Not for nuthin’, but if the price of gas is falling and no one cares – do the caribou in Alaska really have to find a new place to mate? Has anyone noticed that the price of gasoline has plummeted faster than George W’s approval rating?
It’s August 21, the summer nearly over, the vacation season toast, and the price of a gallon of gasoline has fallen well below $4 per gallon. Lordy, Lordy — miracle of miracles — gasoline is now flowing quicker and cheaper than a pint of Thunderbird on a Saturday night.
What event has occurred that has precipitated this wondrous nosedive in price, you may ask? Nothing new — only the same old same old. Like PT Barnum always said – “There’s a sucker born every minute.” Charm pop, anyone?
You see, there really never was a shortage — just greedy people who found a way to increase the wad of money in their own pockets, stick it to us – the consumers – and get away with it.
What’s more, we let them do it. Sure, we might have curtailed some of our vacation trips. We might have even sweated a little more than usual. But give up everything – are you crazy? Not us – no, not us God Fearing, Gas Guzzling, Looking to Party all the Time Us. Nope, we just bit the nozzle and kept on filling up.
Political pundits, analysts, talk show hosts and prognosticators had a field day, too. Off-shore drilling. Dependency on foreign shores. What’s next in the world of oil? The headlines and TV shows screamed out across the land – talk radio over flowed like a stuffed gas tank. And we watched and we listened and we read.
All the while, the powers that be, Exxon, Mobil, Chevron, BP, Hess, the list is endless, laughed all the way to the bank. Because they knew with unwavering certainty that it was never about a shortage at the pumps, but more about the shortage of their profits.
We are, after all, a capitalistic society. At our deepest core, simply put, we are greedy, ham-fisted, gas-guzzling capitalistic pigs. It’s why our streets are paved with gold (or in this case oil) and not recycled byproducts.
Unlike other places in the world where all are the same, prices are low and the government chooses who gets that transplant or not, here in the good old USA, we still have the ability to damn the torpedoes and fill-up ahead.
So what’s the upshot? My predictions are: McCain will not get any more money from the Hiltons; Obama will finally make those changes he’s talking about – like moving from Chicago to Washington; Congress will not lift the off-shore drilling ban, why should we – we have plenty; Nancy Pelosi will go on saving the world one high-priced department store at a time; and gas prices will continue to decline, probably leveling out at about $3.50 per gallon, it’s what the big corporations wanted in the first place.
And us? Oh yeah us – we’ll continue to pay the price, whatever it is, chugging along until next June when the shortage will magically appear and we’re forced to high step, goose step and side step the mating dance once again.
For those of you that like to keep track of gas prices, I have found that the best web site to check is www.GasBuddy.com. just put in your location (city and state) and up from the ground, (your screen) come a bubbling crude, gas prices that is, Texas Tea, Black Gold…
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