Carl Levin says strategic petroleum reserve to blame for high gas prices?

[wuushew]

WASHINGTON – Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., senior Democrat on the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI), released a minority staff report this week entitled, U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve: Recent Policy Has Increased Cost to Consumers But Not Overall U.S. Energy Security. The report found that the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) recent program to fill the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) has increased crude oil prices and hurt U.S. consumers and taxpayers, without actually increasing overall U.S. oil supplies.

http://levin.senate.gov/releases/030703pr1.htm

[Bozita]

1. That's a March 7, 2003 press release.

Seems to be right on target.

[wuushew]

2. I think Carl Levin was mentioned on tonight's CBS evening news as well

We have been dumping oil in the SPR when prices are high. To me that makes no sense.

[TacticalPeek]

4. Simple: BushCo is a cash flow business.

One man's cost is another man's price.

Be interesting to know how much Iraqi oil is in the SPR. The US was their biggest customer before this atrocity, IIRC.

And some of that gross margin will be coming back at us in aWol's tv ads next year. Sorta like re-injection.

[wuushew]

5. Why the fuck do we even have a SPR?

has it ever been used? ever?

With the cold war over I don't see a reason to dump perfectly good oil into abandoned salt caverns. If worst comes to worse bring back rationing.

[TacticalPeek]

6. True, its not really for the fleet anymore.

But properly used, the US can buy and store when its cheap, then put it on the market when it starts getting too high.

But of course, that serves the interest of our country, a foreign concept to aWol's cabal.

[zeemike]

7. I can answer your question

It was created in the seventies during the oil embargo. And according to a ships captain I know they used it to dump the low quality oil on the government at premium prices. And why not they were just going to pump it into a hole in Louisiana and no one would ever know.
It was at a time that there was suppose to be an oil shortage but (according to the same source mentioned above) the exact opposite was true. They had oil tankers setting off shore paying them 35.000 dollars a day because they had no place to unload, the tanks were all full.
And this was verified when the plant I was working at shut down and changed from natural gas to fire there boilers and converted them to oil. Every day for months 4 or 5 tanker trucks would unload the oil for us to burn while the official word was that it was in short supply.

[Maple]

3. Gas prices are high

in Canada too. Jumped quite a bit this last week.

Mind you, we've come to expect that before a long weekend.

No doubt they'll find more when the weekends over.

Even though Saudi Arabia has cut back production by a million barrels a day I believe. Read the figure earlier, but can't remember if that's accurate.

[aquart]

8. You're saying Bushco is robbing us blind to pay off his pals?

They remind me of those released minks, eating everything in their path.

[maggrwaggr]

9. the guy's an idiot. It's supposed to work the OTHER way

And like most Democrats inside the beltway, these guys are just so fucking STUPID they can't even figure out what's really going on.

Bush, if he had half a brain and actually gave a shit about what the American people thought of him, would say "gosh, I feel bad that my fellow Americans are having to pay such high gas prices"

And then he'd release some of that reserve to soften prices.

Instead, he's doing the opposite. Why? DUH. He's an oil man. They're all oil men.

HELLO DEMS ON THE HILL. GET YOUR HEADS OUT OF YOUR ASSES.

[fujiyama]

10. I have little sympathy

people having to pay high prices for gas. I mean a person can afford a 30-40K SUV and then can't pay 2 dollars a gallon for gas? Yeah right.

[Trajan]

12. Hmmmmmmm ...

"People" ? ...

WHO are those "People" who drive SUV's ? ...

I have NO SUV ... as dont MANY good 'people' ...

Have you ANY sympathy for those who are gouged and DONT drive SUV's ???

[KG]

11. there's no mystery here - we're being gouged.

and we're being gouged cause they know than can get away with it.