|
Something most people don't understand about the energy price problem is that there is not a shortage of oil. There is actually a surplus.
OPEC isn't underproducing to try and hurt our economy ala the 1970's.
The problem is the weak dollar. If oil had always been traded in say Euros, the price of oil wouldn't have risen very much in the past 8 years, but it would be expensive for us because the value of the dollar dropped.
If our dollar still had the value it did against the Euro, Pound, or Yen, as it did when Bush took office, gasoline would cost about $2/gallon.
When you cut taxes, fight two wars, and add a prescription drug benefit to medicare with no mechanism to pay for it other than increasing the debt, going from a projected 4 trillion surplus over 10 years to adding massive amounts to the national debt.....people in the world tend to lose faith in your currency.
Alternative sources of energy are important for many reasons and should be pursued aggressively....but the government wants to bring down the price of oil in the short term, they need to stop borrowing money to fight two wars, get our financial house in order, balance the budget, and invest in our infrastructure at home, so that the value of the dollar goes up.
When the dollar goes up, oil prices go down. It's that simple
__________________
sig too big
|