Mr. President, Mind Your Own Business
By Kevin
I do not appreciate the President telling me how or how much to sacrifice in response to a regional natural disaster. I will not play a game of "pretend" so that he may play "good steward" in front of the national press:
Two other points I want to make is, one, we can all pitch in by using -- by being better conservers of energy. I mean, people just need to recognize that the storms have caused disruption and that if they're able to maybe not drive when they -- on a trip that's not essential, that would helpful. The federal government can help, and I've directed the federal agencies nationwide -- and here's some ways we can help. We can curtail nonessential travel. If it makes sense for the citizen out there to curtail nonessential travel, it darn sure makes sense for federal employees. We can encourage employees to carpool or use mass transit. And we can shift peak electricity use to off-peak hours. There's ways for the federal government to lead when it comes to conservation.Mr. President, I'm glad you're temporarily easing regulatory restrictions to reduce bottlenecks, and show a desire for greater refining capacity. But I have a few questions:
First, I'd like to know why it takes a disaster for politicians to realize that protecting existing refineries from competition has a real cost. If we need refining capacity now, then we needed it last year. Why isn't that capacity in place today?
Second, I'd like to know just why I should conserve. We supposedly live in a capitalist society based on property-rights and free-trade; why, all of a sudden, do you ask that I not trust that the price of fuel incorporates all the scarcities at every level of production? What economic lever broke in the past month? Why do you think the price system is failing so bad that we need to "conserve" more than the price signal warrants?
I won't pretend that market prices don't exist, or that markets have suddenly stopped working; I won't pretend that prices are inefficient allocators of resources; I won't pretend that I cannot buy as much gasoline as I can afford at current prices.
Furthermore, Mr. President, I will not pretend that you have legal or moral authority to tell me how much gasoline I may purchase. I will not pretend that your feeble call to use less has any impact whatsoever on my psyche. I will not pretend that the Federal Government knows better than me how much gasoline I should purchase.
In addition, you will be horrified to note that I will not pretend that $3 a gallon gasoline affects my personal driving habits. That's because at my personal margin, it doesn't. I drive 5000 miles a year, and my car gets 30 mpg, meaning I now pay about 10 cents a mile for gasoline to drive, for a total of $500 a year. This is not too much higher than the 6.7 cents ($333) I was paying when gasoline was $2 a gallon. That's about 50 cents a day more than before. I will not change my driving habits for 50 cents a day. I will not pretend that I am driving a Hummer.
I will buy as much gasoline as Sunoco and Exxon and Coastal are willing to supply me at market rates; and there's no reason for me to conserve any more than their prices tell me I should. It doesn't make sense for this citizen to curtail travel, so maybe it doesn't make sense for federal employees to curtail travel either...
A few more questions: How much gasoline do your advisors think will be saved by your plea to conserve? How will that affect prices? How many votes will you gain from a conservation stance? Do you really believe this stuff?
I'd say that it's time your government got out of my gas tank, and kept to minding its own business.
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