A U.S. senator — a Democrat – is taking a strong stand against a bill introduced by a fellow Democrat that would end energy subsidies for big oil companies.
In a speech on the Senate floor Wednesday, Sen. Mary Landrieu, from the oil-producing state of Louisiana, said the bill introduced by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) targets an industry that supports 9.2 million jobs and contributes more than 7.7 percent to U.S. gross domestic product.
Ending energy subsidies for oil and gas companies, she said, will not reduce gas prices, but it will eliminate jobs.
Landrieu also took a swipe at states such as Michigan that produce no energy of their own: “There are a lot of states that don’t produce, don’t conserve, aren’t efficient, and all they want to do is yell about high gas prices,” she said.
“I’ll tell you, if we passed a law that said every state in America had to produce the energy it needed, we’d have an energy policy all right,” Landrieu said.
“Just like in the old days, if you wanted food, you produced it. Every state in America, all 50, if you consume energy, you need to produce something. You can produce it by wind, you could produce it by hydro, you could produce it by nuclear, you could stop driving all your automobiles and everybody walk. You could give everybody a bicycle — we don’t care.”
Landrieu noted that Louisiana, on the other hand, is doing a great job in providing for itself:
“We produce enough energy for everybody in our state, what we need — and we export it to everyone else in America that needs it. And what do we get? We get bills like this (the Menendez bill) that go after, directly, the big companies in our state, that work in our states, to somehow put them in a position to make them feel like they’re not really good companies, they’re not American companies, they don’t pay tax, they get all these subsidies. I’m going to read into the record what taxes they pay. It’s going to surprise you. And then on top of that, we get moratoriums. We get ‘permitoriums.’ We can’t even drill for the oil we have. We can’t even look for the oil we might have.”
Sen. Landrieu said her constituents ask her — since Louisiana produces so much energy for the country — why are Louisianans paying $4 a gallon for gasoline?
Oil producing states should be helped to produce more, she said: “But we get shut down by bureaucracy, moratoriums, permitoriums, rules, regulations, EPA, refuges…”
Landrieu said U.S. oil and natural gas companies pay more than $86 million to the federal government in both income taxes and production fees every day. In addition, she said, since 2000, the oil and gas industry has invested almost $1.7 trillion in U.S. capital projects to advance all forms of energy, including alternatives, while reducing the industry’s environmental footprint.
As for energy subsidies — Landrieu said it might surprise American taxpayers to know that of the $16.6 billion spent on U.S. energy subsidies over the course of one year, oil and gas subsidies account for less than 13 percent of the total, while renewable fuels, such as refined coal, nuclear, solar and hydro, account for more than 85 percent.
A show trial. But evidently one that not all the Democrats — being asked to sacrifice to the narrative for the greater good — are willing to support.
Somewhere, Sarah Palin is smiling. With an unpresidential twang.
Kind of sad that it comes down to someone with the intellectual firepower of Senator Landrieu to have to fight back.
It gets even better. Rush had a clip this morning on Jay Rockerfeller getting all sanctimonious during those hearings. The Oil Executive responded to his false comment about subsidies and said they are not and do not seek subsidies. What they want is to be able to exercise leases that they have paid for and use the captial they have invested in and put their crews back to work. Rockerfeller said something about shared burdens, and the executive corrected him and said the goal is sharred prosperity.
Rockerfeller hated that.
As Rush noted that executive could have continued with, “Of course Senator, not all of us were born with a big fat Standard Oil funded trust that we could tap into.”
Wow. Democrats being slapped with their own no-skin-in-the-game argument? And from one of their own?
Delicious, it is.
Speaking of twang, have you noticed how much flack Obama is getting from the Left about his faux-folksy speech mannerisms? About his oddly-inflected, clipped, decidedly unPresidential delivery?
Neither have I.
New Jersey would have been a better choice to use as an example than my Michigan.
Good for her. This definitely puts that damper on the Democtrats desired narrative™ and more of these fissures should be exploited.
Like when the debt ceiling vote comes up, and the inevitable hew and cry starts, I’m praying that just one reporter ask Schumer on camera about all of his votes against such an action in the past…
Besides, that 2 billion a year the Democrats are talking about in glowing terms of relieving the tax burden on Americans? Yeah, that comes out to roughly 6.667 dollars a person.
Which, of course, will be passed on to us anyway.
I’m no shill for the oil companies, but despite their large profits, their margins are actually less than average for US industries.
That’s something that any person of passing intellectual curiosity ought to be aware of.
geoffb: Thank you, I was going to look for teh same thing because where I work we have a little knowledge about the subject.
Microsoft, for example, made nearly $19 billion on revenues of about $63b, which makes their profit margin right around 30%.
Exxon Mobil, on the other hand, made $30b on sales of $383b. Profit margin under 8%. The last time there was this kind of outrage at Exxon Mobil and others, XOM’s profit margin wasn’t much over 5%.
