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If McCain had won in '08, gas would cost...?

The price of gas under President McCain would have been


  • Total voters
    44
I am not aware of a debacle. Sorry.
Keystone pipeline. It would be easy to issue the permits and our friends in Canada have lots of oil they want to sell to us. All the idiot would have to do is sign a simple waiver.
 
Except that Obama did nothing to make health care more affordable. Insurance costs have gone up.
The rightness or wrongness of a thing is not determined by the number of people who think a certain way.. In a way , this is true...
I beg to double differ on both points.
The info that I have says that the costs will go down...for the masses... and that the costs will rise for the wealthy ???
In truth, I have observed nothing as the Affordable Health Care is yet to be fully implemented.
If nine of ten world governments decide that Affordable Health Care is good, then who am I to argue ??
Or, Is the USA the last bastion for the ultra - wealthy on this planet ?
 
Keystone pipeline. It would be easy to issue the permits and our friends in Canada have lots of oil they want to sell to us. All the idiot would have to do is sign a simple waiver.
Last I knew, environment and property rights were important...
NPR
not Rush Limbaugh.
 
McCain wouldn't have improved the economy as much a Obama did even though he would have had much more alignment in congress. That would have reduced the use the gas a bit. So the price would be slightly lower. It wouldn't have reached down to $3:00. For me I'd have saved a few hundred w/ lower gas prices but lost ten's of thousands in investments.
 
Probably close to the same, just as I believe the prices would've been close to the same if not a little higher if Gore had got electe instead of Bush.

The point I'm getting confused at is that we're pushing people to have more economical cars that use less gas....and people are driving less which uses less gas....and yet we're somehow horribly surprised when the cost of gas goes up to compensate for the reduction in demand.

There isn't really a reduction in demand, though. On an individual basis, yes there is less gas consumed per person, but there are also a lot more people consuming gas. thus, there is a net increase in demand (Demand is not limited to the US).

Granted, that's what drives the prices upwards. If supply remains the same while demand decreases, prices actually drop not increase.
 
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Keystone pipeline. It would be easy to issue the permits and our friends in Canada have lots of oil they want to sell to us. All the idiot would have to do is sign a simple waiver.
Again, the Keystone pipeline gets the oil to the refineries on the Gulf Coast where the Canadian companies that own the oil will have it refined and shipped world wide including the US. Why do you think they are going to charge us less than anyone else? BTW Canada is a net petroleum importer not exporter.
 
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Anyone who thinks the President gets to decide Oil Prices...is an idiot.
 
Anyone who thinks the President gets to decide Oil Prices...is an idiot.

They can influence policy that can have an effect on oil.
 
Very minimally.

Maybe so, but they still have some influence. Personally, I don't think Obama has done anything to help fuel prices at all.
 
Very minimally.
Not necessarily. If they get a policy closely resembling what they wanted you can argue that it's the president that had the influence. The moratorium is all Obama, as were new EPA mandates and OSHA rules, the former being invalidated by a judge with the ruling ignored and the latter being just ridiculous. In a nutshell the proximity of the president to the regs and policies determine their influence.
 
Maybe so, but they still have some influence. Personally, I don't think Obama has done anything to help fuel prices at all.

There hasn't been a president in my lifetime that actually did something to help fuel prices. It's not their job.
 
Not necessarily. If they get a policy closely resembling what they wanted you can argue that it's the president that had the influence. The moratorium is all Obama, as were new EPA mandates and OSHA rules, the former being invalidated by a judge with the ruling ignored and the latter being just ridiculous. In a nutshell the proximity of the president to the regs and policies determine their influence.

The policies have a minimal affect on fuel prices overall.

The price of fuel is not really controlled by the US. It hasn't been since before I was born.
 
The policies have a minimal affect on fuel prices overall.

The price of fuel is not really controlled by the US. It hasn't been since before I was born.
Eh. Yes and no, the futures market will fluctuate dependent on how it views the effects on supply due to current actions, but if the refinery end or distrubution end gets kinked up then that also has effects. It's all about indices performing well.
 
Eh. Yes and no, the futures market will fluctuate dependent on how it views the effects on supply due to current actions, but if the refinery end or distrubution end gets kinked up then that also has effects. It's all about indices performing well.

No US policies exist which could have a major effect on the futures market, though. Minimal effects, sure, but the US policy decisions are only one small part of the total equation.
 
No US policies exist which could have a major effect on the futures market, though. Minimal effects, sure, but the US policy decisions are only one small part of the total equation.
Totally agree. However each of the sub-factors involved do show changes in the pump price. I've heard valid arguments about global demand, the depreciation of the U.S.D., kinks in the supply chain, and the futures market. It's kind of a "death by 1,000 cuts" situation. Politics do have a role in it, the size of such is debateable.
 
