An Oil & Politics Rant - UPDATE

So I've been meaning to write about gas prices and politics but the subjects are lame and annoying. Both topics together are lame and annoying. Combined: they're the lamest and the most annoying things ever.

Luckily, in today's Times Tommy Friedman writes pretty much what I was going to write; "Dumb as We Wanna Be." But, don't be fooled about per gallon prices or how much it takes to fill your car, there's something important to consider:

"When the summer is over, we will have increased our debt to China, increased our transfer of wealth to Saudi Arabia and increased our contribution to global warming for our kids to inherit." [clicky]

Uh did I write that in my sleep? Exactly! Oh, thank god someone's finally cluing in to the heart of the problem. And speaking of god, get a load of these mopes:

Pray-in at Gas Station Asks God to Lower Prices

So, the United States of America has no energy policy ('cept the one Rickey Cheney and his oilfriends wrote in secret that results in $40+ billion annual profits for Exxon/Mobil) and is in the midst of a fairly serious recession. Instead of doing something, these mopes are praying to "god" to lower the price of a gallon of gasoline.

"To solve the problem, Rocky Twyman isn't begging the Lord for any specific act of intervention. He is not asking God to make OPEC pump more oil. Nor is he praying for all the speculative investors to be purged from the New York Mercantile Exchange, where crude oil is traded." [clicky]

Where could I even start here? I won't lower myself. All I have to say is, "do what?!"

Oil and politics: lame and annoying as hell!

------------------------ UPDATE ------------------------

May 1, 2008

ExxonMobil Profits Up 17 Percent
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 8:15 a.m. ET

HOUSTON (AP) -- Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest publicly traded oil company, says record crude prices helped its net income grow 17 percent in the first quarter.

Exxon Mobil said Thursday its earnings for the first three months of the year rose to $10.9 billion, or $2.03 per share, up from $9.3 billion, or $1.62 per share, a year ago.

Analysts polled by Thomson Financial were looking for a slightly larger profit of $2.13 per share.

Revenue rose to $116.8 billion from $87.2 billion a year earlier.

Given record oil prices, some had speculated Exxon Mobil would top its own record for the biggest quarter profit for a U.S. company. But the latest results fell short of the record $11.7 billion profit Exxon Mobil earned in the final quarter of 2007.