Gas price outrage over Obama’s Energy Policies, No? Lets compare Gas Prices under Bush

By Albert N. Milliron, Editor, Politisite.com

Anyone remember all the outrage when gas prices increased during the Bush Presidency? You know, George Bush the Oil man is pocketing the profits, Bush is allowing prices to increase for his big oil supporters. The attacks went on.

Now that we have a Democratic president, those attacks are not in the mainstream news on a daily basis , why? Today oil prices are the result of “world events”.

One should keep in mind that under President Obama, domestic drilling is at a standstill and we have become more dependent, not less, on foreign oil due to the rig shutdowns in the Gulf and the bureaucratic process to get contracts to begin new exploration. The Obama Administration has even refused to renew existing production on coal and other natural resources.

The Obama Administrations strategy to limit natural resource exploration and production to force inventors and research facilities to develop new clean technologies continues to be a dismal failure. Anyone buy a $40,000 Chevy Volt? Those who have a long memory can remember Obama’s 2008 campaign promise that energy prices would skyrocket under his energy policy.

During the first twenty-six months of President Bush’s first term in office, the price of gasoline increased by 7%. At the end of his second term, the price had decreased by 9% from the time he took office (adjusted for inflation). During the first twenty-six months of Obama’s term in office, the price of gasoline has spiked over 67% with no relief in site.
Clearly, other mitigating factors were at work between those two time periods. U.S. demand is one such factor, as is global supply disruptions, cartel pricing and the cost to refine and distribute, but the current price spikes obligate serious people to scrutinize our nation’s energy policy.
President Bush’s response to $4/gallon gasoline was to lift presidential and congressional moratoriums on expanded drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf, a move that many critics say came too late. But what about Obama?
Some on the right have criticized Obama for having no energy policy. This is wrong. Obama’s energy policy is working exactly the way it is designed. This administration knows that unless the price of fossil fuels skyrocket, expensive alternative energy sources, no matter how heavily subsidized, will continue to be unattractive to American consumers.
Obviously, this risky desire to have high gas prices is a punitive policy that foolishly ignores how Americans use petroleum. While oil is largely a transportation fuel, solar and wind can only contribute to our electricity demands. Oil accounts for less than 1% of our electricity demand.
The liberal fascination with developing expensive vehicles that run on electricity doesn’t change that: 1) Solar or wind powered vehicles don’t commercially exist; 2) The cars that do run on electricity, or even battery-powered hybrids still require gas; and 3) the high cost of the alternatively fueled vehicles makes them largely insignificant in the auto market and cost-prohibitive to the average consumer.
Sure, it would be ideal to have a national fleet of cars that are inexpensive and run on cheap and widely available alternative sources of energy. But the markets have demonstrated this reality is nowhere close to fruition. And when you try to hasten that reality by artificially jacking up the price of gas, the economic effects are felt largely by the poorest among us and disincentives business owners from hiring as their fixed operating costs increase.
Think about it, who feels the pain of an extra $1 at the gas pump? The rich guys that the left demonizes or the middle-to-low income wage earners who balance their budgets by the penny, not the dollar? If the only cars available on the market were $40,000 Chevy Volts, would a Lexus or BMW consumer be hit hard, or would the family looking for a barely affordable mode of shuttling their family be affected? Consumer Reports said Obama’s heralded Volt “is an expensive way to be green.”
Read the rest of this article at The Foundry.