Gasoline prices pose problems for Obama
- Thread starter Agent 1337
- Start date
Formaldehyde
Both Fair And Balanced
You mean the 2004 elections? The election GWB won despite proving over and over again that he was an incompetent idiot who hired other incompetent idiots to run the government? Yeah, he sure got blamed a lot of acts which he was clearly responsible.Happened to Bush Jr. during the 2008 elections. So don't act all surprised when the same happens to Obama..
NickyJ
Retired Narrator
Huh? I don't need government support.
Houses are still be sold. Anyway, you could just walk away from your house and rent closer to your job. If you are under water with your mortgage, the smart move right now is to let the note holder take the loss.
Gas prices are subsidized by the U.S government. Those of us with high income and high marginal rates end up subsidizing those of you with such laughably low incomes that you are struggling to pay for gas to get to your job.
There are plenty of jobs catered for intelligent, highly skilled and economically productive workers. Indeed, they are the most rapidly expanding jobs - for example, Biomedical engineers will expand by 73% in the next ten years, medical scientists by 40%. It may be hard to tell him, but that's not the responsibility of the government, it's the personal responsibility of Joe Sixpack to stop his sinful gluttony and learn the virtues of education such that he can become educated enough to be a competent, intelligent, and well-learned individual with useful analytical skills to be part of the best and brightest of society. If he remains a scumsucking imbecile who loathes proper education, then he deserves all the hardship he gets.
Government intervention here is, by definition, providing financial aid to people in the form of lower gas prices, and thus is welfare. By supporting government intervention to increase your own well being you are supporting welfare and thus socialism. It is certainly not the free market.I said that the government should use welfare to do something about this?
Unrest in the middle east means a decreased supply, and you are offering to reduce this effect by temporarily increasing supply through government intervention. Please learn some basic economics before you contradict yourself.
NickyJ
Retired Narrator
Houses are not being sold often. And if people are supposed to move closer to their job, who would move away from the job into your current home. What do you mean by "walk away from the house"? Still own it but you're renting another house? Having possession of it taken away from you? Also, I see you are encouraging more of what got us into the housing hole in the first place. Brilliant move.
I agree that higher fuel prices are going to hurt people. Now, I am part of a group of people that begged people to use less fuel frivolously, so that it could be put to better use.
I'm betting 30% of my portfolio on rising energy prices. I expect these fuel prices to keep on rising. If people can barely afford to get by right now, then they should be using some of their spare cash to figure out what to do when the price rises another 10%
I'm betting 30% of my portfolio on rising energy prices. I expect these fuel prices to keep on rising. If people can barely afford to get by right now, then they should be using some of their spare cash to figure out what to do when the price rises another 10%
NickyJ
Retired Narrator
I hardly think that telling someone to "Be a genius or starve" is the greatest advice. You can't expect Nancy Nobody to become a genius at the snap of a finger.
Drilling isn't only for regular peoples' well being. The government would benefit as well. Less importing.
It isn't even a decreased supply. It's the worry that there will be a decreased supply. And saying that we should be less dependent on foreign imports isn't contradictory. And who said it would be temporary?
I am not expecting Nancy Nobody to become a genius at the snap of a finger. I am expecting him to pull up his bootstraps and assume personal responsibility over his life to become one.
This is the same type of argument that the socialists have made over other forms of welfare.NickyJ said:
Overcoming your mistakes up to this point isn't going to be painless. You are very lucky that the government has been providing you gas welfare up to this point. If you can't sell your house and you can't pay for your gas, then the obvious solution is to walk away from the mortgage obligation that is so far away from your job and pay rent at a location closer to your job. Once again, you are overcoming your past series of bad decisions, so it is not sacrifice free.Houses are not being sold often. And if people are supposed to move closer to their job, who would move away from the job into your current home. What do you mean by "walk away from the house"? Still own it but you're renting another house? Having possession of it taken away from you? Also, I see you are encouraging more of what got us into the housing hole in the first place. Brilliant move.
