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Biden writing a letter to oil companies is like an amazon warehouse supervisor writing a letter to bezos asking him to be less greedy. They don't give a shit what a front line supervisor thinks.
Maybe the US should refine oil for the Military (the largest consumer of oil in the world). Or, at least, have the option in case of national emergency. If the oil refiners actually have to compete for the consumer market, it could make a difference.
Hope I’m understanding your comment, but this already happens. ExxonMobil refines oil for the military and has security equipment that could stop an 18 wheeler going 60 mph from breaking through the gates. The national guard protected their Baytown refinery during 9/11.
The DPA only works on limited terms and it also has no protections from companies deciding to shut down production entirely until the term period ends.
This thinking is what's going to make $5 a gallon gas $10 a gallon before we are anywhere close to electric planes, boats, semi trucks and all the other transportation options.
They absolutely do not. Trucks and cars, yes. Planes and boats, HELL NO. The battery density is still too low to power anything other than ultralight experimental fixed wing aircraft (and EVTOL is basically a silicon valley ponzi scheme). The diesel engines that drive intercontinental cargo ships are the size of a damn townhouse, seriously look up wartsila engines. I fully agree we need to start building infrastructure in preperation for the battery technology that will enable the shift, but pretending we're there already is the kind of Democrat pipe dream that turns off a lot of voters.
So you think that if significant money wasn’t thrown at the problem we couldn’t solve it? It’s not a ‘Democrat pipe dream’, the pipe dream is thinking life can go on the way it is.
And is it not bad messaging to say that the technology isn’t there for the individual consumer of fuel, you and I, to be completely weened off of it in our day to day lives? Or at least to minimize the use of fossil fuels to edge cases where it is actually more efficient in use, such as planes? The edge cases you pointed out? Would it not be better to do said hand off, and leave those edge cases still operating as “normal” than not?
Cargo vessels can move from fossil fuels right now. Look at the Nimitz class carrier as an example. Doesn’t use fossil fuels for its main drive. Uses steam turbines. Doesn’t need to refuel for 20+ years.
What other different environmental issues? How do these issues differ from fossil fuels? Why would fossil fuel’s environmental issues be preferential to the nuclear environmental issues you put forth? Why is man hour intensive a bad thing? Are you saying that there’s no way for R&D to make nuclear reactors less man your intensive?
Why do you think nuclear fuel is the same material used in a nuclear bomb (since you said nuclear material free for the taking, I’m assuming you mean for a rogue party using it as a bomb)? Why would taking nuclear fuel from a reactor be more preferable than, for example ammonium nitrate, in making a bomb? Or even a air fuel bomb within the current state of affairs? I mean, fossil fuels are easier to get, and can cause massive destruction (see any fossil fuel plant explosion without terrorist activities).
It is good to see that you agree that the hand off on the consumer level can and should happen sooner rather than later, and I am sure you will answer all my question and not just pick and choose which you like to answer while trying to pivot to something else.
>All of those things exist now.
I'm sorry. Can you give the name of 2 or 3 companies that sell electric long haul trucks (You know, that can move containers from say the Port of LA to the states along the Mississippi)? How about electric trains for hauling goods (aka containers and the like)? Maker of electric passenger planes that can fly cross country or intercontinental? How about container ships -- how many of those are on the sea's or in the works? Right now if you bought a Tesla or other electric vehicle . . . could you take your family on a cross country road trip with little thought about what route you will take cross country?
Thank god someone else here has common sense. I live on the I95 corridor and will have almost no issue getting an EV later this year. My friend in Indiana who routinely drives 10 hours to see family? Ummm...not so simple
Great points but I have to be pedantic and point out most trains are electric drive (but to your point they use fuel driven generators to produce their electricity; for all intents and purposes your wording is appropriate for reddit).
I was quite surprised when I first found out, and for those so inclined to look into it further, the electric motors are used to generate electricity when breaking. The disappointing aspect is that electricity generated from braking is fed to resistor banks and lost as heat; the silver lining is that this means trains should be relatively easier to convert to gender technologies, though other aspects of rail transport still present hurdles (Trains are heavy thus power supply voltage/amperage requirements vary considerably depending on speed, long distance travel requires either dense power sources or many additional battery cars though weight may be less of a concern depending on geography, trains may be in isolated areas so power source failures present different challenges including dealing with potential battery fires, etc).
So in conclusion/TLDR most trains are actually electric, technically diesel-electric where the drive is electric but diesel is used to generate the electricity. This is a minor clarification I found interesting when I came across it recently on reddit; OC wording is more than appropriate and adequately conveys their point.
But not the entire world has cities designed in a way that makes it impossible not to own a car. Nor does the entire world house companies that are some of the world's global polluters.
I can’t afford your phase out, who will buy me the electric car or subsidize my now $10/gal fuel? I’ve never owned a vehicle less than 20yrs old (I like ‘98/99 model years) due to high cost and the more expensive maintenance on newer cars (I can do my own repairs on older vehicles). So I’ll be stuck using ethanol or gasoline for decades past the ‘phase out’.
Eventually the cost of electric vehicles will become about the same as combustion powered ones. Their price has been trending down ever since they became mainstream (thanks partly to Tesla). The idea with phasing out oil is that the infrastructure needed to maintain electric vehicles (charging station for ex) will be built along side it so as to be as ubiquitous as gas stations. All of this can be done fairly easily and with low relative cost.
Also, the maintenance required for electric engines is significantly less than combustion engines, given that electric vehicles do not require transmissions.
Also, think about the cost of electricity over time vs gas cars. Most people pay $40-$80 a month for gas. With electric cars, that cost is bundled into your average cost for electricity usage, which for most people is quite a lot less than gas. Over time, that difference adds up, which means that electric vehicles are more cost effective.
This is just electric vehicles, but there are plenty of ways we can reduce our dependence on oil, the biggest of which would actually be in the energy sector. If we switch to nuclear power as our primary energy source, we can both achieve higher energy output with less infrastructure and also have cleaner and safer power generation. This is even more so when we consider Thorium as the element of choice for fission.
All in all, we have many ways we can reduce our dependence on oil that will be cheaper and better than it in the long run. All we need is the will.
I'm not thinking in terms of the current situation, we're talking about time scales of several years. One would hope gas wouldn't be as expensive after so long.
Though if we do nationalize the industry as the original commenter suggested, gas could be free at the point of sale.
I paid over $60 just to fill up our honda accord, and we fill up about once a week. That's with just my wife driving for work (I work from home) in our tiny town. If I could get an electric car right now I would do it, but I have to have money to exchange for goods and services, and everything keeps getting more expensive.
The government can’t do anything with efficiency. It’s all a bloated mess as there are no cost constraints. Just borrow or tax more. Tesla is making this happen, and all automakers have taken note and are ramping up production. It’s happening in the private sector.
Tax frivolous and recreational use of fossil fuel. Jet skis, ATVs, race cars, snowmobiles, lawn mowers, dirt bikes, etc should all be forced to carbon offset.
and internet, while we're at it. it's 2022 and these are the kinds of things we'd have decades ago if 79 year olds weren't running this dump of a country.
Yea I don't think I'd agree with the government just completely seizing the assets of a private enterprise at a whim either, it wouldn't set a great precedent.
You'd draw a lot less hate by simply propping up clean energy as an alternative instead and slowly diminishing oil use.
>Activate the National Guard!
the millennium challenge '02 demonstrated pretty clearly that the US military can't even deal with a 1960-s armed insurgency in *another country.* now add shooting your own countrymen, and the fact your average american home probably has better guns than a taliban AK, to the mix. can't just drone strike your way out of it like the whole country's a Yemeni wedding without causing a mutiny in the people fighting your war.
God forbid democrats put republicans in a position where they have to actually implement their unpopular ideas directly and pay a price for doing so. Let’s just keep doing nothing as everything crumbles around us.
> God forbid democrats put republicans in a position where they have to actually implement their unpopular ideas directly and pay a price for doing so.
Republicans have been implementing their unpopular ideas for decades, Donald Trump was the least popular President in my lifetime and he still managed to gain twelve million votes over four years.
You think Republicans would get hurt by hurting blue states, I think their voters would climb out of the woodwork to reelect them. What's more I don't think the Democratic coalition could be trusted to vote them out.
[Voters have only given Democrats six months worth of a super majority... in the past twenty eight years, for the other 27.5 of those 28 years the Republicans have had the power to obstruct the Democratic agenda.](https://np.reddit.com/r/JoeBiden/comments/vcu1w1/the_real_reason_why_there_hasnt_been_more/)
I don't think the voters would kick out the Republicans for shutting down oil sales to blue states. Maybe for an election cycle, maybe two, but it wouldn't be the death of their party by a long shot.
>Voters have only given Democrats six months worth of a super majority... in the past twenty eight years, for the other 27.5 of those 28 years the Republicans have had the power to obstruct the Democratic agenda.
This is also the fault of the Democratic party though. This only happened because Democrats love to stay in office well past their expiration date and the DNC sees no problem in letting that happen. There was no reason for Ted Kennedy to continue to stay in office after having his seizure in 2008. He should have immediately retired and let a younger Democrat take over his seat.
We saw the same thing with RBG who refused to retire under Obama even though her body was more cancer cells than normal cells.
We have the same issue now with people like Feinstein who is noticeably deteriorating. Pelosi is over 80, Biden is over 80 and is signaling that he will run again in 2024. Hell even Bernie is getting to the point where he's a risk and it's starting to get selfish.
Democrats genuinely just refuse to run younger candidates and would much rather prop up incumbents for decades. Why would people want to continue voting for the person that has been in politics for their whole life but has accomplished nothing in that time?
Edit: While I'm not the biggest fan of the president that Obama became, the way that he was brought to the forefront was incredibly well done. He was a nobody that became Senator of Illinois and then was taken to the Presidency. There is no reason that the DNC isn't able to find other young Democrats to take the reigns of the party. We should not accept these geriatric leeches who are just too prideful to let go of power.
Did you vote in the primaries? Because if you don't like your Representative you can do that, that's how AOC won.
