04-09-07 by Court
The media debate about who is to blame for rising gasoline prices is on.
Last week perennial pundit George Will took the oil industry’s line in his syndicated column that gasoline prices are actually too low historically. UPI, now only a radio wire service, blames government rules, drivers themselves and the price of crude.
Every expert who is in a position to know pins the blame on refiners who have closed down refining capacity at a period of high demand.
Bloomberg reports:
Gasoline at the pump rose 18 cents during the past two weeks to a nationwide average of $2.79 a gallon, according to the Lundberg survey of 7,000 U.S. filling stations.
That was the highest price since early September, according to the survey.
Publisher Trilby Lundberg said the latest rise stems from reduced refining capacity due to maintenance at a time of strong gasoline demand.
Apparently it’s a hard concept to explain to television viewers.
This morning CNN asked viewers to pick: "OPEC or are drivers to blame?" CNN’s interim morning anchor muffed the Lundberg survey finding in introducing an insipid segment about how filling up your tires and changing your air filters will save you a few cents.
Who is to blame? The anchor actually said: "Lundberg found crude oil, demand, blah blah blah." Got it 100% wrong. Maybe that’s why there’s going to be a new CNN morning host team soon after the O’Briens (Miles and Soledad) were fired last week and today’s temp didn’t realize he was more than a chair warmer.
Oil companies have for a decade known that "reduced refining capacity = big profits." The media just cannot wrap its mind around the notion that American motorists are being bilked in the same way California ratepayers were during the energy crisis. Unplanned maintenance and plant shutdowns drove the price of gas sky high.
The pain at the pump today is a symptom of the same oil company formula that made Exxon Mobil $40 billion in profit last year and Chevron $17 billion. Time to put the blame on the pricegougers.