Gas prices jump as assault starts; 20-cent-a-gallon increase seen ...

[Newsjock]

http://news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060317/NEWS01/603170416/1075

By Michelle L. Start
Originally posted on March 17, 2006

Operation Swarmer, happening half a world away in Iraq, is having a direct and immediate impact on local consumers at the gas pump.

Launched on Thursday, it is the largest American air strike since the war started in March 2003 and also involves a ground assault.

At the Citgo gas station on Fowler Street, owner Sam Fatayel, 33, said the situation in Iraq is to blame for the latest price increases at the pump.

"They raise it every week," he said. "Every week, it goes up 10 cents. They raise it on me. I raise it on them."

At some gas stations in Lee County, the price increased more than 20 cents after Operation Swarmer started.

more

[NanceGreggs]

1. OF COURSE the bump-up in price is due to ...

... cirumstances beyond the control of the oil companies. Now watch their quarterly PROFITS surge as a 'direct result' of the impact of Operation Swarmer.

Funny how that works, eh?

[PA Democrat]

11. Now, now, don't be so cynical

Dick Cheney will hold another top secret energy task force meeting and he'll "fix" everything! All we have to do is invade another oil-producing country and things will be just hunky-dory! :sarcasm:

[Untermonkey]

24. Their profits are not a true measure of how much they make...

But their profit margins are. If the price of oil goes up 1% and their profits go up 1% they really haven't made any more money than they did previously. It's only when the profit margin goes up that a company really makes any money.

[tabasco]

37. That's not correct.

By definition, a profit is a net gain.

And FYI - Exxon had the biggest profit in the history of Earth last year.

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/profit.asp

Profit margin is a measure of how efficient a business is in making money, compared to other similar businesses.

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/profitmargin.asp

I hope you didn't learn that in school. :crazy:

[Untermonkey]

41. I just wish I'd had enough foresight to buy stock in Exxon.

I could have retired on the profit from just the past five years. I suppose if we, as Americans, were truly concerned about oil company profits we'd simply use less oil and gasoline, thereby saving ourselves money and reducing the profits of the oil companies.

[Rainscents]

2. Another around of hightway robbery!

[Untermonkey]

42. Robbery?

Is anyone forcing you to purchase gasoline at the current price? Couldn't you take public transit, carpool, ride a bicycle, walk, etc.? There are options to driving your own car every day. If you ride the bus to work one day a week you'll cut your gasoline consumption by 20%.

If everybody did that just one day a week we'd see a major improvement in traffic, air quality, and the price of gasoline.

[tabasco]

44. Wow! You should have been in California ...

during the Enron price gouging. You could have told everybody just to deal with it and stop using electricity! :crazy:

Get a clue. :dunce: Price-gouging, windfall profits, and corporate corruption are not things we have to deal with. Unless they control the government, which of course they do.

Tell the OTR trucker to walk to work. Tell somebody in LA to ride a bike to work. Yeah, right. The same oil industry you love lobbies against public transportation, and has been very successful. Republicans are bought by the oil industry and kill bills to help build public transportation for the working man. They want us to be addicted to oil. All the conservation programs begun and furthered by Democratic presidents have been dismantled by republicans. Take your complaints to a republican board and ask them why this is. Don't complain to working people who have no choice but to drive a car.

Well, now that you know what a profit is, you can start you career as a broker and become one of the corporate elite, who are becoming richer every day at our expense. Just like the Enron stockholders who got screwed out of their life savings.

[Untermonkey]

49. You are such a pessimist.

You do realize, don't you, that the ONLY reason the oil companies made such enormous profits is because SOMEONE bought all of that oil? Our society, as a whole, has become addicted to cheap oil and the lifestyle it provides. Los Angeles is the mother of all examples, with it's sprawling suburbs and massive freeway system. Mass transit can, and does, work all over the world and when it becomes too expensive for Americans to drive their 14 mpg SUVs and pickups they'll either buy more fuel efficient cars OR some entrepreneur will come up with an alternative fuel OR another entrepreneur will make mass transit a better alternative.

People are people, regardless of their political leanings and they will take the path of least resistance which, at this point in time, is driving their gas burning vehicles for tens or hundreds of miles each day carrying only one person. That's what our society has chosen and that's what we'll continue to choose until something better comes along.

I challenge you, instead of complaining about oil company profits and demanding that "someone" do something about it, that YOU do something about it. If you don't like the situation as it is you can either bitch and moan OR you can take steps to change the situation.

[MessiahRp]

3. "At the Citgo gas station on Fowler Street"

The worst part is Citgos don't even get their gas from the middle east. Maybe if we made it where companies that buy from different regions can charge less, companies would be less inclined to buy from the Middle East and gas prices would come down.

[ColonelTom]

19. Oil/gas is fungible. Citgo's affected too.

Prices in the Middle East do affect prices in other regions. If gas is expensive from the Middle East, that puts more demand on other non-Middle-East suppliers, and their prices rise accordingly.