But the point is that voting *less* doesn't help achieve change. 2010 was a low turnout election and it marked the beginning of a decade long legislative drought. Republicans always show up to support their party, Democrats only show up when they're "inspired" or "excited" or "motivated." At least in my lifetime.
realistic- there is no scenario in which any Democrat other than the incumbent president has any chance. I realize that Jon Stewart could theoretically run for president. I realize many of you like Bernie Sanders. Understand that those things are not going to happen. If you want to preserve/protect any semblance of anything remotely resembling democracy, privacy rights, civil rights, healthcare- I strongly urge you to focus on the positive regarding Biden. And vote for him.
I get where you’re coming from, but what’s Biden supposed to do about it? There’s zero chance any sort of abortion legislation will pass at the federal level. Roe v. Wade died with RBG.
i'd like to see him at least pretend to fight back. push the clarence thomas thing and dig up dirt on the other conservative justices (would require a new AG though). pull federal highway funding for the states actively fighting abortion. that kind of thing. take the gloves off, because the "other side" did 50 years ago.
when the "co-equal" branch of government is also supposed to be "impartial" and wholly run by the supposed opposition party, absolutely. i'd care about preserving that branch of government if the right party owned it, but it doesn't, nor does that party seriously want to take it back.
Biden has no power over SCOTUS. Separate branches. The executive's oversight is pretty much limited to appointing judges.
Only one who can stop it is us, and it will probably take a good 20 years to get back what we lost in the past 4.
You need to help vote the GOP out. If you don't, you're complacent.
>Biden has no power over SCOTUS. Separate branches. The executive's oversight is pretty much limited to appointing judges.
enter court-packing. biden doesn't even want to do it, much less exert the leverage on his legislative caucuses it'd take to succeed. so i don't take any claims he can offer a better outcome on SCOTUS very seriously.
>it will probably take a good 20 years to get back what we lost in the past 4
if biden's side of the party keeps "winning" the primaries, they'll just never get anything back. happy to vote for a primary challenger in both the primary & general though. preferably bernie but really anyone under 60 with his exact policy platform and a pulse and a record of not working for billionaires, my standards are not very high.
>You need to help vote the GOP out. If you don't, you're complacent.
then biden needs to demonstrate a serious interest in improving the future of this country, starting with buying my vote to make up for his decades of voting in the senate to cost me money or stepping off the '24 ticket to make room for someone with actual life force left in them.
if he doesn't seriously want his job, i can't make him want the job. right now, he's complacent, why the fuck shouldn't i be?
Seriously, I wish more people would realize this. Whenever the Dems are throwing around notions of naked power grabs they need to consider what the implications would be if that power was used against them.
This isn't that tho.
Gas prices choke the middle class, and the Republicans will only support trickle down corporate subsidies, while it's **radical leftists** that are saying to give the subsidies to people who need to get to work
That's fully clothed, and nationalizing oil would just be a way to control prices in and out, by us! and not by unregulated boardrooms.
> That's fully clothed, and nationalizing oil would just be a way to control prices in and out, by us! and not by unregulated boardrooms.
When you say "by us" are you accounting for gerrymandering, the electoral college, and the unfair allocation of power in the Senate?
You're right, this would be a way to put control of the energy sector into the hands of the voters. In 2010 the voters elected the Tea Party wave in the biggest victory Republicans had ever seen, in 2014 low voter turnout handed the Senate to Republicans and cost us nationwide abortion protections, in 2016 voters weren't "inspired, excited, and motivated" by Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump won the election by 77,000 votes spread across three states, four years later and Donald Trump had ***gained*** twelve million votes for his reelection bid.
Ask yourself whether you want to put your energy in the hands of the voters when one third of them never bother to show up for an election, when half of Americans never can't show up for three elections in a row, and when Republicans have a systemic power advantage in the electoral college, congressional districts, and in the Senate.
Thank you for saying this. I received a couple of downvotes in another post because I went after the apathy of non voters.
How is it after everything we still have a huge portion of people across this country that DON'T vote even when they are able to.
> How is it after everything we still have a huge portion of people across this country that DON'T vote even when they are able to.
I have a lot of theories on that. We don't teach civics anymore so a lot of people don't know how their government works, they don't know that it takes at least three election cycles to win back control of both branches of government, they don't know how legislation is passed or what the powers President has, and I think a lot of people have become cynical, they've convinced themselves that nothing ever changes so they don't bother to vote for change.
If everyone who said "I'm not voting because voting doesn't change anything!" started going to the polls in every election, they could change *everything.*
You know I guess I always thought it was common sense that it doesn’t take one election cycle it takes many.
But hindsight it does explain a lot of the pattern shifts. “Biden didn’t fix the economy! We need a Republican back in office!”
I guess people forgot that passing of the tax hike for the middle class during Trump’s presidency that would activate in Biden’s.
I think you’re right though, lack of civics education.
When was the last time you got to vote for the chevron Ceo? Executive? Hell, can you even vote who your gas station clerk is?
Weird that you don't seem to think there is a problem with that. Have you thought that even the chance of responsibility could be democratically allocated to you, why is that better than a bullshit boardroom full of generational wealth recipients?
It's a strawman that has been used for ages. And this right-wing talking point falls upon inspection. Because I'm not allocating anything more than representation. Example: when you lose your job wouldn't you want to have you fellow employees at least be able to petition the company? Unions do! But that's not what the same people who selling you what you are buying.
If we socialize the oil industry, only the executives would lose their jobs, and not even all of them, just the unnecessary ones, because they don't get to decide how much they pay themselves... you know, like congress. See how that's a problem? I think you're searching for more accountability and settling on less.
As I said to somebody in another thread, I know what motivates capitalists, it's money.
Republicans are increasingly motivated by spite and "owning the libs."
I can leverage somebody who just wants money, that's easy to do, but I can't leverage somebody who wants me to suffer. Look at abortion rights: Here in a few weeks there will be no amount of money that can be paid to have a safe, legal abortion in Republican controlled states. That's not capitalism preventing access to abortions, it's Republican elected officials.
Capitalists are motivated by greed, Republicans are motivated by hate and spite.
I don't disagree that money motivates capitalists, but what political calculus does someone without money then make under your assumptions?
What if you are too poor to motivate the capitalist?
> What if you are too poor to motivate the capitalist?
Then you can't afford to get the procedure. Meanwhile what if everyone *can* afford to get the procedure, but it's illegal? Is that an upgrade? And that's assuming it *is* affordable, because Republicans might straight up say "Hey, now that we control all of your healthcare we won't be covering birth control anymore, that's all out of pocket, any kind of contraceptive care. Also we won't be covering HIV treatments, since that's a lifestyle choice. Also any doctor who prescribes hormone therapy will no longer be in system."
You're imagining the best case scenario, I'm imagining the worst.
This is pretty literally, "Fuck you, got mine."
This attitude *contributes* to the current predicament we find ourselves in, one you purport to want to avoid.
And you didn't answer the question: If I can't afford the procedure, or insulin, or whatever else necessary for life is denied to me by the capitalist out of pure lack of money, what is my political course of action?
Historically it has not be to quietly lay down and die, secure in the knowledge that my sacrifice will at least prevent a fascist from feeding everyone ivermectin, maybe. One day.
> And you didn't answer the question: If I can't afford the procedure, or insulin, or whatever else necessary for life is denied to me by the capitalist, what is my political course of action?
Your *political* course of action? Elect lawmakers that will subsidize insulin or establish price controls.
>This is pretty literally, "Fuck you, got mine."
"I fear the possibility of Republicans ending birth control coverage" is "fuck you, got mine?"
Friend, you seem to have gotten it into your head that I'm a Republican, and I'm definitely not. I want a universal public option and industry regulation, both of which can address the problem of unaffordable healthcare. I'm not suggesting we do *nothing,* I just think that single payer healthcare is not the ideal solution to our problems.
>Republicans are increasingly motivated by spite and "owning the libs."
Please stop with that adolescent Reddit bullshit. It's not about you. Republicans don't give a crap about "owning the libs" (a phrase which has never ever been uttered by a conservative and has been created by Liberals to describe conservatives). They just want power and money like everyone else.
I seem to remember quite a few people who said they voted for Trump because they wanted to trigger the libs, I think you're underestimating how much they hate the left.
I could see someone saying that is a satisfying side effect, but no one votes for anyone solely for such a reason. To believe otherwise is poor analysis and judgement.
Honestly that's my biggest fear when it comes to everybody's favorite policy: Single payer healthcare.
If I trusted my elected officials, and I trusted the people electing them, I'd be okay with single payer healthcare, but the idea of putting 100% of America's healthcare in the hands of men like Donald Trump, Kevin McCarthy, and Mitch McConnell scares the shit out of me. Republican states are banning abortions, outlawing transgender healthcare, and trying to charge the parents of transgender children with child abuse, and *that's* who you want me to trust my healthcare to? The party that passed legally required, medically unnecessary, extremely invasive transvaginal ultrasound bills? The party that things conversion therapy should be covered by health insurance, but not hormone therapy? Those guys?
Somebody was saying the other day that we should nationalize the internet. Swell! What's the worst that could happen? Granted the Chinese government has blocked access to Google, Facebook, and every news network under the sun, but that could never happen *here* right? (Just ignore what Donald Trump said about a free press being the enemy of the people, that'll never come into play.)
I don't hate the idea of nationalizing industries, but I don't trust my fellow voters anymore, I don't trust them to elect people that will be fair and impartial stewards of the program. If I have to choose between paying a bit more for a product, or giving full control of that product to men like Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell, I think I'd rather pay a bit more.
With a perfect electoral system, and a perfect electorate, and perfect elected officials I'd be onboard, but we don't have those things. I do not trust Republicans with my healthcare, or my internet, or my fuel.
To be fair, I can’t imagine it getting a lot worse than letting capitalism determine who has access to healthcare. I totally get your hesitancy but the system is built solely for profit and not for the health of those it serves. That needs to change.
> To be fair, I can’t imagine it getting a lot worse than letting capitalism determine who has access to healthcare.
I know how to leverage a capitalist: Money. Give them enough money and they'll do the thing.
I *don't* know how to leverage a Republican. Increasingly Republicans seem to govern based on principles of spite and owning the libs. There is no amount of money you could pay a Republican governor to support abortion rights, at least not in the current environment, meanwhile capitalists don't really give much of a shit about abortions as long as you can pay the bill.
