Idiot politicians, Stupid American public and Oil

So now the solution to gas prices is to give everyone $100.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,193327,00.html

Look, I'd like $100. Really, it'd be nice. However, this goes against so many of my political beliefs it's not funny.

1) It's income redistribution. - Don't look at me like that. If every taxpayer gets $100, regardless of what he paid in, it's income redistribution. I don't appreciate that. If you don't want my money, don't tax me. (This isn't a diatribe on taxes, so I'll stop here).

2) It fixes nothing. So you give me a hundred bucks, and I buy a couple tanks of gas with it. You've actually raised prices (this won't happen b/c people won't spend the money on gas, but let's pretend) by letting the increase in prices not stiffle short term demand.

3) Let's talk about the plus here - it opens ANWR for drilling. I've gotten in no less than 3 arguements from people saying "it's the oil companies, I mean you can't blame the tree huggers". That's EXACTLY who I blame. If we were drilling in ANWR and off the cost of FL, then oil wouldn't be at $75 a barrell, since supply would be up.

Let's take this further
a) Not allowing drilling in ANWR and FL
b) Boutique blends of gasoline, including summer and regional blends that reduce refining capacity and create pockets of fuel that cannot be used in other places
c) Opposing nuclear power plants, instead having plants that use oil.
d) Lack of new refineries.

Granted none of the above fix the instability in Iran and Nigeria that is helping to drive oil up, but it would certainly mitigate it.

Speaking of which, Qatar says oil prices would drop if people would shut up and stop inciting panic. Not sure about that, but it seems easy enough to try. Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid... want to see?

http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/06/front2453851.3097222224.html

I'm all for being energy independent. The best way to do that is to create DOMESTIC sources of energy. Yeah, alternative technologies are great, and eventually they'll be mastered but it's not happening right away. It'll take 15 years to replace the automobile supply in America. We're flat out not going to conserve ourselves out of the problem.

A better arguement for domestic consumption is who we're propping up. Take a look at this link.

http://www.reason.com/0605/fe.rb.peak.shtml

"Economides worries that the conventional wisdom that oil-producing countries do not want to cause a global economic recession is wrong. “The danger posed by the axis of energy militants—Venezuela, Iran, and, increasingly, Russia under President Vladimir Putin—is that they could not care less,” he says. “These militants hardly have functioning real economies whose workings would be adversely affected by a recession.”

This is the part I think is key.

But seriously, how are we going to fix the problem, when most Americans think it's as simple as Exxon price gouging?