This week has seen much hand-wringing, rending of garments and gnashing of teeth over the price of oil and its concomitant effect at the pump. Apparently, $3 or $4 per gallon gasoline is the final sign of the onset of the Apocalypse. And all those who happen to work in the higher echelons of an oil company had better beef up their personal security detail, because the scapegoat hunt is in full swing.

 

The reality is that it's the hijacking of America's energy policy by the radical environmental lobby that is artificially restricting supply - forcing prices upward as a result - and the economic ignorance of the masses that keeps them from getting the blame that should be heaped upon them. Worse, our dependency on foreign oil (and, more importantly, the tyrants whom we suffer at the mercy of because of it) is furthered by these tree-hugging con artists who disingenuously feign outrage at the very situation they have directly brought about.

 

Contrary to the claims of environmentalists, there is actually plenty of oil available domestically. From ANWR to the Gulf of Mexico (in which Fidel Castro can drill but the U.S. cannot), from the tar sands of Alberta to the Pacific continental shelf, new technology has found potentially enormous supplies of both oil and natural gas. ANWR alone could possibly cover all of America's oil needs for 2-3 years, should the need arise. Sadly, these supplies will never become "resources" (a word applicable only when a substance is actually used) because the environmentalists and the Democratic senators whom they all but own will stop at nothing to prevent it.  Apparently a handful of caribou (who'd probably appreciate the heat an oil rig would put off) on the most remote, frozen, barren, desolate piece of land in all of America get more representation in Congress than her people do.
 

Similarly, there hasn't been a new oil refinery built in America since the early 1960s. Combined with the increased demand of today over then, the system has been stretched to the breaking point. As we all saw with Hurricane Katrina, anything that disrupts a system operating regularly at more than 95 percent capacity has immediate and hurtful effects.  Equally responsible but always escaping blame are the similar effects needless and wasteful regulations - pushed through by the radical environmentalist lobby - have on the oil supply chain.

Government regulations have heaped untold costs and delays on oil delivery, for which we all pay the price. Among these is the requirement that refineries and gas stations constantly switch blends, which forces them offline to make the change. The government also required the adding of MTBE, an expensive chemical that did virtually nothing to make already clean gas cleaner, then required them to drop it, after which they hypocritically sued oil companies for the deleterious effects of a substance they were forced to use. Finally, they required even more ethanol use, which is more energy-consuming to produce than oil and difficult to transport.

Every time Congress makes the oil industry jump through another regulatory hoop, we take it up the keister. Think about it. Congress is arguably more damaging than the biggest natural disaster to ever hit America.

 

As far as the imported oil on which we must rely because of environmentalist and Congressional malfeasance, its price is greatly inflated over its real value because it's controlled by a monopoly and cartel called OPEC. America-hating dictators like Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, or any of a number of Middle Eastern sheiks, have been handed a perpetual extortion and blackmail weapon thanks to our failure to supply ourselves domestically. It ought not take a genius in international relations to see how allowing those who dislike you to control your energy supply can be extremely risky to national security. If we supplied ourselves, on the other hand, we might just be able to break that cartel, bring back free-market supply-and-demand forces to bear on oil, and drop the price of it dramatically. More to the point, America will reclaim the power she's stupidly handed away to her enemies.

 

Finally, there is one fact that the green lobby has somewhat right, but even then they get the cause wrong. One effect of their mangling of normal free-market economics by choking off supply is to enrich the existing oil companies. They must raise prices to reduce consumption and protect what supply they have left when Congress makes the mess already described above. Furthermore, there is no chance for any new competition to get in the oil game and drive prices down, to the benefit of us all. Want to explore for oil? Drill where you have reason to think it exists? Build and operate a refinery? Or just open a corner gas station? You'd have a better chance of flapping your arms and flying to Mars successfully then getting permission from government to do any of that, so thoroughly do the environmentalist extremists control the levers of power.

So the basic forces of Economics 101 do their thing, and voilá, more profit for oil companies. And government, too, as 30 percent of it gets sucked into Washington by the corporate income tax. Remember this the next time you hear any politician demagoguing oil companies. They're getting a 30 percent cut of that action, too. Not to mention the federal gasoline tax, which no one dares suggest cutting to provide consumer relief . (Not bad compensation for being a lying phony, I must say.)  Far from being outraged, Congress is laughing all the way to the pork-barrel spending bank.

 

One more point must also be made, and that is to keep things in their proper perspective. Even at $4, a gallon of gas still costs less than a gallon of milk, a gallon of bottled water, or a gallon of a great many other things. This in spite of what it takes to get oil from abroad to a usable form in a pump near you, when those other things are not nearly so difficult or expensive to get to retail market. Yes, it may require a change in budgeting for your family, but this is not the end of the world. So you have to drink tap water instead of Dasani or get instant Folgers instead of stopping at Starbucks. Believe it or not, life will go on.

 

So the next time you swing into a gas station and see a price you think is shockingly high, just remember who made it all possible: radical environmentalists (whose real if undeclared goal is nothing short of banning the automobile), Congress, OPEC and the economic ignorance of far too many spoiled Americans.