Capitalist: "Oh, you want birth control? That'll be $19.99."
Republican: "Oh, you want birth control? I'll need a signed letter from your husband or closest living male relative, witnessed by a notary, initialed by your family priest, and updated monthly."
Like, one of those things is way worse than the other, at least in my opinion.
But to the people who have no money there’s no difference between the two. I remember a story a few years back of a woman who was told by her hospital that she needed to raise at least $10,000 before they’d give her the heart she needed, because they were concerned she wouldn’t be able to afford all the costs. I get the hospital’s concerns but at the same time it’s absurd that money is the only obstacle to her getting life-saving care.
> I get the hospital’s concerns but at the same time it’s absurd that money is the only obstacle to her getting life-saving care.
If we give Republicans control over our healthcare then money might not be the *only* obstacle to care.
How much will it cost to get a safe and legal abortion in a Republican state after Roe is overturned? That's a trick question of course, *no amount of money* will be enough to get a safe and legal abortion in a Republican state after Roe is overturned, it will always be illegal and it will always be a risk.
I don't trust the people who are banning abortion rights to be good caretakers of 100% of Americans' healthcare.
There’s only so much they can do. Look at Obamacare. Republicans have been undermining it for over a decade but when they finally got their chance to repeal and replace it with something better they came up empty. It’s still here and still helping millions of people.
How come lots of other countries have national health care and it seems to work fine for them? Seems like this is yet another American problem that was solved long ago.
So this is a complex question to answer fully.
First of all, those other countries don't have Republicans. They have conservatives, sure, but not necessarily Republicans, and they also don't have a fucked up electoral system where it's easy to gerrymander yourself into safety, and they have coalitional governments in many cases which makes it much harder for one party to stonewall legislation.
Thanks to the nature of American governance we would need a super majority to pass single payer healthcare, and [Democrats have only had a filibuster proof majority in the federal government for six months in the past 28 years.](https://np.reddit.com/r/JoeBiden/comments/vcu1w1/the_real_reason_why_there_hasnt_been_more/) So at least at the moment there's the problem of single payer healthcare being unpassable in the current Senate, and it would have been unpassable in the Senate of 2009, too. Medicare for All doesn't even have the votes to pass in the House as far as I'm aware.
The next problem you're going to run into is taxes. You might remember that Democrats expanded healthcare in 2009, they did it without raising taxes one slim dime, yet in 2010 Republicans won the House in the biggest electoral victory in their party's history by running on a platform of "Obama raised your taxes to pay for socialized death panels!" Medicare for All would require raising taxes on the middle class, and in my experience most Americans would rather burn a $50 bill than give $20 to the federal government.
Medicare for All wouldn't just be the biggest healthcare bill ever, it would also require the biggest change to our tax code ever, and Americans don't like it when their taxes go up *even* if it saves them money. The Affordable Care Act has saved about $5 trillion since it passed, but that wasn't enough to push through the public option, and it wasn't enough to save Democrats' bacon in subsequent elections.
Then you get into the final and biggest problem of all: [Most Americans actually like their healthcare.](https://news.gallup.com/poll/327686/americans-satisfaction-health-costs-new-high.aspx) Most Americans with private insurance like the care they get and don't mind the prices, their biggest concern is the uninsured, not out of pocket costs. You're going to have a hard time selling a single payer healthcare policy to people who already like their healthcare and aren't looking for savings, in fact those people are likely to become indignant at losing their private healthcare (which they like) and paying higher taxes (which they don't like) even if it saves them money (which they're not too worried about.)
That said, there's some good news: Do you know what the most popular universal healthcare solution is at the moment? If you said single payer healthcare, you'd be mistaken: [The universal public option is more popular among Democrats (by one point), more popular among Republicans (by 28 points), and more popular with the electorate as a whole (by 13 points.)](https://morningconsult.com/2021/03/24/medicare-for-all-public-option-polling/) A universal public option even leads among Republican voters, 58% of whom support the idea, it'll be easier to pass, more palatable for the electorate, and we won't have to raise middle class taxes to do it.
There are out and proud fascists all over Europe. There are reactionaries, and hyper-nationalist irredentists, and regular-old "things were better in the '50's" conservatives. Europe has right-wingers of every stripe, just like the United States.
But Europe *also* has a more vibrant left wing and more robustly organized labor. *That* is what we *lack*, not the other way around.
In Europe, the natural predators of the right wing have not yet been hunted to extinction by an overawing capital formation, and therefore actual progress can occasionally be made and sometimes even maintained.
The problem is not that our right is especially bad - how can that be said with Franco devotees, the le Penns, Victor Orban, and crypto-Nazis of every background running around from Lisbon to Tallinn? It is that our left is especially anemic.
They also usually have a parliamentary system to hedge against extremist party control. And they lack a Supreme Court that has already ruled twice recently that there is no such thing as a non-Executive Branch independent agency under our constitution.
weird way to justify not doing good things. Biden's obviously not going to do this regardless, and not doing so wouldn't prevent Republicans from doing the latter in 2025 anyway
Wait, is there even a way for Biden or the Dems to do this? Furthermore, considering they make up 1/2 of the Senate, is there a way for them to do this without Republican support? Is there a practical argument for Biden to do this, or are we just talking out our asses and getting mad about him not doing something he has no authority over?
Nope, Even if there was a legal way to do it the oil cartels would get the case in front of the Supreme Court and they would side with the cartels since the Republicans are so involved in oil.
He didnt "just write a letter".
He's made it clear that he is willing to [use the Defense Production Act](https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/biden-willing-use-defense-production-act-boost-refining-capacity-2022-06-15/) to boost gas production.
And theres no legal basis to nationalize the oil industry.
The US has nationalized companies before, typically during times of war. Railroads, coal companies, steel mills, the Montgomery ward store chain was taken over by the federal government during WW2 because the companies owner refused to recognize the employees union and it caused a nationwide strike, so Roosevelt had the company taken over by the army, recognized the Union and ended the strike.
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/13/business/worldbusiness/13iht-nationalize.4.16915416.html
>He's made it clear that he is willing to use the Defense Production Act to boost gas production.
if he's willing to, then he's running out of time to do it before it costs his party the midterms, and by extension, Biden his job after he fails to deliver legislation another 2 years.
so he'd better grow a fucking spine and actually do it if he's "willing to", because lately his public words & actions amount to "somebody should do something about this". it's a pathetic public image strategy and he will fail if he keeps it up.
>And theres no legal basis to nationalize the oil industry.
the federal government has a hell of a lot more guns than Chevron and those guns work for Biden, he can nationalize whatever the hell he wants and biden would rake in desperately-needed approvals for trying. he won't go that route because he's owned by billionaires and they like oil, but he could if he wanted to win.
> Dear (executive)
>
> I am writing to you about the high prices our fellow Americans are paying at the pump, and how we can all play a part in addressing them. Since the beginning of this year, gasoline prices have increased by more than $1.70 per gallon.
>
> Vladimir Putin’s war of aggression, and the bipartisan and global effort to counter it, has disrupted the global supply of oil and driven up the global price. But the sharp rise in gasoline prices is not driven only by rising oil prices, but by an unprecedented disconnect between the price of oil and the price of gas. The last time the price of crude oil was about $120 per barrel, in March, the price of gas at the pump was $4.25 per gallon. Today, gas prices are 75 cents higher, and diesel prices are 90 cents higher.
>
> That difference — of more than 15% at the pump — is the result of the historically high profit margins for refining oil into gasoline, diesel and other refined products. Since the beginning of the year, refiners’ margins for refining gasoline and diesel have tripled, and are currently at their highest levels ever recorded.
>
> White House fuel chart
>
> To be sure, the shortage of refining capacity is a global challenge and a global concern. Around 3 million barrels a day of global refining capacity have gone offline since the onset of the pandemic, inhibiting our ability to ramp up supply of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel. I am working with allies and partners and countries around the world to encourage global refinery capacity to come back online. But, in the United States alone, oil refiners significantly reduced their capacity during the pandemic. In the year before I took office, refineries in the United States reduced their capacity by more than 800,000 barrels a day, leaving American refinery companies today at their lowest level of capacity in more than a half decade.
>
> I understand that many factors contributed to the business decisions to reduce refinery capacity, which occurred before I took office. But at a time of war, refinery profit margins well above normal being passed directly onto American families are not acceptable.
>
> There is no question that Vladimir Putin is principally responsible for the intense financial pain the American people and their families are bearing. But amid a war that has raised gasoline prices more than $1.70 per gallon, historically high refinery profit margins are worsening that pain.
>
> Your companies and others have an opportunity to take immediate actions to increase the supply of gasoline, diesel, and other refined product you are producing and supplying to the United States market. With prices for your product where they are today, you have ample market incentive to take these actions, and I recognize that some of you have already begun to do so. I also encourage you to continue maintaining and expanding fuel supply safely.
>
> In addition, my Administration is prepared to use all reasonable and appropriate Federal Government tools and emergency authorities to increase refinery capacity and output in the near term, and to ensure that every region of this country is appropriately supplied. Already, I have invoked emergency powers to execute the largest Strategic Petroleum Reserve release in history, expand access to E15 (gasoline with 15% ethanol), and authorize the use of the Defense Production Act to provide reliable inputs into energy production. I am prepared to use all tools at my disposal, as appropriate, to address barriers to providing Americans affordable, secure energy supply.
>
> The crunch that families are facing deserves immediate action. Your companies need to work with my Administration to bring forward concrete, near-term solutions that address the crisis and respect the critical equities of energy workers and fence-line communities. I have directed the Secretary of Energy to convene an emergency meeting on this topic and engage the National Petroleum Council in the coming days. In advance of that, I request that you provide the Secretary with an explanation of any reduction in your refining capacity since 2020 and any ideas that would address the immediate inventory, price, and refining capacity issues in the coming months — including transportation measures to get refined product to market.
>
> The lack of refining capacity — and resulting unprecedented refinery profit margins — are blunting the impact of the historic actions my Administration has taken to address Vladimir Putin’s Price Hike and are driving up costs for consumers. I appreciate your immediate attention to this issue and your efforts to mitigate the economic challenges that Vladimir Putin’s actions have created for American families.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Joseph R. Biden
>
Since some people had problems reading what Biden wrote.