All that being said, I'm sure the oil companies will profit handsomely from all this.

[Untermonkey]

25. You're gonna confuse a lot of people with big words like "fungible"

Fungible - adj: being of such a nature that one part or quantity may be replaced by another equal part or quantity in the satisfaction of an obligation. Oil, wheat, and lumber are fungible commodities.

[Historic NY]

4. Just in time for nice weather and for all those old car owners.......

long winter dustoffs.:nuke::grr:

[Voltaire99]

5. War crimes don't grow on trees, you know.

The gasoline pump: Bushism's umbilical cord to your life.

[luckyleftyme2]

8. GAS PRICES

they spiked in the north east 20 plus cents a gallon in 24 hours. i hope even the most die hard
republican can see the need to get control of the country away from this administration.
they should go down in "history" as the last resort gang. this excuse of the military attack
causing the spike is straight "B.S."
and guess what,the attack is 18 months over due!

[Javaman]

18. Someone on here was claiming that the price only goes up

via each shipment. They buy x amount of gas at x price, that price stays where it's at till the next shipment.

Bwahahahahaha...yeah right.

I find it interesting that when the price of oil goes up, the very next day the price at the pump goes up. Don't tell me that suddenly every gas station across the U.S. suddenly gets a new delivery that very same morning.

However, when the price of oil goes down, the price at the pump, stays the same. then once again they claim that it's the price at which they bought the gas at and have to wait till the next delivery for the price at the pump to go down.

Alllllll Bulllllshit!!

these people are completely despicable.

I loath and hate that fucking idiot*.

[luckyleftyme2]

6. LETS NATIONALIZE THE OIL COMPANIES

RUN THIS THOUGHT BY ONE TIME:lets nationalize the oil companies until we're out of the mid-east war. this is to include any country in the oil region. we have the law and ability to do this in a
national emergency. this law is on the books.
we can use all the profit to support the so called "terrorist wars".
we can prove once and for all whether our government is interested in protecting the people or the oil companies.we also can claim all the profits these companies have made since the war has started.
now outside of a few texas billionaires (who will survive just fine on their personal fortune)a few others who corrupt the system i see no down side on this proposal.
in fact it would probably hasten a wining solution to the war.
p.s. someone once told me: its amazing to watch a cornered rat try to leave a sinking ship!

[salin]

7. Oh Please, for several years every high driving time sees

gas prices go up - just in time for the holidays. Once upon a time the in unison hikes for things like... SPRING BREAK SEASON... would have been seen as collusion - but under the current corporations can do no worng era... spurious excuses are offered - and some how not questioned by the press, and cynically excepted by the public.

There will also be a gas hike around Memorial Day weekend. Prices will go back down and be increased again in time for the Fourth of July weekend, and once again for Labor Day Weekend.

[hadrons]

9. gas station should have signs pointing to "Operation Swarmer" for the rise

in the gas price ... it will shut the kool-aid drinkers up

[allisonthegreat]

46. really...the proof is in the price at the pump...eom

[orleans]

47. (swarmer...really...what kind of a name is that anyway?) n/t

[Thor_MN]

51. Plan Bee?

Since I think they are just making this shit up as they go along, I really don't think they have ever had a Plan A, but maybe they think they have been forced into Plan B...

[BiggJawn]

10. Between $2.53 and $2.70 here.

And this following mandatory meetings with HR at work explaining how a rating of "Competent" will not get you a salary increase because "You're doing what we pay you for".

Fuel will soon cost me what food does.

[SujiwanKenobee]

12. It seems like the price is going up DAILY here in MD

It has jumped from 2.25 to 2.45 in 3 days. I see the employees out changing the sign prices during the day. I think that this industry ought to be nationalized until consumers are offered easy to obtain multiple technologies that will offset the use of petroleum products.

[Earth_First]

13. Who are they fooling? It's been going up for sometime now...

it wasn't this sudden overnight increase that they are attempting to portray.

[Brazenly Liberal]

14. What happened to that "talk" Georgie-boy was going to have

with the oil companies?

Mr. Peabody, set the Wayback Machine for 2000!

Ah, yes, there he is. George Bush on the campaign trail. Saying that if he's elected, he won't sit still for oil companies making obscene profits while gouging the public. Saying that if that kind of thing happens on his watch, he'll just sit the oil companies down and have a talk with them and straighten it all out.

Well, we just saw profits that were not only obscene, they were record-smashing. So when is he going to sit them down for that little talk?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

33. It turned out to be the "jawbone" of an Ass rather than the "jawbone"

of a statesman.

[orleans]

48. the only jawbone action we get is his coke habbit tweek jaw n/t

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

50. Or Gannon jaw meets Chimp bone. n/t

[HockeyMom]

15. It's going to hit $3.00 very, very soon

If we attack Iran, count on $5.00. It's getting so I cannot afford to drive back and forth to work. I don't have the luxury of mass transit and nobody I work with lives near me to carpool.

