Gasoline surges under Bush following refinery mergers

[UpInArms]

http://www.azcentral.com/business/articles/0517gasoline-price17-ON.html

President Bush allowed an increase in oil refinery mergers to go unchecked since he took office and may have contributed to the highest gasoline prices in 20 years as the November election approaches.

The Bush administration approved 33 takeovers totaling $19.5 billion, on top of 21 deals worth $7.3 billion under President Clinton, Bloomberg data shows. Reduced supplies were already pushing up gas prices in Clinton's term, according to a Federal Trade Commission study conducted after pump prices rose to more than $2 a gallon in Milwaukee and Chicago in 2000.

"We're in a much worse position than we were when the federal government broke up the Rockefeller oil companies of the early 1900s," Jon Meade Huntsman, a registered Republican and founder of Salt Lake City-based Huntsman Co., the largest privately held chemicals maker, said in an interview. "The average guy on the street is getting killed because this administration does not care."

<snip>

The rise in gasoline prices helped refiners generate the highest margins from refining crude oil into gasoline and other fuels in the first quarter since at least 1990. ConocoPhillips, the largest U.S. oil refiner, last month posted its biggest quarterly profit since the 2002 acquisition that formed the company. ChevronTexaco Corp., the second-biggest U.S. oil producer, said earnings rose 33 percent to the highest level since a 2001 merger formed the company. Chevron's first-quarter refining profit doubled.

...more...

[The Backlash Cometh]

1. Question about free market.

How can consumers have an impact on free market, when the corporations are also free to merge until there is no competition left?

I sense a disturbance in the force.

[Just Me]

5. FREE market? Oh, that would be one controlled by corporations,...

,...that is what the FREE market really is,...yes,...one controlled by BIG freakin' corporations.

My economics professors LIED to me!!!!!

I'm gonna track those liars down *LOL*!!!!

[Voltaire99]

10. That's what antitrust law is supposed to do. You may laugh now.

One overlooked area of antitrust is mergers, which twenty-five years ago were still carefully regulated.

Reaganism-Clintonism put an end to that by gutting regulation and deemphasizing antitrust enforcement along Chicago School lines (why, "efficiency" is *good* for you, grasshopper!). Thus has been legitimized a practice that clobbers markets and consumers. Both parties are to blame for this.

[The Backlash Cometh]

11. I've always said that the only guarantee that free market offers is a

guarantee that it will fail. That's because it is its own poison pill. Actually, two. It will self-destruct on these two premises:

Without regulation, consumers will lose confidence in the system and withdraw their investments -- insteady, they'll put their money into more secure, regulated methods.

AND...

Without regulation, corporations will be able to create monopolies, which will take away the very options that were suppose to be the crowning jewel of free market.

So, I say the SEC and anti-trust laws are the only way out of the mess that's been created by pro-business Republicans.

[fearnobush]

2. As I said before, this is just an other BFEE planned ENRON like

sweet deal to the energy whores. I wish more Dems would shout the same pattern here we see as with Enron. Soon, the gas house of cards will come crashing and it will make Enron look like a picnic.

[izzie]

3. It is beyond me that the GOP is going to bring this country to its knees.

I guess you need to have a MBA to do that.

[Just Me]

6. Maybe we should demand a constitutional amendment,...

,...that excludes corporatists from running for office.

[havocmom]

4. Good find, UpInArms! I emailed article to a bunch

and printed for my off-line brother. heh heh heh, making him a little package of printed material to read before the election. He just isn't in the loop and thinks he is informed from watching CNN & FAUX. My package might undo his bypass surgery, but what the hell.

[central scrutinizer]

7. what part of capitalism don't you understand?

competition is bad for profits - monopoly is good for profits.

[keithyboy]

8. Would someone who posts at the Freeper board explain this to them

You might get one or two to see the light.

[maggrwaggr]

9. it's about time somebody frikkin' figured this out

one more thing to be angry about, great.

WHY is Bush still in power?