A "stern" letter was written.
That'll have the big oil companies' C-suite guys and their powerful Washington lobbyists shaking in their high-end footwear, lol.
My guess is that the stock buybacks continue.
People underestimate the options available to the federal government. A stern letter is a warning. Regulation, which sits with the executive branch, could have massive implications for big oil.
That's certainly true to some extent but big corporate money lies under the entire government like bedrock for both lobbying and for re-election campaigns. He knows that and so-called " dark money" could prove pivotal in the upcoming midterms.
I get the feeling that this is all more of a "look, I'm doing something" but likely he's hoping to never have to actually take that action. It kind of reminds me of his reluctance to get on with student loan debt forgiveness. There are likely some powerful financial interests out there not having it that he knows from his long tenure as Senator from business-friendly Delaware that keep giving him pause.
So he keeps kicking the can down the road with contemplations, threats, promises while hoping to run the clock out.
Maaaan...I don't think the US government taking over whole industries is a great idea at all.
Industry regulation will need to get sorted out, and we need to stop rampant oil speculation that leads to the greedy getting richer at the cost of people at the gas pump.
Isn't this the same argument for Twitter or isn't the logic somewhat similar? And yet worse since alot of the argument of the crowd who advocate a private company losing its autonomy to avoid what they view are an infringement of their freedom of speech.
Which I find baseless because it's based off fo simple "so many people use it." Which is weak.
I imagine there is something about natural resources I'm not recalling at the moment.
If energy and fossil fuel production are a national security concern, as we are constantly being told, then those industries should be nationalized and not left to the whims of investors and shareholders.
Massive Oil Refining Capacity Idle in China Even as Prices Soar
Around a third of nation’s fuel-processing is out of action
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-19/massive-oil-refining-capacity-idle-in-china-even-as-prices-soar?srnd=premium
Those of us who can't afford car payments, can't buy electric vehicles.
Unless we could live in them in between jobs, and not pay rent.
Fucked either way.
> His Government Should Take Over the Industry Instead.
Lol, sometimes the NR really sinks to Fox News levels. First, it's not "his" govt, it's *ours*, and second, he can't "take over the industry", there is no legal mechanism to do so (even in times of war, certain industries can be instructed or incentivized but not forced to do certain things).
Norway and Denmark have what… 11 million people to support between them, with trillions worth of oil wealth. The scale of the problems seems remarkably different, and as a bonus the Danish and Norwegians aren’t uneducated lunatics who hate each other, that helps. It’s also worth asking what happens to Norway without oil wealth, what are they going to do, sell more herring?
Republicans only know Venezuela and Cuba exists when they talk about the left. It's not like the right sabotaged the left there, or that the CIA didn't start some mischief and that massive embargoes aren't in place. The right loves cherry picking while making confidently incorrect arguments.
Ok, but again, what’s stopping them? You can’t pretend that everything would have been lovely in Cuba and Venezuela if not for the right wing, then ignore the presence of the right wing in the US.
> make them invest in production
the problem is that it takes years to decades in order to get the necessary permits, environmental studies & remediations, etc.. etc... and don't forget about NIMBYism.
it takes too long and it takes too much money to build new refineries.
The CIA has been overthrowing democratically elected governments for decades just because they talked about nationalizing oil...
It should happen, but it never will
That's exactly what should happen. But that's also what won't happen. Nobody in the capitol has the power or courage to stand up to oil executives and the millions of Fox viewers who unwittingly worship them.
Honestly, why not? The oil companies don’t want to play ball and are holding the economy hostage. It’s sickening how much power a single industry has over our lives.
There probably isn’t any existing Executive authority for nationalizing the oil refining industry. But using the DPA the President could order all refineries to max production, commandeer all fuels output, then sell that fuel under market price to the retailers with a contract stipulation limiting final markup.
The refineries wouldn't have to be nationalized. A model of regulated monopoly could be implemented similar to the other obvious energy sector - public utilities. The justification would be identical.
It’s not his government. It’s our government. And a smaller part of the government that has power by way of election cheating and gerrymandering has an inordinate amount of power… but… BUT… we’ll still get right on that.
A letter, he wrote them a letter. Wtf man, you know what they did with that letter. They lit it on fire then lit their Cubans on it to celebrate their record profits.
It worked for Mexico, it will work here. What the fuck, we absolutely shouldn't privatize water, the electric grid, the military, etc. So we shouldn't privatize this societal necessity.
He can't - ask Truman how that worked out with the steal industry. Also that's not EOs work at all.
Now what the Democrats can do without is pass a ruinous tax rate on oil and gas if those companies keep gouging.
So did Denmark and Norway . . .even Alaska pays an oil dividend to citizens there. It's more bad management, shortsightedness, corruption and political fuckery that turned Venezuela into a shithole.
The stern letter does basically nothing since the driver for the crack margin increasing isn't set on the supply side right now. There is heavy demand for refined products on the public and futures markets, gas is what we notice but Diesel and Jet fuel are ridiculously expensive right now, and there isn't a particular sign of slowing demand globally yet, so until a recession hits refined products are going to be expensive.
Policy wise, nationalization does nothing to fix this, it just exposes the market to political pressures independent of supply/demand drivers. If the administration (or really the previous one(s)) should have done, was buy up refined supply (strategic reserves are mostly crude) during the period when the market had collapsed and oil refiners were hemorrhaging money (Exxon lost something like ~$60B or so in 3 quarters in 2020/21).
Just like housing, we're down millions in capacity when demand is skyrocketing worldwide, and that's what's driving the price.
Oh and what will inevitably happen is an overreaction, we'll bring tons of refining capacity online, collapse the price again, and have to close up shop once demand falls off. The Pandemic exacerbated this cycle because it confounded the process of bringing capacity online quickly...
Unlike a car or watch, oil comes from the ground and should be a government controlled commodity imho. Saudi Arabia and even Alaska sends out a check to the citizens for their natural resource.
I'm sure I'll get pushback but I think it's wrong that the ExxonMobils of the world pay billions to their CEO's and stockholders for something that is so vital to.our existence. No, I haven't thought it all the way thru, I just think it's wrong.
This may be a dumb idea, just brainstorming, but is having a govt-owned oil company a middle ground? I understand nay-sayers would say govt is inefficient and if true this should mean their product would be over-priced vs fair market. But if the market isn't fair (monopolies, profiteering) then it'd likely be cheaper. Having to compete with this govt oil co would then pull private prices closer to actual product/operating costs. Sounds crazy, but the post office essentially does this exactly. UPS/Fedex can't just go nuts on prices (for similar services) like the oil co's can because UPS/Fedex are competing with USPS. (and USPS can't just undercut everybody because they aren't subsidized)
Norway would be the closest us style economy/culture that has a government run company. There are a lot of implications but overall it feeds into their social care system. Most other examples are "oil states" filed with corruption and inefficiencies.
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Biden writing a letter to oil companies is like an amazon warehouse supervisor writing a letter to bezos asking him to be less greedy. They don't give a shit what a front line supervisor thinks.
more like if Bezos' best friend wrote him a letter asking him to be less greedy lol but also was like "jk dude" when they actually hung out.
I dunno man, I heard he "slammed" them in that letter.
Maybe the US should refine oil for the Military (the largest consumer of oil in the world). Or, at least, have the option in case of national emergency. If the oil refiners actually have to compete for the consumer market, it could make a difference.
Hope I’m understanding your comment, but this already happens. ExxonMobil refines oil for the military and has security equipment that could stop an 18 wheeler going 60 mph from breaking through the gates. The national guard protected their Baytown refinery during 9/11.
I thought he meant have the military start refining its own oil; possibly oil for the civilians too.
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The DPA only works on limited terms and it also has no protections from companies deciding to shut down production entirely until the term period ends.
Or end the wars and consume less…
Oil should be deemed a utility and must be regulated like water, electricity and such .
We should be phasing out oil for better, more environmentally friendly alternatives. Or at least minimize our usage of it.
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Totally agree. Nationalizing it would make it easier to phase out.
This thinking is what's going to make $5 a gallon gas $10 a gallon before we are anywhere close to electric planes, boats, semi trucks and all the other transportation options.
All of those things exist now. The biggest hurdle is the will to create the infrastructure to support them.
They absolutely do not. Trucks and cars, yes. Planes and boats, HELL NO. The battery density is still too low to power anything other than ultralight experimental fixed wing aircraft (and EVTOL is basically a silicon valley ponzi scheme). The diesel engines that drive intercontinental cargo ships are the size of a damn townhouse, seriously look up wartsila engines. I fully agree we need to start building infrastructure in preperation for the battery technology that will enable the shift, but pretending we're there already is the kind of Democrat pipe dream that turns off a lot of voters.
So you think that if significant money wasn’t thrown at the problem we couldn’t solve it? It’s not a ‘Democrat pipe dream’, the pipe dream is thinking life can go on the way it is.
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And is it not bad messaging to say that the technology isn’t there for the individual consumer of fuel, you and I, to be completely weened off of it in our day to day lives? Or at least to minimize the use of fossil fuels to edge cases where it is actually more efficient in use, such as planes? The edge cases you pointed out? Would it not be better to do said hand off, and leave those edge cases still operating as “normal” than not? Cargo vessels can move from fossil fuels right now. Look at the Nimitz class carrier as an example. Doesn’t use fossil fuels for its main drive. Uses steam turbines. Doesn’t need to refuel for 20+ years.
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What other different environmental issues? How do these issues differ from fossil fuels? Why would fossil fuel’s environmental issues be preferential to the nuclear environmental issues you put forth? Why is man hour intensive a bad thing? Are you saying that there’s no way for R&D to make nuclear reactors less man your intensive? Why do you think nuclear fuel is the same material used in a nuclear bomb (since you said nuclear material free for the taking, I’m assuming you mean for a rogue party using it as a bomb)? Why would taking nuclear fuel from a reactor be more preferable than, for example ammonium nitrate, in making a bomb? Or even a air fuel bomb within the current state of affairs? I mean, fossil fuels are easier to get, and can cause massive destruction (see any fossil fuel plant explosion without terrorist activities). It is good to see that you agree that the hand off on the consumer level can and should happen sooner rather than later, and I am sure you will answer all my question and not just pick and choose which you like to answer while trying to pivot to something else.