GinandTonic
Saphire w/ Schweps + Lime
- Joined
- May 25, 2005
- Messages
- 8,898
Choosing my car cannot, by definition, have added to my choices. Having a car added to my choices. Having decent public transport added to my choices, with regard to your buses point, by making the whole idea of taking a bus for such a journey absurd. Buses were absolutely stuck with me in the traffic and I could have done the journey by every-five-min buses with one change, but that would have been the worst of all possible worlds, unless you were a pensioner exploiting their free off-peak bus-pass.
So bus for on-the-cheap. Tube and lightrail for utility. Tube and riverbus for pleasant journey. Car for taking kids and elderly with minimum fuss. And if that is really what you need, or to transport lots of tools or whatever, then all to the good.
Decent public transport adds options, and by reducing congestion aids drivers. As does making cyclists lives a little easier.
More choice. More freedom. Better for everyone, even drivers.
LucyDuke
staring at the clock
And it's still a very localized aberration unless you demonstrate otherwise.
LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU LA LA LA EVERYTHING'S FINE
Right?
That might account for some of the short-term fluctuations. And drill baby drill might help postpone the inevitable. But the hard facts are that demand is increasing, the supply is finite, and it's getting harder and harder, and will only continue to get harder and harder, to extract what supply does remain. I'd love to hear how that won't increase the price at the pump in the long term, even if everyone in the desert stops fighting and gets together to sing kumbaya.
Perhaps the government should stop subsidizing gas, roads, and public transport. The free market would surely solve the problem.
Many developed nations have gas prices that are much higher than market prices because the governments put high taxes on gasoline. That's an artificial price. They do it to discourage use.
NickyJ
Retired Narrator
FYI, Nancy is female. Anyway: Pulling up bootstraps doesn't make you an instant genius either.
So spending money frivolously results in less importing? In that case, TO THE FRIVOLOUS MOBILE!
I hardly think it's the average Joe's fault that people are worried about a decreased supply of oil. I hardly think it's the average Joe's fault that Libya has a civil war going. So doing what got us into a mess is recommended? Again, brilliant.
LucyDuke
staring at the clock
They don't have spare cash. They can barely afford to get by.
If the average Joe is going to remain so far away from his job that he is dependant on gas welfare, then it is the average Joe that is repeating the mistakes that put him in his own personal mess.I hardly think it's the average Joe's fault that people are worried about a decreased supply of oil. I hardly think it's the average Joe's fault that Libya has a civil war going. So doing what got us into a mess is recommended? Again, brilliant.
Apologies, I assumed you were talking about a male because we were talking about people with the ability to be economically productive, intelligent, creative analytical members of society. Again, I am not asking for people to become instant geniuses, I am merely asking them to pull up their bootstraps.
Sure. What do you think protectionist measures meant to keep jobs and products here in America are?
Sure it is. By marketing the idea that people ought to be governed by average, mediocre stupid people, instead of the intellectual and productive elite, you are causers of the civil wars overthrowing enlightened autocrats.
NickyJ
Retired Narrator
Like I said, it's still $5, and nothing changes that station's price.[/QUOTE]
Well, if that's how you want to handle problems, I guess that's how you will do it. To each his own.
No fighting there, no worries about the supply. No worries about the supply, no more rising prices under the pretenses that there will be no oil tomorrow. Bam. Lower prices.
If you can barely afford to get by, it means you're getting by with a bit of wiggle room! So, people should be using that wiggle room to prepare for higher energy prices, because there might come a time when people cannot 'barely' afford to get by. Then they're screwed, and other people will be too stressed to help. (Very happy to see you back. I hope it is for a good reason!)
NickyJ, drilling won't really bring down prices. Exxon will buy the right to drill, and they'll then sell the drilled oil for the proper market price. Alberta's doing very, very well with oil above $100 USD, the middle east stress doesn't hurt us. We just pocket the profit.
Keep in mind, too, that the USD is devaluing, because of the weakness of the American economy. This devaluing will be seen as a rise in international commodity prices.
