Addiction

Flipping through the channels today, the only interesting thing I found on the tube was c-span coverage of the Senate Judiciary Committee. They were discussing the problems we are experiencing in this country with oil companies. Evidently, since 1991 or something, the five major oil companies have gone from owning about 25%-30% of the nation's shares of oil to over 50%. And they seem to be engaging in cooperative actions to price fix and under sell the small-time competition. Also, last year, Exon-Mobile, the biggest of the oil companies posted the largest profits ever for any company in the United States. Yet consumers are paying more for oil and gas than ever before, and people are being forced to survive the winter without heat because they can't afford to heat their house and eat. It doesn't take much to begin believing that something needs to be done.

Evidently Senators on the Judiciary Committee felt the same way. I was impressed by the proceedings of the committee. Evidently, there was bipartisan support for a bill aimed at changing the anti-trust laws and heading towards solving this problem of our addiction to oil. This bipartisanship is nice for me to see. They just aren't doing anything drastic enough to fix the oil problem, in my opinion. But I'm sure my drastic measures would create economic havoc and not be feasible. As much as I hate to admit it, the Judiciary Committee is probably going about it the best way they can.