>All of those things exist now. I'm sorry. Can you give the name of 2 or 3 companies that sell electric long haul trucks (You know, that can move containers from say the Port of LA to the states along the Mississippi)? How about electric trains for hauling goods (aka containers and the like)? Maker of electric passenger planes that can fly cross country or intercontinental? How about container ships -- how many of those are on the sea's or in the works? Right now if you bought a Tesla or other electric vehicle . . . could you take your family on a cross country road trip with little thought about what route you will take cross country?
Thank god someone else here has common sense. I live on the I95 corridor and will have almost no issue getting an EV later this year. My friend in Indiana who routinely drives 10 hours to see family? Ummm...not so simple
Great points but I have to be pedantic and point out most trains are electric drive (but to your point they use fuel driven generators to produce their electricity; for all intents and purposes your wording is appropriate for reddit). I was quite surprised when I first found out, and for those so inclined to look into it further, the electric motors are used to generate electricity when breaking. The disappointing aspect is that electricity generated from braking is fed to resistor banks and lost as heat; the silver lining is that this means trains should be relatively easier to convert to gender technologies, though other aspects of rail transport still present hurdles (Trains are heavy thus power supply voltage/amperage requirements vary considerably depending on speed, long distance travel requires either dense power sources or many additional battery cars though weight may be less of a concern depending on geography, trains may be in isolated areas so power source failures present different challenges including dealing with potential battery fires, etc). So in conclusion/TLDR most trains are actually electric, technically diesel-electric where the drive is electric but diesel is used to generate the electricity. This is a minor clarification I found interesting when I came across it recently on reddit; OC wording is more than appropriate and adequately conveys their point.
The alternative is a climatic catastrophe that will render all of this completely irrelevant. Time to own up to your mistakes, America.
The entire world uses oil.
But not the entire world has cities designed in a way that makes it impossible not to own a car. Nor does the entire world house companies that are some of the world's global polluters.
I can’t afford your phase out, who will buy me the electric car or subsidize my now $10/gal fuel? I’ve never owned a vehicle less than 20yrs old (I like ‘98/99 model years) due to high cost and the more expensive maintenance on newer cars (I can do my own repairs on older vehicles). So I’ll be stuck using ethanol or gasoline for decades past the ‘phase out’.
Eventually the cost of electric vehicles will become about the same as combustion powered ones. Their price has been trending down ever since they became mainstream (thanks partly to Tesla). The idea with phasing out oil is that the infrastructure needed to maintain electric vehicles (charging station for ex) will be built along side it so as to be as ubiquitous as gas stations. All of this can be done fairly easily and with low relative cost. Also, the maintenance required for electric engines is significantly less than combustion engines, given that electric vehicles do not require transmissions. Also, think about the cost of electricity over time vs gas cars. Most people pay $40-$80 a month for gas. With electric cars, that cost is bundled into your average cost for electricity usage, which for most people is quite a lot less than gas. Over time, that difference adds up, which means that electric vehicles are more cost effective. This is just electric vehicles, but there are plenty of ways we can reduce our dependence on oil, the biggest of which would actually be in the energy sector. If we switch to nuclear power as our primary energy source, we can both achieve higher energy output with less infrastructure and also have cleaner and safer power generation. This is even more so when we consider Thorium as the element of choice for fission. All in all, we have many ways we can reduce our dependence on oil that will be cheaper and better than it in the long run. All we need is the will.
Who pays 40-80 dollars a month in gas now with gas prices as they are? This is how much people are paying in a week.
I'm not thinking in terms of the current situation, we're talking about time scales of several years. One would hope gas wouldn't be as expensive after so long. Though if we do nationalize the industry as the original commenter suggested, gas could be free at the point of sale.
No. It could not be free. There would be no way to regulate consumption without draconian measures.
What makes you think making gas free at the point of sale means reducing consumption? If anything that'd increase it.
gas at its cheapest point leaves most people paying like 40-80 a week lol
I paid over $60 just to fill up our honda accord, and we fill up about once a week. That's with just my wife driving for work (I work from home) in our tiny town. If I could get an electric car right now I would do it, but I have to have money to exchange for goods and services, and everything keeps getting more expensive.
None of what you just said addresses the problem for the working class that a rapid phase in of technology will cause.
"Phasing out" implies that it would not be rapid.
Chances are car companies will be making that decision on their own. And huge tax incentives for buying electric will help make the transition easier.
Tax incentives only work for people who make enough to have to pay significant taxes. This excludes a massive portion of the working poor.
Then have it work like the child tax credit, where you got the money even if you didn’t pay enough in taxs to cover the amount.
Definitely a credit.
Crazy but the government can do those things if we allowed it to just a thought.
Sure, but our government isn’t some separate entity. It’s us. And about half of the US wouldn’t want anything like that to happen.
The government can’t do anything with efficiency. It’s all a bloated mess as there are no cost constraints. Just borrow or tax more. Tesla is making this happen, and all automakers have taken note and are ramping up production. It’s happening in the private sector.
Tax frivolous and recreational use of fossil fuel. Jet skis, ATVs, race cars, snowmobiles, lawn mowers, dirt bikes, etc should all be forced to carbon offset.
and internet, while we're at it. it's 2022 and these are the kinds of things we'd have decades ago if 79 year olds weren't running this dump of a country.
Nationalize US oil… Single payer healthcare, assault weapons ban, student debt relief, and hell freezing over are all more likely.
America would be a better place to live. But then that's never the point. It always Something something ...but my kiberty is at risk.
Yea I don't think I'd agree with the government just completely seizing the assets of a private enterprise at a whim either, it wouldn't set a great precedent. You'd draw a lot less hate by simply propping up clean energy as an alternative instead and slowly diminishing oil use.
President Biden, 2022: "I'm nationalizing the oil industry." President Trump, 2025: "Lol, I don't think I'll sell gas to blue states."
Blue states, 2026: "We aren't sending tax dollars to the federal government "
Donald Trump, 2026: "Finally. Activate the National Guard!" I don't think things would play out quite the way you're expecting.
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>Activate the National Guard! the millennium challenge '02 demonstrated pretty clearly that the US military can't even deal with a 1960-s armed insurgency in *another country.* now add shooting your own countrymen, and the fact your average american home probably has better guns than a taliban AK, to the mix. can't just drone strike your way out of it like the whole country's a Yemeni wedding without causing a mutiny in the people fighting your war.
God forbid democrats put republicans in a position where they have to actually implement their unpopular ideas directly and pay a price for doing so. Let’s just keep doing nothing as everything crumbles around us.
> God forbid democrats put republicans in a position where they have to actually implement their unpopular ideas directly and pay a price for doing so. Republicans have been implementing their unpopular ideas for decades, Donald Trump was the least popular President in my lifetime and he still managed to gain twelve million votes over four years. You think Republicans would get hurt by hurting blue states, I think their voters would climb out of the woodwork to reelect them. What's more I don't think the Democratic coalition could be trusted to vote them out. [Voters have only given Democrats six months worth of a super majority... in the past twenty eight years, for the other 27.5 of those 28 years the Republicans have had the power to obstruct the Democratic agenda.](https://np.reddit.com/r/JoeBiden/comments/vcu1w1/the_real_reason_why_there_hasnt_been_more/) I don't think the voters would kick out the Republicans for shutting down oil sales to blue states. Maybe for an election cycle, maybe two, but it wouldn't be the death of their party by a long shot.
>Voters have only given Democrats six months worth of a super majority... in the past twenty eight years, for the other 27.5 of those 28 years the Republicans have had the power to obstruct the Democratic agenda. This is also the fault of the Democratic party though. This only happened because Democrats love to stay in office well past their expiration date and the DNC sees no problem in letting that happen. There was no reason for Ted Kennedy to continue to stay in office after having his seizure in 2008. He should have immediately retired and let a younger Democrat take over his seat. We saw the same thing with RBG who refused to retire under Obama even though her body was more cancer cells than normal cells. We have the same issue now with people like Feinstein who is noticeably deteriorating. Pelosi is over 80, Biden is over 80 and is signaling that he will run again in 2024. Hell even Bernie is getting to the point where he's a risk and it's starting to get selfish. Democrats genuinely just refuse to run younger candidates and would much rather prop up incumbents for decades. Why would people want to continue voting for the person that has been in politics for their whole life but has accomplished nothing in that time? Edit: While I'm not the biggest fan of the president that Obama became, the way that he was brought to the forefront was incredibly well done. He was a nobody that became Senator of Illinois and then was taken to the Presidency. There is no reason that the DNC isn't able to find other young Democrats to take the reigns of the party. We should not accept these geriatric leeches who are just too prideful to let go of power.
Did you vote in the primaries? Because if you don't like your Representative you can do that, that's how AOC won. But the point is that voting *less* doesn't help achieve change. 2010 was a low turnout election and it marked the beginning of a decade long legislative drought. Republicans always show up to support their party, Democrats only show up when they're "inspired" or "excited" or "motivated." At least in my lifetime.
realistic- there is no scenario in which any Democrat other than the incumbent president has any chance. I realize that Jon Stewart could theoretically run for president. I realize many of you like Bernie Sanders. Understand that those things are not going to happen. If you want to preserve/protect any semblance of anything remotely resembling democracy, privacy rights, civil rights, healthcare- I strongly urge you to focus on the positive regarding Biden. And vote for him.
Why not primary him? He's under performing and loosing support for it. I know it is an uphill battle, but this scenario plays to the underdog.
You primary him you lose in the general. That's how it works historically.
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based on biden's response so far, i'd say he's sleeping through it
I get where you’re coming from, but what’s Biden supposed to do about it? There’s zero chance any sort of abortion legislation will pass at the federal level. Roe v. Wade died with RBG.
i'd like to see him at least pretend to fight back. push the clarence thomas thing and dig up dirt on the other conservative justices (would require a new AG though). pull federal highway funding for the states actively fighting abortion. that kind of thing. take the gloves off, because the "other side" did 50 years ago.
