 5 cents a barrel. So 70 thousand barrels saves us 24 cents a gallon, while a million barrels won't do a thing?

Also, Democrats want to raise taxes on oil companies. By increasing taxes, they promise the price of gasoline will drop, and the oil companies will increase supply. In reality, taxes decrease incentives to supply oil and raise the price we pay.

Of course, we are collecting a huge amount of taxes from the oil companies. The feds took over $30 billion from Exxon-Mobil last year (that's more than the taxes paid by the bottom 50 percent of all individuals).

The Democrats also say drilling in ANWR is useless because we won't get any oil for 10 years. But they take credit for a bill they passed which will force Americans to buy more fuel-efficient cars. Their plan requires cars to get 35 miles per gallon, by 2020 -- 13 years from now. So we shouldn't drill in ANWR because it will take 10 years before it helps us, but increasing gas mileage over 13 years is "smart energy policy."

Posted by Abdul at May 15, 2008 8:13 AM