THOSE $#@*!# GAS PRICES !!

[Deleted]

The truth behind those $#@*!# gas prices

Don't pin it on the oil companies. Here's what's really going on, where to place your outrage and how investors can make a buck.

With gas prices at record highs, I'm sure you've got a few choice words to say about the greedy you-know-whats who run the big oil companies.

But I've got an alternative solution, and I don't mean ethanol: Don't get mad. Get even.

There's no point in getting mad at the oil companies, despite their record profits. They aren't gouging you, and the higher prices aren't their fault.

The blames lies a lot farther upstream. It lies with Congress. It lies with corn farmers. It lies with the Chinese. It lies in Europe. And, I'm sorry to say, it mostly lies with you.

Unless you are a vegetarian city dweller who walks to work, has never let a plastic fork touch your lips and has never bought a cheap Asian-made cell phone, then you need to shoulder some of the responsibility for our consumerist culture's absolutely extraordinary demand for crude oil and its refined byproducts.

Higher prices at the pump today are a matter of simple economics. U.S. refiners have the ability to churn out 17 million barrels of gasoline per day. Demand is around 22 million barrels per day. To make up the difference, we bring in gasoline from foreign refiners, which means that, at the margins, pump prices are set by import prices.
Gasoline, like crude oil, is auctioned worldwide to the highest bidder, and with the dollar weak and overseas economic growth strong because of our fantastic appetite for iPods made in China and T-shirts made in Costa Rica, we have to pay up to keep our supply coming in. And that's all there is to it.

articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Investing/SuperModels/TheTruthBehindThoseGasPrices.aspx/Approved

[Snoopy]

Look at the bright side the Loonie is up to 98 cents and they are predicting it will go over one buck. Last time our money was worth more was 1976 as CDN as reminded me over and over again.

[Deleted]

OPEC drives up oil prices in a new way

The oil-producing nations' fast-growing, subsidized economies and soaring consumption of petroleum are big reasons the rest of world is paying more for its crude.

This time, OPEC really is to blame for higher oil prices.

In recent days, oil traders and speculators have forced the price of oil above $80 a barrel despite the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries' decision to raise production.

I fully expect oil prices to keep rising for the rest of 2007 and into 2008. The only thing likely to stop oil from climbing to $85 a barrel is profit-taking by speculators themselves.

Not every OPEC country is happy about this rise in oil prices. The Saudis, for example, have argued for increased production to hold down prices and keep demand from falling. But oil prices are headed up no matter what OPEC says or does.

And OPEC really doesn't have anyone else to blame for its inability to set prices. Runaway demand in the oil-producing countries themselves is the newest factor pushing up global oil prices.

Why prices are still rising

You can see where oil prices are headed in the reaction Sept. 12 to OPEC's announcement that it would increase production. Despite the news, prices went up that day. The price of a barrel of benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude climbed $1.68 to $79.91.

The next day, crude tacked on an additional 13 cents a barrel to close at $80.04. Speculators were ecstatic: Hedge funds and other traders have staked out big positions in the options market at $80 a barrel that are worth billions as oil climbs above that level.

articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Investing/JubaksJournal/OPECDrivesUpOilPricesInANewWay.aspx/Approved

[Deleted]

...It is good for us that plan to travel to the states .. I go every year with the girls , shopping , visiting , even if it's only Mich. I haven't had any better offers yet to go anywhere else .. So if anybody needs a travel buddy , let me know ...

[sasquatch]

It is certainly not a fair and equitable situation.

The increased demand of "developing nations" such as India/China is challenging demand. Even Russian despite it's failed market economy is rolling in cash from it's oil/gas exports. Cash which it foolishly investing in strategic military stuff in a futile attempt to regain it's statis as a super power.

The lack of inter-province distribution infrastructure is a problem and the inaddequate refrinning capacity is a crime. New built refinneries will be state of the art and efficeient, and would allow export of value added product rather than crude. Only problem is the Greens object----Suzuki finnished his cross country crusade with a protest against a new Irving refinnery in St. Johns NB.


The oil patch will predictably complain as will our NAFTA partners to a two price system, which results in a lower price for domestically consumed petroleum.

Add the that the reality that government at all levels benefits from higher fuel prices with the sales tax structure.

Then a critical mass, that still worships Turdeau, have this anti-Alberta agenda to shut down the OIL SANDs in the name of environmentalism.

[proudtobeadp]

It was not that long ago that Canada had a domestic price for oil as a commodity for Canadians at a Canadian price. That cost reflected the cost of production, refining and a reasonable profit for the producer/refiner/transporter/distributor which were even then the same gangs all sort of called the Association of Canadian Oil Producers and Refiners. Gasoline was under a dollar for an imperial gallon (none of this liter crap). The these same interests got a hold of the media and preaced how lucky we were in comparisson to Europe and the rest of the world who paid "world prices" which was just another lie and they knew it as many oil producing countries paid a local national price. With the media they BS'd so hard and so long that it was so good for the consumer, they got out governments on board without assurance in supply with out own domestic product coast to coast our government with the promises of riches from the oil folk and their world price strategy conned Canadians it was good and it should happen and it did happen. All the while Canadian government was shifting tax bases from 50 / 50 corporations to where Canadians now pay huge taxes and corporations very little in real terms so not only did we get the manipulatable world price structure the government unloaded all the taxes from shared to the people paying almost everything and the corporations very little and they wer definitely strip mining recources with little royalty by then as well.

The picture kept evolving to where its now virtually all become income tax and consumption taxes with Bay Street and the corporations armed with world commodity prices like oil running all the way to the bank in one of the biggest corporate welfare cases running exists now here in Canada where should you mention a domestic price for oil could get you locked up in the lonnie bin with the CPA holding the key!

Everyone saw what happened when Alberta wanted to increase their royalty by 1% in addition to the near 2% they were already getting, the CPA revolted and threatened to take their money out of town when a barrel of oil was trading withing the $100.00 per unit range. Alberta's stake would have been a whole 3 cents on a dollar or $3.00 on that $100.00 dollar world price. Please someone tell me there should not be a domestic price for oil in Canada once you examine what is going on and where that other $97.00 a barrel is going! A little bit to the feds, a little bit to the provinces and the rest to the corporated cartels and their investors and that is all!

[sasquatch]

The simple fact is due to environmental lobbying, NO NEW REFINERIES have been built in North America for decades.......The target of Suzuki's cross country crusade beside shutting down the Alberta oil fields was to halt the contruction of a new Irving refinery in St John NB.
Electricity is getting expensive because the obscene expense of wind energy provides little or no power----and it's proponents prevent nuclear........

[Deleted]

...... with " Ike " barrelling down on Texas ..... GAS PRICES ROSE OVER NIGHT BY .13 cents ...... WHY !!!!!!!!! This is not right ..... @ssholes ... am I pissed Yep !!! we should start picking the pumps and mass e-mailing these oil giants .... THE BIGGER THEY ARE THE HARDER THEY FALL .. Grrrrrrr

[sasquatch]

It is somehow satisfying that this price hike coincides with a general election.....
Dion's tax on everything is now beyond a hard sell...
Layton is blatantly flailing blindly and May is stammering.....