Besides, utilities will be going up too. I have noticed the prices of groceries have gone up also. This all "fuels" inflation, but you notice we NEVER hear anything about that?

[NickB79]

23. Don't forget about hurricane season starting soon

A few more Catagory 4's and 5's plowing through oil platforms in the Gulf and possibly coming ashore near refineries will send oil prices skyrocketting as well.

[juliana24]

32. 5.00 per gallon=Major Depression.

Just in time for the 2006 elections too !!!

Bye, bye Regressives !!!

[CountAllVotes]

35. I saw it for $2.99 here today

California of course. :grr:

:kick:

[Divine Discontent]

45. the sad part....

BESIDES OUR SUFFERING. which will be great in it's hit on us all.

is that Democrats (I believe) will win the elections but be handed such a f'd up America that they will in no way be able to even BEGIN cleaning up Bush's mess in just over a year plus of non-election time they'll be handed before the 08 election comes and the repukes say the Dems were in charge when things went bad... americans are such sheeple as a whole... so damn angry.

[0007]

16. This time next year it will be around four dollars a gallon

When junior leaves office expect to be paying around six bucks.

[NaturalHigh]

17. My advice FWIW...

We need to reduce our driving as much as possible. It's unconscionable for the oil companies to reap record profits by picking our pockets with these high gas prices.

Our vacation this year will consist of staying home, playing soccer in the backyard, watching movies, etc.

[Not Me]

20. I took a road trip in December of 2003

and kept some mileage/gas records. At that time (Christmas 2003) just a little over 2 years ago, gas was $1.30 a gallon here in FL. Exactly half of what it is now.

[Roland99]

21. Louisville, Ky - Feb. 2006 = $1.98...Mar. 2006 = $2.59

[Demeter]

22. Oh, Is THAT This Week's Excuse?

Funny how there's always something to justify higher profits.

[wordpix2]

26. any EXCUSE to raise prices, even if there's no oil produced in Samarra

[alcibiades_mystery]

27. Completely hilarious

Anyone who believes that the 20 cent jump in gas prices is because of Operation Swarmer deserves to pay $1.00 more per gallon. Only an imbecile would believe such a thing.

[DS1]

28. Great, and I'm about to start commuting 150 miles per day until I

find a place closer to my new job :grr:

[alarcojon]

29. Hey, this won't help Bush's poll numbers any

I can't wait to see him go below 30%

[lovuian]

30. This will tip families over the edge & corporations

the cry is going to get ugly and uglier!!!

[superconnected]

31. And now we know why opperation swarmer exists.

It's bushs swarmy approach.

[Heewack]

34. This article is a bunch of bunk

The increase has to do with the end of European help with gasoline reserves that they offered after Katrina hit.

[Trajan]

39. Well ... Its ALWAYS something ! ....

Its oil prices increasing BEFORE that oil hits the refineries ...

Its gas prices decreasing WAY after the the refineries saw that last of that oil ...

Its summer ...

Its fall ...

Its winter ! ...

Its SPRING ! ...

Warm winter !

COLD Winter ...

Warm Summer ...

HOT summer ! ...

Travel Season: ...

Strange formulations !


You know ? .... there is as many excuses as there are enablers who promote them ....

FUCK them .....

They are higher for the same reasons they have ALWAYS went higher : PURE UNADULTERATED GREED .....

[bullwinkle428]

36. Gasoline now almost equal to diesel price - I'm now really on the

fence about replacing my gasser with a diesel from VW, but I'm sure the demand for diesels,which has been relatively high over the last year, will probably get even worse now.

[tammywammy]

43. I work at a VW dealership

We actually have TDIs in stock right now, as opposed to last fall when there was a 2+ month wait.

If you wait here's some things to consider:

1. You won't get the in-stock selection, and may have to order one (takes between 7-14 weeks to arrive from factory depending on where in line it's at).

2. You won't be receiving any discounts on the car, expect to pay sticker if gas prices shoot up.

3. VW can only import a limited number of diesels every year. I've been hearing that we're coming up on it, and soon they won't be available. (I'm not definite on this, but I've been hearing it around the dealership for a few weeks).

I have a diesel Beetle. I love it. I wouldn't trade it for the world. The extra torque you get makes the car very peppy and a great passer on the highway. One of the bonuses for me to buying it, was that with regular maintenance (oil changes, timing belt, etc) a diesel engine can easily last 200K miles. Also, diesels have awesome resale value.

[Trajan]

38. GAS PRICE ASSAULT JUMP STARTS GOP WALLETS !

I swear that's what I read ....

[Mithras61]

40. I don't know the SOURCE of the problem...

but gas has jumped 10¢ per gallon (according to the AAA Fule Guage Report http://www.fuelgaugereport.com/TXmetro.asp">here) in the Houston area in the last two days.

It only reports "yesterday" and "today" but yesterday's "yesterday" was $2.344.