Totally agree. However each of the sub-factors involved do show changes in the pump price. I've heard valid arguments about global demand, the depreciation of the U.S.D., kinks in the supply chain, and the futures market. It's kind of a "death by 1,000 cuts" situation. Politics do have a role in it, the size of such is debateable.

So we get back to my point that presidents can only have a minimal influence. :mrgreen:
 
So we get back to my point that presidents can only have a minimal influence. :mrgreen:
I actually think we're both right on this. As ironic as that sounds I do firmly believe that a president has a minimal effect when they get let the market correct, but the more hands on they seem to get the worse the prices tend to rise. I think it's a legit 50/50.
 
I actually think we're both right on this. As ironic as that sounds I do firmly believe that a president has a minimal effect when they get let the market correct, but the more hands on they seem to get the worse the prices tend to rise. I think it's a legit 50/50.

I have a different perspective on things. I think they seem to get more hands on to give the appearance that they are doing something about the prices when in truth they aren't really doing anything but putting on a show.

When prices start rising, president's put on more of a show to hopefully cause people to say "Well, at least he's doing something about it!"

It's all a dog and pony show, though.
 
I have a different perspective on things. I think they seem to get more hands on to give the appearance that they are doing something about the prices when in truth they aren't really doing anything but putting on a show.

When prices start rising, president's put on more of a show to hopefully cause people to say "Well, at least he's doing something about it!"

It's all a dog and pony show, though.
It's a possibility for sure. I don't buy though that we really are doing anything productive to help the market right now though, we have more crude than refined product but still don't have a stable exploration/production environment. We need more refineries, a streamlined production process, and valid alternatives to take further pressure off of supply. My big problem is that one side says the market is just trending up due to demand, that's a single factor, the supply is somewhat strained due to red tape so it's such a large mess there is no one right answer.
 
It's a possibility for sure. I don't buy though that we really are doing anything productive to help the market right now though, we have more crude than refined product but still don't have a stable exploration/production environment. We need more refineries, a streamlined production process, and valid alternatives to take further pressure off of supply. My big problem is that one side says the market is just trending up due to demand, that's a single factor, the supply is somewhat strained due to red tape so it's such a large mess there is no one right answer.

Personally, I think the prices are being driven up by speculation and have nothing to do with current supply and demand trends. Basically the same things that drove up prices in 2008 and doing so now (and ultimately, it's the desire for short term profits not long term thinking that affects speculation).
 
If the president owned the head of the leadership in Saudi Arabia, then decided to force them to adjust production to his desire...he might have enough influence to Lower prices here by half a buck. Thing is, all this cr@p is based on an annual increase....Obama certainly does not control when we drive. Remember as well, the recent past:

"In May 2008, average gas prices in the United States approached, and in some places passed, $4.00 a gallon, shattering records. But this was nothing new to American consumers. May was a month of records that broke one after another, and that came on the heels of months of rising prices. And then the cycle continued, with prices eventually falling and then inching toward the $4.00 mark again in 2011."

HowStuffWorks "How Gas Prices Work"

I would be amazed if gas prices dropped while Coffee, bananas, and energy all went up.
 
Personally, I think the prices are being driven up by speculation and have nothing to do with current supply and demand trends. Basically the same things that drove up prices in 2008 and doing so now (and ultimately, it's the desire for short term profits not long term thinking that affects speculation).
I take the opposite view of speculation. To have long sellers you must have short sellers and both are hedging their bets on what they think the market will bear out based on their information. IMO speculators are an indicator of future prices more than an actual factor, for instance if most people are selling long we could be in for some major problems, short sellers are looking to make money and get out quick meaning they see a drop in the foreseeable future.
 
I take the opposite view of speculation. To have long sellers you must have short sellers and both are hedging their bets on what they think the market will bear out based on their information. IMO speculators are an indicator of future prices more than an actual factor, for instance if most people are selling long we could be in for some major problems, short sellers are looking to make money and get out quick meaning they see a drop in the foreseeable future.

But it's that interplay which is driving up the prices. It's basically the same **** we saw with mortgage bundles but with oil. The oil bubble burst the last time, too, but it went unnoticed because it coincided with teh general market downturn. It'll happen again.
 
I have a different perspective on things. I think they seem to get more hands on to give the appearance that they are doing something about the prices when in truth they aren't really doing anything but putting on a show.

When prices start rising, president's put on more of a show to hopefully cause people to say "Well, at least he's doing something about it!"

It's all a dog and pony show, though.
Yes, its for the people that don't and can't understand how things really work. They have to, essentially required, put on dog and pony show. When you have people on this thread that think that the Keystone pipeline will bring cheap oil to the US what are you going to do.
 
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