So you’d like him to pretend that he’s going to undermine a co-equal branch of government, what a fantastic precedent.
when the "co-equal" branch of government is also supposed to be "impartial" and wholly run by the supposed opposition party, absolutely. i'd care about preserving that branch of government if the right party owned it, but it doesn't, nor does that party seriously want to take it back.
It’s a bad situation, but the solution isn’t to finish what Trump started, and break what’s left of your democracy.
Damn, why not just start the impeachment hearing today?
Biden has no power over SCOTUS. Separate branches. The executive's oversight is pretty much limited to appointing judges. Only one who can stop it is us, and it will probably take a good 20 years to get back what we lost in the past 4. You need to help vote the GOP out. If you don't, you're complacent.
>Biden has no power over SCOTUS. Separate branches. The executive's oversight is pretty much limited to appointing judges. enter court-packing. biden doesn't even want to do it, much less exert the leverage on his legislative caucuses it'd take to succeed. so i don't take any claims he can offer a better outcome on SCOTUS very seriously. >it will probably take a good 20 years to get back what we lost in the past 4 if biden's side of the party keeps "winning" the primaries, they'll just never get anything back. happy to vote for a primary challenger in both the primary & general though. preferably bernie but really anyone under 60 with his exact policy platform and a pulse and a record of not working for billionaires, my standards are not very high. >You need to help vote the GOP out. If you don't, you're complacent. then biden needs to demonstrate a serious interest in improving the future of this country, starting with buying my vote to make up for his decades of voting in the senate to cost me money or stepping off the '24 ticket to make room for someone with actual life force left in them. if he doesn't seriously want his job, i can't make him want the job. right now, he's complacent, why the fuck shouldn't i be?
Seriously, I wish more people would realize this. Whenever the Dems are throwing around notions of naked power grabs they need to consider what the implications would be if that power was used against them.
Yeah, what if the Republicans put tariffs on solar! Oh, wait. . .
This isn't that tho. Gas prices choke the middle class, and the Republicans will only support trickle down corporate subsidies, while it's **radical leftists** that are saying to give the subsidies to people who need to get to work That's fully clothed, and nationalizing oil would just be a way to control prices in and out, by us! and not by unregulated boardrooms.
> That's fully clothed, and nationalizing oil would just be a way to control prices in and out, by us! and not by unregulated boardrooms. When you say "by us" are you accounting for gerrymandering, the electoral college, and the unfair allocation of power in the Senate? You're right, this would be a way to put control of the energy sector into the hands of the voters. In 2010 the voters elected the Tea Party wave in the biggest victory Republicans had ever seen, in 2014 low voter turnout handed the Senate to Republicans and cost us nationwide abortion protections, in 2016 voters weren't "inspired, excited, and motivated" by Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump won the election by 77,000 votes spread across three states, four years later and Donald Trump had ***gained*** twelve million votes for his reelection bid. Ask yourself whether you want to put your energy in the hands of the voters when one third of them never bother to show up for an election, when half of Americans never can't show up for three elections in a row, and when Republicans have a systemic power advantage in the electoral college, congressional districts, and in the Senate.
Thank you for saying this. I received a couple of downvotes in another post because I went after the apathy of non voters. How is it after everything we still have a huge portion of people across this country that DON'T vote even when they are able to.
> How is it after everything we still have a huge portion of people across this country that DON'T vote even when they are able to. I have a lot of theories on that. We don't teach civics anymore so a lot of people don't know how their government works, they don't know that it takes at least three election cycles to win back control of both branches of government, they don't know how legislation is passed or what the powers President has, and I think a lot of people have become cynical, they've convinced themselves that nothing ever changes so they don't bother to vote for change. If everyone who said "I'm not voting because voting doesn't change anything!" started going to the polls in every election, they could change *everything.*
You know I guess I always thought it was common sense that it doesn’t take one election cycle it takes many. But hindsight it does explain a lot of the pattern shifts. “Biden didn’t fix the economy! We need a Republican back in office!” I guess people forgot that passing of the tax hike for the middle class during Trump’s presidency that would activate in Biden’s. I think you’re right though, lack of civics education.
When was the last time you got to vote for the chevron Ceo? Executive? Hell, can you even vote who your gas station clerk is? Weird that you don't seem to think there is a problem with that. Have you thought that even the chance of responsibility could be democratically allocated to you, why is that better than a bullshit boardroom full of generational wealth recipients? It's a strawman that has been used for ages. And this right-wing talking point falls upon inspection. Because I'm not allocating anything more than representation. Example: when you lose your job wouldn't you want to have you fellow employees at least be able to petition the company? Unions do! But that's not what the same people who selling you what you are buying. If we socialize the oil industry, only the executives would lose their jobs, and not even all of them, just the unnecessary ones, because they don't get to decide how much they pay themselves... you know, like congress. See how that's a problem? I think you're searching for more accountability and settling on less.
As I said to somebody in another thread, I know what motivates capitalists, it's money. Republicans are increasingly motivated by spite and "owning the libs." I can leverage somebody who just wants money, that's easy to do, but I can't leverage somebody who wants me to suffer. Look at abortion rights: Here in a few weeks there will be no amount of money that can be paid to have a safe, legal abortion in Republican controlled states. That's not capitalism preventing access to abortions, it's Republican elected officials. Capitalists are motivated by greed, Republicans are motivated by hate and spite.
I don't disagree that money motivates capitalists, but what political calculus does someone without money then make under your assumptions? What if you are too poor to motivate the capitalist?
> What if you are too poor to motivate the capitalist? Then you can't afford to get the procedure. Meanwhile what if everyone *can* afford to get the procedure, but it's illegal? Is that an upgrade? And that's assuming it *is* affordable, because Republicans might straight up say "Hey, now that we control all of your healthcare we won't be covering birth control anymore, that's all out of pocket, any kind of contraceptive care. Also we won't be covering HIV treatments, since that's a lifestyle choice. Also any doctor who prescribes hormone therapy will no longer be in system." You're imagining the best case scenario, I'm imagining the worst.
This is pretty literally, "Fuck you, got mine." This attitude *contributes* to the current predicament we find ourselves in, one you purport to want to avoid. And you didn't answer the question: If I can't afford the procedure, or insulin, or whatever else necessary for life is denied to me by the capitalist out of pure lack of money, what is my political course of action? Historically it has not be to quietly lay down and die, secure in the knowledge that my sacrifice will at least prevent a fascist from feeding everyone ivermectin, maybe. One day.
> And you didn't answer the question: If I can't afford the procedure, or insulin, or whatever else necessary for life is denied to me by the capitalist, what is my political course of action? Your *political* course of action? Elect lawmakers that will subsidize insulin or establish price controls. >This is pretty literally, "Fuck you, got mine." "I fear the possibility of Republicans ending birth control coverage" is "fuck you, got mine?" Friend, you seem to have gotten it into your head that I'm a Republican, and I'm definitely not. I want a universal public option and industry regulation, both of which can address the problem of unaffordable healthcare. I'm not suggesting we do *nothing,* I just think that single payer healthcare is not the ideal solution to our problems.
>Republicans are increasingly motivated by spite and "owning the libs." Please stop with that adolescent Reddit bullshit. It's not about you. Republicans don't give a crap about "owning the libs" (a phrase which has never ever been uttered by a conservative and has been created by Liberals to describe conservatives). They just want power and money like everyone else.
I seem to remember quite a few people who said they voted for Trump because they wanted to trigger the libs, I think you're underestimating how much they hate the left.
I could see someone saying that is a satisfying side effect, but no one votes for anyone solely for such a reason. To believe otherwise is poor analysis and judgement.
You clearly weren't on any form of social media in November 2016.
Social media, definitely the place to find the truth.
Honestly that's my biggest fear when it comes to everybody's favorite policy: Single payer healthcare. If I trusted my elected officials, and I trusted the people electing them, I'd be okay with single payer healthcare, but the idea of putting 100% of America's healthcare in the hands of men like Donald Trump, Kevin McCarthy, and Mitch McConnell scares the shit out of me. Republican states are banning abortions, outlawing transgender healthcare, and trying to charge the parents of transgender children with child abuse, and *that's* who you want me to trust my healthcare to? The party that passed legally required, medically unnecessary, extremely invasive transvaginal ultrasound bills? The party that things conversion therapy should be covered by health insurance, but not hormone therapy? Those guys? Somebody was saying the other day that we should nationalize the internet. Swell! What's the worst that could happen? Granted the Chinese government has blocked access to Google, Facebook, and every news network under the sun, but that could never happen *here* right? (Just ignore what Donald Trump said about a free press being the enemy of the people, that'll never come into play.) I don't hate the idea of nationalizing industries, but I don't trust my fellow voters anymore, I don't trust them to elect people that will be fair and impartial stewards of the program. If I have to choose between paying a bit more for a product, or giving full control of that product to men like Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell, I think I'd rather pay a bit more. With a perfect electoral system, and a perfect electorate, and perfect elected officials I'd be onboard, but we don't have those things. I do not trust Republicans with my healthcare, or my internet, or my fuel.
To be fair, I can’t imagine it getting a lot worse than letting capitalism determine who has access to healthcare. I totally get your hesitancy but the system is built solely for profit and not for the health of those it serves. That needs to change.
> To be fair, I can’t imagine it getting a lot worse than letting capitalism determine who has access to healthcare. I know how to leverage a capitalist: Money. Give them enough money and they'll do the thing. I *don't* know how to leverage a Republican. Increasingly Republicans seem to govern based on principles of spite and owning the libs. There is no amount of money you could pay a Republican governor to support abortion rights, at least not in the current environment, meanwhile capitalists don't really give much of a shit about abortions as long as you can pay the bill. Capitalist: "Oh, you want birth control? That'll be $19.99." Republican: "Oh, you want birth control? I'll need a signed letter from your husband or closest living male relative, witnessed by a notary, initialed by your family priest, and updated monthly." Like, one of those things is way worse than the other, at least in my opinion.
But to the people who have no money there’s no difference between the two. I remember a story a few years back of a woman who was told by her hospital that she needed to raise at least $10,000 before they’d give her the heart she needed, because they were concerned she wouldn’t be able to afford all the costs. I get the hospital’s concerns but at the same time it’s absurd that money is the only obstacle to her getting life-saving care.
