Fueling Speculation

I'm confused. I mean, I know I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed. If I were, I would be sodomizing you from my office on Wall Street. But I drive a bus. Could this be the reason I am unable to puzzle out how cheap gas could be bad for the economy?

Despite the inroads made by electric cars, hybrids and more-efficient internal combustion engines, we remain a nation quite literally over an oil barrel. Be it getting to work, distributing consumer goods or taking the kids to soccer practice, we use gas. Lots of it. We can't function without it.

So when gas prices rise, its impact, combined with stagnant wages, is significant. A larger and larger portion of our income is devoted to fuel, leaving less and less for everything else. While this is wildly and exorbitantly wonderful for our oil companies, it is not so good for the rest of us.

And yet, after gas prices have steadily fallen for months, certain entities are propagating the idea that low gas prices not only impact the bottom lines of Royal Dutch Shell and Exxon, but are injurious to the economy as a whole.

How can it be that something which frees up billions of dollars, bright-eyed, bushy-tailed little dollars ready, willing and able to make their acquaintance with the remainder of the economy, be bad?

The answer is it can't.

Now, I've already indicated that I know as much about economics as House Republicans do about foreign policy, but I know for damn sure that cheap gas is better than expensive gas.

Rather than asking whether cheap gas is bad or good for the economy, perhaps a better question would be for whose economy is cheap gas harmful?

I think we already know.

Ripping a page from the Republican fear-mongering manual, industry trade associations are preying upon the fears of a citizenry recently out from under the dark cloud of a brutal recession, itching to impart the idea that low gas prices are a symptom of an economy about to go belly up.

The economy may well do exactly that, but you paying $2.49 per gallon of unleaded won't be the reason.

This falls right in line with previous industry explanations for price increases, shortages and other disruptions. It's the ____________ driving season. The threat of violence in ____________. And my favorite: a refinery is closed for maintenance.

Remarkable hardly describes the gluttony and manipulation oil companies, which receive billions in government subsidies (that's right--we pay them to look for the oil that we, well, pay for), feel entitled in foisting upon we the people. 

If you remain unconvinced, or are of the mind that Obama's Cheap Gas is reckless, destructive and a road to incipient socialism, I've included the addresses of our largest oil companies below.

Feel free to send them the difference between the per gallon price you paid today and the amount you feel guarantees a strong economy.

As for me, I'm ripping a page from the Who songbook. You know, the one about not getting fooled again.

Royal Dutch Shell PLC

Carel van Bylandtlaan 16, 2596 HR

The Hague, The Netherlands

Exxon Mobil Corporation

5959 Las Colinas Blvd
Irving, TX, 75039 United States

British Petroleum Company PLC

International Headquarters
1 St James's Square
London, SW1Y 4PD

Chevron Corporation

6001 Bollinger Canyon Rd.
San Ramon, CA, 94583 United States

Total SA

2 Place Jean Millier
Courbevoie, Hauts De Seine, 92400 France

Streaming Thoughts

I’m stuck. I start a post, and after a paragraph or two lose all focus and sense of direction.

Doesn’t matter if it’s about Mitch McConnell and John McCain and the remarkable athletic ability they display while leaping from one position to another, the especially fine Dylan bootleg I downloaded last week or my ongoing unemployment.

My posts just sputter to a stop like a car out of gas.

And that’s another topic: rising gas prices. Where’s the deflation economists were so worried about last year? Demand remains flat, the non-Wall Street economy is still on life support, yet gas prices continue to rise. Why isn’t the dynamic of supply and demand coming into play?

Did it pull a groin or something?

I thought the gravity of low demand kept prices down. Is everything we learned in Economics 101 wrong?

Then there’s the pending reform of Wall Street.

I’m not holding my breath, and neither should you. Like our recent health care reform, the financial re-do will be gentle. Corporate-friendly. It will be faint like the light from a distant star.

Despite the valiant efforts of people like Elizabeth Warren, there’s just too much campaign cash at stake. Too many golf junkets. Too many days to turn into Christmas for our pocket-stuffing congressional representation.

Ironic that the public has no choice but to ask the town drunk to watch the liquor cabinet, isn’t it?

Despite the questionable covers and reportage on personalities like Justin Bieber that make me feel like I wandered into a copy of Young Miss, Rolling Stone continues to do an excellent job of reporting on the farce that passes for governance in the United States of Whatever.

And it doesn’t matter from which side of the aisle the farce originates; Democrats and Republicans alike are stripped of pomp and PR when deserving. Matt Taibbi’s writing deserves Pulitzers.

Considering the subject matter, he must take a lot of showers.

Oh yeah. And then there’s the Dylan show. Re-invigorated by a near-fatal bout with pericarditis and the release of the stellar Time Out of Mind, Dylan is in prime form here.

His is one of a handful of voices actually enhanced by age, not diminished by it. Its gravelly texture only adds resonance to songs of faded love and longing. And the band is expert; responsive, empathetic and supple, providing shading and sparks as needed.

Playing with arrangements, experimenting with phrasing, Dylan is one of rock music’s most challenging (on a bad night) and arresting (on a good one) performers. Here, at the Irving Plaza in New York City on the evening of December 8, 1997, he is very definitely one of the latter.

Sweet Jesus.

Finally, a shout-out to my friends whose music blogs have been snuffed out. It’s funny—now that I can’t download the music they shared I suddenly have the cash to purchase $16.99 CDs at the local big box store and support global giants like Sony and Universal and Bertelsmann.

Or so the powers that be must think.

Long live David. Death to Goliath.