Recently there are many articles appearing in our local papers and on TV and it has become evident that in the quest for votes the candidates and some other elected officials AKA "Politicians" have decided that its OK to pander to the populace offering "Fuel Tax Holidays" or suspensions of the state and federal gas taxes. This so called "help" to the masses is nothing more than cheap politics at the least and ill-thought at at the worst. These type of efforts have been tried in the past and will save you nothing. At best the savings per week will be in the single digit dollars. As soon as the taxes are lifted, "unforseen" market forces will occur that will cause the retail price of the fuels to magically rise to fill the gap the tax relief created (AKA profiteering) and THEN when the tax is reapplied we will be paying more for fuel than we did before the taxes were removed. Never mind that the fuel taxes are one of the major sources of funding for road projects, repair and improvement.
I do not have a crystal ball, and do not claim to have all the answers in this ever expanding fuel crisis. Smart thinking would hopefully lend a thinking person to surmise a few standard issues.
1. Conservation and changing of our fuel usage habits is a must.
2. Research, exploration and extracting the vast underground fuel resources of the USA is paramount. We must produce more fuels in our homeland to reduce dependance on foreign sources.
3. We must preserve our environment and be as careful as possible not to pollute and destroy it while extracting these vast resources, IE the Gulf of Mexico, FL Straits, and yes ANWR. The hands off approach is not working and tapping into our strategic oil reserves is a mistake. They are designated "STRATEGIC OIL RESERVES" for a reason.
4. Give Big Oil a reason to produce more domestic fuels and delve into exploration and extraction of resources and building refineries. They are not motivated at this point in history to do these things as long as the obscene profits continue to roll in at the expense of the American consumer and household.
5. Come to the realization that OPEC is not our friend. They know that their end is in sight and are extracting as much profit as they can before that defining moment when we break free, and we will break free of fossil fuels. They have few other exports and most cant even grow enough food to feed their populace. We need to stop kowtowing to these tyrants and let them eat their oil.
6 Corn is not the answer. Its use as fuel simply drives up the cost of everything else.
All this to simply say, WAKE UP AMERICA! Take control of the situation. Our politicians and elected officials are not listening to us. The very people who put them there. If we speak with our wallet as consumers, business will listen as the almighty dollar and their bottom line is all they understand. I realize that we have to have fuel to get to work and other necessary places. That said, if our fuel consumption is drastically reduced, and our spending controlled, as fuel producers feel the same pinch that you are feeling and business realizes that the customer is a necessity and not a pain for their existence, the change you seek may begin to peek in as fuel backs up at depos. We cannot continue to send our jobs out of the counrtry, and hiring cheap and sometimes illegal labor. We are reaping the consequences of some of that now.
(Please excuse any typos, an editor I'm not :-)
elkahna
