The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights (FTCR) this week exposed internal oil company memos that show how the industry intentionally reduced domestic refining capacity to drive up profits. The exposure comes in the wake of Hurricane Katrina as the oil industry blames environmental regulation for limiting the number of US refineries.
According to FTCR, three main oil and gasoline companies, Mobil, Texaco, and Chevron, worked together through their lobbying arm, the American Petroleum Institute, to pressure refining companies to close facilities in the 1990s to force up the price of gas.
"This calamity has brought home an inescapable truth: We cannot afford George W. Bush’s atrocious war in Iraq."
The memos show the oil companies’ concern that if refinery production weren't cut, the companies wouldn't see "any substantial increase" in their bottom lines.
"Large oil companies have for a decade artificially shorted the gasoline market to drive up prices," said FTCR president Jamie Court. "Oil companies know they can make more money by making less gasoline. Katrina should be a wakeup call to America that the refiners profit widely when they keep the system running on empty."
Oil Companies and Human Rights, No Seriously
An Amnesty International report released this week shows that ExxonMobil, the main company that operates the Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline, and its partners have bought their way out of obeying human rights laws in those two countries.
According to the report, "The investment agreements governing the project risk seriously undermining the ability and willingness of Chad and Cameroon to protect their citizens’ human rights, making the oil companies de facto unaccountable in the pipeline zone. In effect, the parties to the agreements – the governments of Chad and Cameroon and the ExxonMobil-led oil consortium, which also includes Chevron Corporation of the US and Petronas Bhd of Malaysia – have contracted out of their human rights responsibilities."
The report concludes that the legal agreements governing the project place a "price tag" on human rights by creating financial penalties for the governments of Chad and Cameroon to protect human rights. The agreement require the two countries to pay large fines if they interrupt the operation of the pipeline or oil-fields – even when making an intervention to protect rights and enforce laws that apply elsewhere in their countries.
As you might have guessed, the World Bank played a large role in the creation of this agreement by lending its support and providing access to loans to fund the project, showing no concern for the rights and needs of the people living in the area. Amnesty already is reporting that local people who have objected to the construction of the pipeline in their communities as a health and environmental risk are being intimidated and arrested.
Anything to keep control over the oil supply.
Bush and Republicans Offer No Solution to High Gas Prices
According to Anna Aurilio, Legislative Director of the Public Interest Research Group, the Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress have failed to respond adequately to skyrocketing gas prices.
While consumers have done their part to increase use of public transportation, carpooling, and drive less and more carefully, the administration and the Republicans, so closely allied with the large multinational oil companies, simply have failed to develop a viable policy to reduce the cost of gas and oil to consumers.
Aurilio offered a handful of solutions to the crisis.
First, she said, reduce oil consumption by raising the federal standards on gasoline mileage in new cars and trucks. Aurilio said that technology exists to raise this requirement to an average of 40 miles per gallon over the next ten years, reducing oil consumption by as much as one-third.
Second, Aurilio added, Congress should provide subsidies to consumers to trade in older model cars for newer cars that have better gas mileage. Such incentives could easily be funded by repealing massive tax breaks to already very wealthy and successful oil companies as was just passed this summer in the Republican authored Energy Bill.
Third, Aurilio concluded, the government needs to investigate seriously charges of price gouging and strengthen laws that are designed to protect consumers from exploitation.
Aurilio did not discuss the impact of cuts in local and state budgets for public transportation caused by cuts in grants from the federal government. Massive investment in public transportation, buses, rail, etc., would also have an enormous impact on reduction of oil consumption.
Bush Administration Rationale for Forcing Local Authorities to Enforce Immigration Laws Flawed
This week, the ACLU released a secret memo obtained from the Department of Justice that reveals the flawed rationale for new and controversial features of Bush administration immigration policy. In 2002, Bush administration officials ordered a radical shift in immigration policy when it asked local and state police to make immigration arrests.
According to the ACLU, this new policy immediately raised alarm in many quarters. Immigrant advocates and many law enforcement officials believe that state and local police should not engage in immigration enforcement because immigrants will be afraid to report crime or interact with the police.
Further, the ACLU stated, immigration enforcement takes police resources away from important public-safety missions. State and local police, who lack specialized training, will fail to properly evaluate whether individuals are in compliance with the highly technical immigration laws, and increased racial profiling, discrimination and costly litigation will result.
When members of Congress, law enforcement agencies, and immigrant and civil rights advocates asked to see the memo that outlined the administration's rationale for this new policy, the Department of Justice refused to release this memo. It became available only recently as a result of a court order.
According to ACLU legal experts, the Justice Department had good reason for not wanting to make their rationale public. The memo's arguments are faulty and fraught with misreadings of case law and court decisions, and are full of politically motivated legal arguments.
"The government has pushed forward a dangerous and unwise immigration arrest policy," said Omar Jadwat, an ACLU staff attorney on immigration issues. "It's not surprising to find that the legal justification for that policy was in fact faulty. This is a reminder that openness and full debate should be hallmarks of the policymaking process, rather than secrecy and incomplete reasoning."
Jay Bybee, the Justice Department attorney who authored the erroneous memo, will likely soon see his political fortunes on the rise, if Bush's past choices for high office are any indication. Bybee's rightward ideological leanings are more important to Bush than his competence.
Communist Party Demands Full Support for Katrina Victims
In a statement released late last week, the Communist Party, USA (CPUSA) denounced the slow response of the Bush administration to the Hurricane Katrina disaster that cost the lives of thousands along the Gulf Coast.
The CPUSA expressed its fullest sympathy and solidarity with all the people who are suffering from the effects of the hurricane, especially the infants, children and seniors, who are the most vulnerable.
The statement demanded that the "full weight of the federal government [be thrown] behind rescue and recovery efforts."
Failure to provide adequate relief, the statement read, would be a "racist, anti-working class crime."
Additionally, the administration’s effort to blame individuals, local and state officials for the disaster "is a cop-out."
The statement also contrasted the Bush administration's quick action and concerted efforts to push appropriations bills that funded the war and occupation of Iraq, tax cuts for the rich, and other policies that enriched large corporations.
The CPUSA called for a massive infusion of federal aid to the victims of the disaster and the return of National Guard units from Iraq.
"This calamity," read the statement, "has brought home an inescapable truth: We cannot afford George W. Bush’s atrocious war in Iraq."
The CPUSA called for the repeal of the Bush tax cuts for the rich and large cuts in military spending in order to pay for rebuilding New Orleans and other areas affected by the disaster, but also to rebuild impoverished and broken down urban areas across the country that face similar problems New Orleans faced on the eve of the hurricane.
The statement also called for an end to price gouging and profiteering by the oil companies from the disaster and a concerted federal effort to combat global warming by reducing greenhouse emissions.
