Bush/McCain’s Gas Price Scam Is an Enron Re-Run

[babylonsister]

Bush/McCain’s Gas Price Scam Is an Enron Re-Run
by Harvey Wasserman


The Bush/McCain gas price escalation is an Enron Re-Run. It is Chapter 2 of the scam Bush crony “Kenny Boy” Lay used in 1999-2001 to steal $100 billion from California ratepayers.

Now this administration is replicating that crisis to funnel untold billions into the coffers of its oil baron backers… and to push the failed strategies of offshore drilling and nuke power.

There is no doubt that we are at the edge of the petro-abyss. Peak oil is upon us, as is the global-warmed finale of Earth’s carrying capacity for burning more fossil fuels. It is the perfect storm that must end the age of fossil/nuke.

But the immediate situation is not so clear. Bush/McCain say soaring prices are due to a lack of supply, and there are those who agree.

The Saudis, and others with more credibility, argue the price rise is contrived by bankers and speculators. Their mega-theft comes not only at the gas pump, but in food prices and other essentials.

Whatever the case, remember that during the Enron con, there was no shortage of electric generating capacity. Enron’s operatives laughed into their PCs as they selectively shut perfectly operable power stations and jacked up electric prices 700% and more. Enron, of course, later went bankrupt, wiping out countless thousands.

more...

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/06/23/9820/

[skooooo]

1. That's a good way to refer to it -- a scam! nt

[tbyg52]

2. >>used in 1999-2001 to steal $100 billion from California ratepayers.

And also to install Gov. Terminator.....
http://tabacco.blog-city.com/enron_the_california_energy_crisis_gray_davis_recall__ar_1.htm

[Leopolds Ghost]

3. Econ 101: Shortage is not required to drive price sky-high. The PRICE ITSELF PREVENTS SHORTAGES

By "killing demand" for a resource where there is NOT ENOUGH to GO ROUND.

In fact, shortages are evidence of market manipulation BY THE GOVERNMENT
to keep prices artificially LOW for all consumers.

We saw this in the Soviet Union and again with China (an example of
state capitalism designed to promote wasteful auto use by 1 billion
new drivers, like America sought to do in the 1950s until 2008,

when its official policy was to encourage EVERYONE to attain the
"freedom" (and full citizenship) of a drivers license in order to
allow them to have any mobility or right to travel unmolested at all.

As retired oilman T. Boone Pickens told Congress, oil has already peaked,
and once demand exceeds supply for a limited resource, PRICE MUST GO UP TO KILL DEMAND.

Oil has NEVER been a limited resource before (like diamonds).

There has ALWAYS been more supply available than demand... until now.

Don't believe Pickens? He is building the world's largest Wind Farm
in West Texas with his royalties... If you are in a mutual fund, you
get a royalty check from oil cos. If you drive to the store because
you live in a city where walking is impossible / illegal,
despite the disadvantages of doing so, you profit from the oil cos.

The only people who really suffer are the 4% of Americans who farm.

(70% of whom voted for Bush twice)

Econ 101 teaches us that the speculators are actually doing the
right thing for once. If there were an Intrade account on
oil commodity futures here at DU, would you bet on the price of
oil going down long-term? That is what you are asking speculators
to do... take a bath in order to ensure cheap oil.

[lonestarnot]

4. That thing got my blood a boil'n!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7J51LEr-k9M

[Fire Walk With Me]

5. Never forget that Enron were major BushCo campaign contributors/friends, met with Ahnold prior to

the ousting of California Governor Gray Davis over the fictional energy shortage/"rolling brownouts", etc...

Recommended...

[Leopolds Ghost]

6. The era of cheap oil is over. Speculators are right to do what government refused to do

Punish consumers who refuse to change their driving habits before the
oil is priced into demand-killing territory.

Those of us who have already changed our habits, those of us who have
no incentive to rape the environment to build more highways like the bluest counties are doing, have no reason to care about the price of oil.

We are more concerned about WHO GETS THE MONEY?

Oil cartels (including Exxon, etc.?)

or the public thru high gas taxes and oil company profit taxes?

Electricity on the other hand is a public good.

[Hydra]

7. I'm glad this is finally getting airtime

The facts were there that this shortage was deliberate, but the peak-oilers relentlessly cover for them. Some of them even push for the nuclear and oil shale(both BAD ideas).

In the end, we got screwed...AGAIN...and we have no one to blame but ourselves.

[Edweird]

8. Yep. Not peak oil. Not a "good thing" as one poster so repetitively asserts.

Just us getting pounded in the cornhole while bastards make money hand over fist.