Selling gas retail has Exxon feeling guilty about getting so damn rich. So to even things up they are selling their stations. Maybe now all those envious people that hated to see "Big Oil" sticken it to the "common man" can now cashin on a huge oppertunity and get FILTHY RICH! Here is the story: Despite the pain at the pump for consumers, the retail side of the gasoline business isn't that profitable, if at all. Gas station owners have known this all along. Most now hope they get enough traffic at their stations to make money on auto repairs or food and drink sales. Exxon Mobil, proclaimed by the no-drill demagogues to be the poster child for gas gouging, recognizes this as well, deciding to unload its 800 company-owned stations and an additional 1,400 dealer-operated locations to distributors. Still, Democrats will say Exxon and its unindicted co-conspirators still make obscene profits. The fact is that American oil companies in 2007 had an 8.3% profit margin, compared with 8.9% for all U.S. manufacturing. The cigarette and beverage companies' profit margin was 19.1%. Drug companies made 18.4%. Nobody complains about profits made by politically connected ethanol producers such as Archer Daniels Midland. Since February 2006, the congressionally mandated use of heavily subsidized and energy-inefficient ethanol has caused the price of corn, wheat and soybeans to increase more than 200%. Isn't this price-gouging? The ability of an Exxon Mobil to manipulate profits is a myth. As Stephen Simon of Exxon Mobil pointed out in the recent congressional show trial, America's largest oil and gas corporation accounts for only 3% of global oil production and 6% of global refining capacity. It controls only 1% of global petroleum reserves. Price — and profits — are driven by global supply and demand. Yes, price is also driven by speculators. But the way to increase supply, and punish speculators, is to drill wherever oil exists in the U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, on whose watch gas prices have increased 75%, says "the fact is we can't drill our way out of this problem." Tell that to Joe Sixpack filling up his pickup on the way to work. Pelosi would rather continue to send $500 billion a year to the likes of Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, who spends the money undermining U.S interests and funding an armed insurrection against U.S. ally Colombia. We already drill in Alaska. More than 15 billion barrels of oil have been sent down the Alaska pipeline from Prudhoe Bay, just 60 miles west of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, over the last three decades, much more than the six months' supply predicted by critics. As Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman notes, the development "footprint" would be minimal: "ANWR, in its totality, is about the size of South Carolina, and the area where we believe the hydrocarbons are located is about the size of Delaware, not to mention the exploration site would be no larger than about the size of (Boston's) Logan International Airport." As for the "pristine" wilderness, the tiny portion of ANWR where drilling would occur is what hell would look like if it ever froze over. Winter on the coastal plain lasts for nine months. Total darkness reigns for 58 days. The temperature drops to 70 degrees below zero without the wind chill. Your spit freezes before it hits the ground. Unfortunately, GOP nominee John McCain's energy policy has been, well, inconsistent. He opposes drilling in ANWR because he considers it a historical treasure like the Grand Canyon. Two House Republicans previously opposed to drilling in ANWR, Reps. Jim Walsh of New York and Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland, announced Thursday that they'd now support drilling there. Some would call it flip-flopping. We'd call it coming to your senses. Bartlett said: "There will be environmental impact (but) I believe the environmental impact pales compared to the need." Technology has advanced since we drilled the first well in Prudhoe Bay. Similarly, to get the trillion barrels in the shale rock in the Green River formation out west, we don't have to strip-mine the Rockies. According to the Rand Corporation, the up to 1.8 trillion barrels of oil can be extracted safely with a new technology which uses superheated steam to extract the oil from the porous rock. All John McCain has to do is do what his congressional colleagues have done — concede that the need and benefits to extract the huge reserves under American soil and in American waters for the American people exceed the risks. The country will then say thank you, President McCain. A clear majority wants to drill here, and drill now. Otherwise, we all may be riding a caribou to work.
