JohnH wrote:

Chuck, who was President when all the oil companies consolidated and all
the refineries were closed?

Wow! That's the very first time that anybody ever suggested that the
President of the United States is in charge of operating or closing oil
refineries.

While I'm researching the identity of th POTUS in 1995, maybe you could
get together a list of new applications to build oil refineries that
have been presented since the year 2000. If the previous POTUS was
responsible for the shutting down of oil refineries, I'm sure there
must have been a backlog of demand to build new facilities after he
finished his final term.

Please read the senate report that I linked in my reply to RCE or
follow the links provided by Thunder. You will see that refineries have
been closed following analysis by the Petroleum Institute and other
organizations that demonstrated to the oil companies they could
actually earn more money (in fact, a *lot* more money) by choking off
the supply of refined products to the US market. The party affiliation
of the POTUS has nothing to do with it. I wonder who is president right
now? (when lower income families and middle class families with long
commutes are raiding savings accounts, scrimping on food and clothing,
abandoning travel plans, and making other sacrifices while the oil
companies rack up record-breaking profits and oil company executives
are collecting $98mm annual *bonuses*) Doesn't really mater who the
president is right now- he doesn't set the standard for rapacious
profiteering by the oil companies any more than the previous president
did.

My advice would be to avoid getting manipulated by people with a vested
interest in distracting the majority of the public from our current
energy problem. The most effective way to distract enough people so
that the artificially manipulated market won't get the scrutiny it
deserves is to get the radio rabble rousers from both sides to convince
their followers that it is somehow the fault of the opposing political
philosophy or party. Keeping the people fighting among themselves is an
important step toward political and social domination.

It is a lack of free enterprise, lack of effective competition, and a
willingness to manipulate
supply that is responsible for that $500 charge to fill up your boat-
not the D's, the R's, the reds, the blues, the liberals, or the
conservatives. Not the current POTUS, and not the previous, either.