Why cry for big oil?
Big oil seems surprised that oil prices have fallen so fast after such a huge surge. But they shouldn’t be. I was only a young pup during the energy crisis of the 70s, but I understood enough to know that the crisis was a sham. It was a big put-on by big oil for their own interests. And the American people and government bought it. Then, people started buying smaller, foreign cars that used less gas. Foreign cars were popular because American automakers thought that Americans were stupid enough to keep buying the crap they were building.
But, Americans aren’t so dumb after all. We started buying foreign fuel-efficient jobs because they lasted longer and cost less to run. THEN, the automakers decided they had better put some good old American quality back into their cars. Americans started buying more American cars again. Oil companies, aghast that people weren’t buying as much gasoline as before, brought the ‘crisis’ to an end.
Enter the 2000’s, and again another energy crisis. No gasoline rationing this time by the government, but at over $4.00/gallon after a meteoric rise caused the consumer to ration their own fuel. Oil companies were reaping record profits from these artificially inflated prices. Higher fuel means higher goods, higher goods mean less disposable income, hell, it meant families were having to choose to drive or eat. Eating won.
People started looking, again, for more fuel-efficient alternatives and they found them. Now, oil prices are hitting the basement again and oil companies just can’t seem to understand why. They don’t understand why people still aren’t driving like they used to, whey they are not buying as much fuel as they used to, why prices are dropping like a rock. It is because they raped us and we are fighting back.
Americans aren’t stupid. We are strong and we will find a way to survive. If we can’t burn petroleum products, we will burn something – even water.
I do think some good comes out of all this, we are finding greener fuels and using them more efficiently, but the way it happened ruined a lot of good people. It did need to happen, but not as fast as it did. And it was all done artificially. The cost of obtaining the oil did not go up, the cost of refining did not go up, the paychecks of the blue-collar workers did not go up. Only the obscene profits of big oil went up like a gusher.
So, I don’t cry for big oil. They should have saved their sunshine for a rainy day.
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