Boortz on Price Gouging

I've not had but a few minutes a day for internet time the last few days (busy at home and busy at work), but I did get time to see this at Nealz Nuze. Here we go. As expected, President Bush has decided to order an investigation into high gasoline prices. He is scheduled to announce the probe today in Washington. This is in response to an ignorant public that demand politicians "do something" about high gas prices. This is so pathetic on so many levels...so we'll cover just a few. Just like with the other calls for investigations into price gouging...this will go nowhere. A lot of money will be spent investigation oil companies...and just as a bunch of times before, no evidence of any such price gouging will be proven to have taken place. Besides, what is price gouging anyway? Just a buzzword used by the anti-capitalist, government-educated among us. Most people think that one oil company owns the oil rig that gets the crude out of the ground, the tanker that delivers it and the refinery that makes the gasoline. This is also false. In many cases, every step in that chain is owned by a different party. Then, when it comes to the actual gasoline, the gas station is most likely an independent dealer...who may have a franchise from one of the big oil companies. We are to believe that all of these separate companies and individuals got together to fix gas prices artificially high? There's also the pesky law of supply and demand. In case you haven't checked lately, the supply of crude oil and refined gasoline is limited, but the demand is increasing worldwide. This leads to temporary shortages and higher prices. It's not Bush's fault, and it's not the fault of the oil companies. If you want someone to blame, try the environmental lobby that fights any and all exploration for new sources of crude oil. So no amount of investigations are going to do anything about gas prices. it sounds good, but you're still looking at between $3 and $4 a gallon this summer. If that's too high for you, time to warm up your tricycle ... or try walking. Maybe you'll work off some pounds. I agree with Boortz 100% on this as I'm sure anyone that reads 1492 knows. The subject of investigating gouging comes up everytime gas gets high and people start whining and I don't remember a single time when evidence of price gouging was found. All this is politicians (Bush including) pandering to the public. It's all a waste of time. Here is a list of reasons why gas is high: *China *India *Iran Nuclear Threat *Environmentalist *Refineries Taking Down Time for Maintenance (they put this off after Katrina to keep supply up, downtime is always needed for a 24/7 plant) *Federal Taxes *State Taxes *Special Blends for Certain States That isn't every reason but it is a good picture of what is going on. BTW NC state gas tax is 29.9 cent per gallon. This is suppose to go to the Highway Trust Fund and it does. But then every year a set amount is pulled out of the HTF to go to the general fund, this is to cover the removal of taxes from the GF to the HTF when it was created. Then extra $$$ is removed from the HTF and put in the GF and is never replaced nor used for roads.