Your typical leftoid would be happy if we broke up XOM and the other large oil companies into so many Baby Bells, which would in turn require a fracturing of refinery and storage facilities, into a zillion small companies whose profit numbers were modestly small, even if their respective profit margins were all over 10%.
Logic!
Heh. Sarah Palin could have written that screed. It’s nice to see a Dem finally getting some smarts.
As I recall from a previous gas-price flare-up, at that time the oil companies’ take from the sale of a gallon of gas turned out to be less than a quarter of the government’s take.
I once dropped that into a discussion about obscene oil company profits and things suddenly got very quiet.
For about ten seconds, then everybody demanded to see my Big Oil pay stub.
If you’re arguing against the received wisdom of progressives, you simply must be a shill for the opposition.
XOM pretax income $53 bn. Income taxes paid $21.6 bn. Effective tax rate? 40.75%
Profit margin? 8%
Who makes out better from oil & gas companies? Investors or the government? You decide.
One of Dan’s contributors had the skinny on the latest tax rates on gasoline
http://powip.com/2011/04/explain-to-a-simple-girl-how-does-raising-taxes-lower-prices/
Where I live in NY, the profit per gallon is on the order of 25 cents, and the tax is more than twice that amount. Of course, it’s a big state with a lot of roads to keep up. But still, with the large number of drivers, you’d think the volume would allow less of a gun-to-the-head rate.
Gasoline taxes are mostly not tax rates; they are excise per gallon. So when you’re converting to tax rates, realize that the high price of gasoline makes effective gas tax rates lower. In other words, for a constant sales volume (in gallons), the government’s take is largely independent of the cost of gasoline.
Which is one reason why you see people talking up raising gasoline taxes: they’ve realized that the government’s cut as a percentage is shrinking, when the price goes up.
SHIT….just shit. Ok, look, Gas is basically a loss leader in my business. Less than a dime a gallon profit, yet my bays used to pay out all my overhead, the wages, taxes, mandatory Shell purchases etc…
It’s been a LONG time since I sold the franchise, but I can’t think the ratio has changed all that much.
As far as the post goes? Drill and frack baby, Drill and frack…
Sorry, but these Dem senators live in an alternate reality. if you make more than $15,00 a year, you are screwed. Really.
I, too, think that we should let the middle East control this country, and let their oil money be distributed to radical Islamists. And I also believe that anyone who works his (or her) butt off should be punished, and their money given to illegal immigrants and crack addicts
Obama is an absolute jerk, and has no regard for history – remember Hitler and Pol Pot (not to mention Lenin, Stalin, and Mao). He is a “black man” (Don’t make me laugh) who HATES the fact that the USA has become the most amazing society in history because our constitution prohibits any jerk like Obama from eating the country alive.
OOPS! My bad!
Fudge the Constitution, because “I’M GONNA GET OBAMA CASH!!!! NO MORE MORGAGE PAYMENTS! NO MORE PAYING FOR ANYTHING!
Fucking idiots.
You forgot his secret stach Zino. where the poor morons can just reach in his pocket, and with less satisfaction than from tthe devil with the blue dress? MONEY!!!
Unless I’m mistaken, that’s not necessarily the case for all the states Slart. I’ll have to look up which ones, but I recall in the last gas price spike New Jersey was one of the ones that went from price based model to quantity based.
BBL
Your typical leftoid would be happy if we
broke up XOM and the other large oil companies into so many Baby Bells, which would in turn require a fracturing of refinery and storage facilities, into a zillion small companies whose profit numbers were modestly small, even if their respective profit margins were all over 10%.nationalized them.Fixt that for you.
The profits then, of course, could be used to fund schools.
The profits then, of course, could be used to fund
schoolsteacher unions.Such a cynic, newrouter.
Think of Teh Children™.
So this asshole is from New Jersey? Why am I not surprised?
“Jersey Shore” is as real as it gets. The southern half of the stste is very redneck and quite untamed, but the northern part (and the beautifull coast) are well captured in “Jersey Shore”.
Those people on “Jersey Shore” are not Jersey misfits, they are the true northern New Jersey-ites. Ever been to Camden? Hohokus? Hold your nose, Bubba, and be careful of humongous fake tits…
I think they were spawned in NYC, where ego trumps intellect, and only one in 350,000 women (and men) are worth a second glance (or chance)…And with their sprawling intellects, they figured that the Jersey shore would make them seem human, because, after all, BIG TITS and an empty head are the most important human qualities.
Well, I do have to say that Six Flags (NJ) is awesome. Just don’t bother with the “Safari” It will make you feel shitty, and make you realize that monkeys aren’t cute. They are probably in a dead heat with rats for the dirtiest creatures that walk the earth.
and DON’T give them bananas (you racists) because thety will tear each others eyes out for a bite that is already in another’s mouth.
Yup. Been there, too…
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I guess I wasn’t looking ahead far enough, Carin.