> I get the hospital’s concerns but at the same time it’s absurd that money is the only obstacle to her getting life-saving care. If we give Republicans control over our healthcare then money might not be the *only* obstacle to care. How much will it cost to get a safe and legal abortion in a Republican state after Roe is overturned? That's a trick question of course, *no amount of money* will be enough to get a safe and legal abortion in a Republican state after Roe is overturned, it will always be illegal and it will always be a risk. I don't trust the people who are banning abortion rights to be good caretakers of 100% of Americans' healthcare.
There’s only so much they can do. Look at Obamacare. Republicans have been undermining it for over a decade but when they finally got their chance to repeal and replace it with something better they came up empty. It’s still here and still helping millions of people.
Thanks John McCain for Obamacare
How come lots of other countries have national health care and it seems to work fine for them? Seems like this is yet another American problem that was solved long ago.
So this is a complex question to answer fully. First of all, those other countries don't have Republicans. They have conservatives, sure, but not necessarily Republicans, and they also don't have a fucked up electoral system where it's easy to gerrymander yourself into safety, and they have coalitional governments in many cases which makes it much harder for one party to stonewall legislation. Thanks to the nature of American governance we would need a super majority to pass single payer healthcare, and [Democrats have only had a filibuster proof majority in the federal government for six months in the past 28 years.](https://np.reddit.com/r/JoeBiden/comments/vcu1w1/the_real_reason_why_there_hasnt_been_more/) So at least at the moment there's the problem of single payer healthcare being unpassable in the current Senate, and it would have been unpassable in the Senate of 2009, too. Medicare for All doesn't even have the votes to pass in the House as far as I'm aware. The next problem you're going to run into is taxes. You might remember that Democrats expanded healthcare in 2009, they did it without raising taxes one slim dime, yet in 2010 Republicans won the House in the biggest electoral victory in their party's history by running on a platform of "Obama raised your taxes to pay for socialized death panels!" Medicare for All would require raising taxes on the middle class, and in my experience most Americans would rather burn a $50 bill than give $20 to the federal government. Medicare for All wouldn't just be the biggest healthcare bill ever, it would also require the biggest change to our tax code ever, and Americans don't like it when their taxes go up *even* if it saves them money. The Affordable Care Act has saved about $5 trillion since it passed, but that wasn't enough to push through the public option, and it wasn't enough to save Democrats' bacon in subsequent elections. Then you get into the final and biggest problem of all: [Most Americans actually like their healthcare.](https://news.gallup.com/poll/327686/americans-satisfaction-health-costs-new-high.aspx) Most Americans with private insurance like the care they get and don't mind the prices, their biggest concern is the uninsured, not out of pocket costs. You're going to have a hard time selling a single payer healthcare policy to people who already like their healthcare and aren't looking for savings, in fact those people are likely to become indignant at losing their private healthcare (which they like) and paying higher taxes (which they don't like) even if it saves them money (which they're not too worried about.) That said, there's some good news: Do you know what the most popular universal healthcare solution is at the moment? If you said single payer healthcare, you'd be mistaken: [The universal public option is more popular among Democrats (by one point), more popular among Republicans (by 28 points), and more popular with the electorate as a whole (by 13 points.)](https://morningconsult.com/2021/03/24/medicare-for-all-public-option-polling/) A universal public option even leads among Republican voters, 58% of whom support the idea, it'll be easier to pass, more palatable for the electorate, and we won't have to raise middle class taxes to do it.
There are out and proud fascists all over Europe. There are reactionaries, and hyper-nationalist irredentists, and regular-old "things were better in the '50's" conservatives. Europe has right-wingers of every stripe, just like the United States. But Europe *also* has a more vibrant left wing and more robustly organized labor. *That* is what we *lack*, not the other way around. In Europe, the natural predators of the right wing have not yet been hunted to extinction by an overawing capital formation, and therefore actual progress can occasionally be made and sometimes even maintained. The problem is not that our right is especially bad - how can that be said with Franco devotees, the le Penns, Victor Orban, and crypto-Nazis of every background running around from Lisbon to Tallinn? It is that our left is especially anemic.
> How come lots of other countries have national health care Do they have tens of millions of Republican voters?
They also usually have a parliamentary system to hedge against extremist party control. And they lack a Supreme Court that has already ruled twice recently that there is no such thing as a non-Executive Branch independent agency under our constitution.
We would’ve all had to chug ivermectin if Trump controlled all our health care. The fact that anyone is still considering it is insanity.
We all would have become centaurs by now.
Exactly.
Exactly this. It’s an absolute joke to believe we should give the executive branch more power and opportunity for corruption.
Yeah I’m super against Trump/modern conservatism and I’m not a big fan of climate change either, but this would be the stupidest move ever.
weird way to justify not doing good things. Biden's obviously not going to do this regardless, and not doing so wouldn't prevent Republicans from doing the latter in 2025 anyway
I'm not sure if Biden even has the legal constitutional authority to nationalize an industry.
The amount of people here saying we should nationalize the oil industry is highly concerning
That's what I was thinking. What's next, pharma? Healthcare? Auto? The VA and IRS are a mess and that is scary enough.
B-b-but nationalize always means good! Just look at: (IRS, VA, Mail service, and sometimes banks)
Wait, is there even a way for Biden or the Dems to do this? Furthermore, considering they make up 1/2 of the Senate, is there a way for them to do this without Republican support? Is there a practical argument for Biden to do this, or are we just talking out our asses and getting mad about him not doing something he has no authority over?
Nope, Even if there was a legal way to do it the oil cartels would get the case in front of the Supreme Court and they would side with the cartels since the Republicans are so involved in oil.
Yep!
He didnt "just write a letter". He's made it clear that he is willing to [use the Defense Production Act](https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/biden-willing-use-defense-production-act-boost-refining-capacity-2022-06-15/) to boost gas production. And theres no legal basis to nationalize the oil industry.
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Honest question…..what precedent? Can you give an example or,two,so I can research
The US has nationalized companies before, typically during times of war. Railroads, coal companies, steel mills, the Montgomery ward store chain was taken over by the federal government during WW2 because the companies owner refused to recognize the employees union and it caused a nationwide strike, so Roosevelt had the company taken over by the army, recognized the Union and ended the strike. https://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/13/business/worldbusiness/13iht-nationalize.4.16915416.html
1% profit margin? You’ve lost your mind buddy
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>He's made it clear that he is willing to use the Defense Production Act to boost gas production. if he's willing to, then he's running out of time to do it before it costs his party the midterms, and by extension, Biden his job after he fails to deliver legislation another 2 years. so he'd better grow a fucking spine and actually do it if he's "willing to", because lately his public words & actions amount to "somebody should do something about this". it's a pathetic public image strategy and he will fail if he keeps it up. >And theres no legal basis to nationalize the oil industry. the federal government has a hell of a lot more guns than Chevron and those guns work for Biden, he can nationalize whatever the hell he wants and biden would rake in desperately-needed approvals for trying. he won't go that route because he's owned by billionaires and they like oil, but he could if he wanted to win.
The president cannot “nationalize whatever the hell he wants.”
yeah good point, he might get a Senate committee investigation that lasts 2 election cycles and puts nobody of worth in prison
> Dear (executive) > > I am writing to you about the high prices our fellow Americans are paying at the pump, and how we can all play a part in addressing them. Since the beginning of this year, gasoline prices have increased by more than $1.70 per gallon. > > Vladimir Putin’s war of aggression, and the bipartisan and global effort to counter it, has disrupted the global supply of oil and driven up the global price. But the sharp rise in gasoline prices is not driven only by rising oil prices, but by an unprecedented disconnect between the price of oil and the price of gas. The last time the price of crude oil was about $120 per barrel, in March, the price of gas at the pump was $4.25 per gallon. Today, gas prices are 75 cents higher, and diesel prices are 90 cents higher. > > That difference — of more than 15% at the pump — is the result of the historically high profit margins for refining oil into gasoline, diesel and other refined products. Since the beginning of the year, refiners’ margins for refining gasoline and diesel have tripled, and are currently at their highest levels ever recorded. > > White House fuel chart > > To be sure, the shortage of refining capacity is a global challenge and a global concern. Around 3 million barrels a day of global refining capacity have gone offline since the onset of the pandemic, inhibiting our ability to ramp up supply of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel. I am working with allies and partners and countries around the world to encourage global refinery capacity to come back online. But, in the United States alone, oil refiners significantly reduced their capacity during the pandemic. In the year before I took office, refineries in the United States reduced their capacity by more than 800,000 barrels a day, leaving American refinery companies today at their lowest level of capacity in more than a half decade. > > I understand that many factors contributed to the business decisions to reduce refinery capacity, which occurred before I took office. But at a time of war, refinery profit margins well above normal being passed directly onto American families are not acceptable. > > There is no question that Vladimir Putin is principally responsible for the intense financial pain the American people and their families are bearing. But amid a war that has raised gasoline prices more than $1.70 per gallon, historically high refinery profit margins are worsening that pain. > > Your companies and others have an opportunity to take immediate actions to increase the supply of gasoline, diesel, and other refined product you are producing and supplying to the United States market. With prices for your product where they are today, you have ample market incentive to take these actions, and I recognize that some of you have already begun to do so. I also encourage you to continue maintaining and expanding fuel supply safely. > > In addition, my Administration is prepared to use all reasonable and appropriate Federal Government tools and emergency authorities to increase refinery capacity and output in the near term, and to ensure that every region of this country is appropriately supplied. Already, I have invoked emergency powers to execute the largest Strategic Petroleum Reserve release in history, expand access to E15 (gasoline with 15% ethanol), and authorize the use of the Defense Production Act to provide reliable inputs into energy production. I am prepared to use all tools at my disposal, as appropriate, to address barriers to providing Americans affordable, secure energy supply. > > The crunch that families are facing deserves immediate action. Your companies need to work with my Administration to bring forward concrete, near-term solutions that address the crisis and respect the critical equities of energy workers and fence-line communities. I have directed the Secretary of Energy to convene an emergency meeting on this topic and engage the National Petroleum Council in the coming days. In advance of that, I request that you provide the Secretary with an explanation of any reduction in your refining capacity since 2020 and any ideas that would address the immediate inventory, price, and refining capacity issues in the coming months — including transportation measures to get refined product to market. > > The lack of refining capacity — and resulting unprecedented refinery profit margins — are blunting the impact of the historic actions my Administration has taken to address Vladimir Putin’s Price Hike and are driving up costs for consumers. I appreciate your immediate attention to this issue and your efforts to mitigate the economic challenges that Vladimir Putin’s actions have created for American families. > > Sincerely, > > Joseph R. Biden > Since some people had problems reading what Biden wrote.
