And the Procession into Hell continues...

As usual, when the country has a problem, our fearless leader comes up with the exactly wrong response. To answer the high gas prices, President Bush has come up with a plan! And that plan is.... to reduce tax breaks for the oil industry? No. To institute a cap on prices? No. To encourage conservation and alternative fuel research? HA! No, the answer is He Relaxes Environmental Rules, Suspends Oil Reserve Deposits. Once again, the President trashes the planet to save his oil buddies a few bucks. Ok, a whole big shitload of bucks. Thanks, Mr. Pres.

Harry Reid has a Gas Price Petition which of course, has no bite, in that the Republican congress will never allow it to mean anything. But I signed my name, just to have my opinion voiced. I added the following comment:

"While I am willing to pay a fair price for goods and services I use, I feel that the record profits of the oil companies indicate we are being charged far more than is fair. Tax breaks and giveaways to the oil industry in the face of these profits are simply obscene given the impact to the economy of these prices. It must end. Now."

I think about how a gallon of gas is about the same cost as a gallon of milk. Milk is a renewable resource, gas is not. Gas is valuable, no doubt. I understand that a large portion of the price we pay per gallon (especially in California) consists of taxes levied by the state and federal government. I don't even have a problem with that, though I'd like to keep better tabs on how that tax is used. But when the executives of major oil companies continue quarter after quarter to rake in record profits, something is wrong. The price at the pump is passed on to the poor and middle class over and over again, through wholesale increases in price retailers must pay in freight. Everyone spreads the costs around and the buck stops at the average citizen's wallet. It's not right.

And of course, gas prices are such a trivial issue, really, when taken against the horror of Iraq and God forbid, Iran, and the nightmare lives of Katrina victims who have no comfort nine months after the disaster. Our President's failed policies on every level, on every subject, have devastated this country. It will be years before anyone, Democrat or Republican, will be able to get this country back on it's feet, and regain our place in the world.