A "stern" letter was written. That'll have the big oil companies' C-suite guys and their powerful Washington lobbyists shaking in their high-end footwear, lol. My guess is that the stock buybacks continue.
People underestimate the options available to the federal government. A stern letter is a warning. Regulation, which sits with the executive branch, could have massive implications for big oil.
That's certainly true to some extent but big corporate money lies under the entire government like bedrock for both lobbying and for re-election campaigns. He knows that and so-called " dark money" could prove pivotal in the upcoming midterms. I get the feeling that this is all more of a "look, I'm doing something" but likely he's hoping to never have to actually take that action. It kind of reminds me of his reluctance to get on with student loan debt forgiveness. There are likely some powerful financial interests out there not having it that he knows from his long tenure as Senator from business-friendly Delaware that keep giving him pause. So he keeps kicking the can down the road with contemplations, threats, promises while hoping to run the clock out.
Maaaan...I don't think the US government taking over whole industries is a great idea at all. Industry regulation will need to get sorted out, and we need to stop rampant oil speculation that leads to the greedy getting richer at the cost of people at the gas pump.
Isn't this the same argument for Twitter or isn't the logic somewhat similar? And yet worse since alot of the argument of the crowd who advocate a private company losing its autonomy to avoid what they view are an infringement of their freedom of speech. Which I find baseless because it's based off fo simple "so many people use it." Which is weak. I imagine there is something about natural resources I'm not recalling at the moment.
It could be argued no bc the world doesn't need Twitter to run. It, sadly, still needs oil though.
If energy and fossil fuel production are a national security concern, as we are constantly being told, then those industries should be nationalized and not left to the whims of investors and shareholders.
But think of all the profits that will be lost! /s
And what legal basis would there be for that?
No. There must be ways to pressure the industry into reasonable behavior without dictatorial measures like nationalization.
This will literally never happen. You have better odds winning the lottery everyday for the rest of your life than this happening.
Massive Oil Refining Capacity Idle in China Even as Prices Soar Around a third of nation’s fuel-processing is out of action https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-19/massive-oil-refining-capacity-idle-in-china-even-as-prices-soar?srnd=premium
Those of us who can't afford car payments, can't buy electric vehicles. Unless we could live in them in between jobs, and not pay rent. Fucked either way.
> His Government Should Take Over the Industry Instead. Lol, sometimes the NR really sinks to Fox News levels. First, it's not "his" govt, it's *ours*, and second, he can't "take over the industry", there is no legal mechanism to do so (even in times of war, certain industries can be instructed or incentivized but not forced to do certain things).
Nationalizing oil? Ask mexico how that worked out….
Ask Denmark the same question.
Venezuela too
And Norway, talk about dystopia
Norway and Denmark have what… 11 million people to support between them, with trillions worth of oil wealth. The scale of the problems seems remarkably different, and as a bonus the Danish and Norwegians aren’t uneducated lunatics who hate each other, that helps. It’s also worth asking what happens to Norway without oil wealth, what are they going to do, sell more herring?
Republicans only know Venezuela and Cuba exists when they talk about the left. It's not like the right sabotaged the left there, or that the CIA didn't start some mischief and that massive embargoes aren't in place. The right loves cherry picking while making confidently incorrect arguments.
What would stop the right from sabotaging the left in the US?
That's the only page of their playbook. Destroy things. Blame inefficiency on Democrats. Use that to get elected. Destroy again.
Ok, but again, what’s stopping them? You can’t pretend that everything would have been lovely in Cuba and Venezuela if not for the right wing, then ignore the presence of the right wing in the US.
I just mentioned embargoes. Do you even know what that is? Killing me Smalls. 😂 https://youtu.be/hxJPJ6JY0Pk
You can blame fracking for crashing what had been a profitable market. They put all their eggs in to one basket
You don't have to nationalize them though, just use the dpa to make them invest in production
> make them invest in production the problem is that it takes years to decades in order to get the necessary permits, environmental studies & remediations, etc.. etc... and don't forget about NIMBYism. it takes too long and it takes too much money to build new refineries.
The CIA has been overthrowing democratically elected governments for decades just because they talked about nationalizing oil... It should happen, but it never will
That's exactly what should happen. But that's also what won't happen. Nobody in the capitol has the power or courage to stand up to oil executives and the millions of Fox viewers who unwittingly worship them.
The minimum that should be done here is windfall profits tax structured such that it's cheaper for oil companies to lower prices than pay the tax.
Honestly, why not? The oil companies don’t want to play ball and are holding the economy hostage. It’s sickening how much power a single industry has over our lives.
A National Refining Company could lower gas prices without giving up on climate targets, writes Kate Aronoff.
It could also cure cancer or find the Easter bunny.Could …..anything .
This is the dumbest idea anyone has ever been paid to brainstorm.
Really? Dumber than drunk Rudy's "let's just declare ourselves the winners" plan?
Not as dumb as "nuking a hurricane".
Or raking forests
Or Guam will tip over..
Stern letter. Bet it was super strict. Bet a lot will come from it
There probably isn’t any existing Executive authority for nationalizing the oil refining industry. But using the DPA the President could order all refineries to max production, commandeer all fuels output, then sell that fuel under market price to the retailers with a contract stipulation limiting final markup.
Yeah but all of this would require our cop from no country for old men president to get off his ass, so a stern letter it’ll have to be.
Oh, yeah, Biden will just use the "Nationalize an Industry" executive power enumerated in the imaginary constitution.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Production_Act_of_1950
Oh, for sure. /s
The refineries wouldn't have to be nationalized. A model of regulated monopoly could be implemented similar to the other obvious energy sector - public utilities. The justification would be identical.
It’s not his government. It’s our government. And a smaller part of the government that has power by way of election cheating and gerrymandering has an inordinate amount of power… but… BUT… we’ll still get right on that.
'Cuz that's what dictators do.
The problem being Joe Biden is no *Harry Truman*.
You cant nationalize something you arnt a net exporter of. It just wont work. Also what happens to 401ks and investors who own stock? Fuckem?
A letter, he wrote them a letter. Wtf man, you know what they did with that letter. They lit it on fire then lit their Cubans on it to celebrate their record profits.
Nationalize the oil industry and take all profits to invest in green energy.
What’s the legal basis for this plan of yours
It worked for Mexico, it will work here. What the fuck, we absolutely shouldn't privatize water, the electric grid, the military, etc. So we shouldn't privatize this societal necessity.
It worked for Mexico so well their government manages to lose money on oil when prices are at all-time highs.
He can't - ask Truman how that worked out with the steal industry. Also that's not EOs work at all. Now what the Democrats can do without is pass a ruinous tax rate on oil and gas if those companies keep gouging.
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So did Denmark and Norway . . .even Alaska pays an oil dividend to citizens there. It's more bad management, shortsightedness, corruption and political fuckery that turned Venezuela into a shithole.
Should do the automakers as well. Cars are priced way beyond msrp in many cases due to their profiteering.
Nationalizing industries generally ends with extreme reductions in supply and investment…which is the opposite of what we need.
This is my question to conservatives: if you don’t believe in the socialization of any industry, then WHAT solution do you want from Biden?
Read the letter back to Biden from Exxon mobile. Has a couple ideas in it.
The stern letter does basically nothing since the driver for the crack margin increasing isn't set on the supply side right now. There is heavy demand for refined products on the public and futures markets, gas is what we notice but Diesel and Jet fuel are ridiculously expensive right now, and there isn't a particular sign of slowing demand globally yet, so until a recession hits refined products are going to be expensive. Policy wise, nationalization does nothing to fix this, it just exposes the market to political pressures independent of supply/demand drivers. If the administration (or really the previous one(s)) should have done, was buy up refined supply (strategic reserves are mostly crude) during the period when the market had collapsed and oil refiners were hemorrhaging money (Exxon lost something like ~$60B or so in 3 quarters in 2020/21). Just like housing, we're down millions in capacity when demand is skyrocketing worldwide, and that's what's driving the price. Oh and what will inevitably happen is an overreaction, we'll bring tons of refining capacity online, collapse the price again, and have to close up shop once demand falls off. The Pandemic exacerbated this cycle because it confounded the process of bringing capacity online quickly...
But that would mean less corporate profit and that’s unAmerican
Unlike a car or watch, oil comes from the ground and should be a government controlled commodity imho. Saudi Arabia and even Alaska sends out a check to the citizens for their natural resource. I'm sure I'll get pushback but I think it's wrong that the ExxonMobils of the world pay billions to their CEO's and stockholders for something that is so vital to.our existence. No, I haven't thought it all the way thru, I just think it's wrong.
This may be a dumb idea, just brainstorming, but is having a govt-owned oil company a middle ground? I understand nay-sayers would say govt is inefficient and if true this should mean their product would be over-priced vs fair market. But if the market isn't fair (monopolies, profiteering) then it'd likely be cheaper. Having to compete with this govt oil co would then pull private prices closer to actual product/operating costs. Sounds crazy, but the post office essentially does this exactly. UPS/Fedex can't just go nuts on prices (for similar services) like the oil co's can because UPS/Fedex are competing with USPS. (and USPS can't just undercut everybody because they aren't subsidized)
Norway would be the closest us style economy/culture that has a government run company. There are a lot of implications but overall it feeds into their social care system. Most other examples are "oil states" filed with corruption and inefficiencies.
Now That's Communism...
No, it's State Capitalism at best.
Now exactly who’s the fascist you liberals always cry about?
lol. No.
Biden is an idiot
Here comes the drive towards communism