Kate, was Bachmann good enough to tell us how?
Let’s say she can get rid of the entire federal fuel surcharge. That’s 18.4 cents per gallon, which would get us down to $3.39 a gallon. What’s next?
The U.S. increased its oil production by more than any other country in 2009, and still accounted for six to ten percent of global oil production (depending on how you measure). I think we should drill domestically wherever we can and that that should be a part of any plan to stabilize energy prices, but remember: oil is priced, bought, and sold globally. Is there any evidence, anywhere, that we can tap enough untapped oil and boost global supply enough to move prices to the degree Bachmann promises? Better yet: even if we could, would granting new drilling leases any place they were wanted (including national parks and the like) in 2013 be felt at the pump during a President Bachmann’s first term?
The only policies I can think of that would surely accomplish the $2.00 a gallon target are:
1) The seizure by force and nationalized exploitation of a large proportion of the world’s oil supply.
2) The massive federal subsidization of fuel costs.
3) The fomenting of a second global recession as bad as or worse than the last one, complete with negative global GDP growth.
Am I missing something?
Let me say again: We should increase domestic production and expand drilling. But not because it will, by itself, cut gas prices in half. It won’t by a long-shot.
Commenters are already making the point under Kate’s post, and I think there’s truth to it, that this has shades of Obama’s “the rise of the oceans will begin to slow” bit. It’s also unbecoming of a conservative candidate for the presidency in that implies way, way, way, way, way (way) too much economic power in that office. Way too much.
Bachmann on a mind-dump role reminds me of Bluto Blutarsky on a mind-dump role in Animal House.
P.S. Man, I miss that kind of inchoate inanity...
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Forget it, [s]he's on a roll."
(And now I have the idea of Ron Paul playing "Stork" in my head)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis remark by Bachmann does seem to be a groaner, all right. I hope a civil inquiry of her elicits some soothing elaboration from her.
That said, it is not a Bachmann deal breaker for this voter.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Kate, was Bachmann good enough to tell us how?"
I believe she's going to use the same machine Obama used to lower the level of the ocean.
:-)
Every time Bachmann takes a step forward, she takes two steps back within a day or so. She's not crazy and she's not stupid, but she's also not ready for prime time - which is one of the few areas where she really does resemble Sarah Palin.
Running a national campaign under the scrutiny (and against the opposition) of the national press isn't something you just walk into. You need to be coached and to practice. Palin was badly served in this regard by the nitwits around John McCain, and Bachmann has been ill-served by her own staff and some of her more experienced supporters.
Bachmann has been very useful in firing up the base and showing Pawlenty the door, but I think her contribution to the 2012 election is approaching its sell-by date. I give her a dozen or so major gaffes before she simply vanishes in the wake of Perry and Romney. (And possibly Palin and Christie if they get in.)
Regards,
Joe
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSimply with every passing day Bachmann shows herself to bean undisciplined and unfocused campaigner who has no business running for president. The math simply doesn't work. Federal taxes and exploration would bring the price down, but there are other price variables over which no president could possibly control. Shooting from the hip may seem like a good idea until you shoot yourself in the foot, in this case, over and over.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI believe Bachmann is looking for a way to pull the spotlight off Perry and back to herself, where it rested for, oh, ten minutes after the Ames straw poll win, upstaged by the Perry entry.
It is the very fact that it's difficult to see how she could fulfill this pledge that is the biggest clue - reporters will have to go ask her. That is one way to spark media interest at a time when she's gone, in less than a week, from frontrunner (Ames) to distant third place.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"That is one way to spark media interest at a time when she's gone, in less than a week, from frontrunner (Ames) to distant third place."
thanks for your opinion. is the daily kos missing an idiot?
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"We should increase domestic production and expand drilling. But not because it will, by itself, cut gas prices in half. It won’t by a long-shot. "
yea because opening up large areas of the us to drilling and gutting stupid regs won't affect futures markets at all. some real dense people at nro.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt is strange how there is an odd blindness to this fact. Oil prices tumbled when Bush played with the offshore drilling moratorium--doesn't anyone remember that?
There's one thing, Daniel, that she can do that will start oil prices downward--re-affirm the end of the offshore drilling moratorium.
Here's another--get rid of Obama's de facto Gulf moratorium.
That's two.
Here's a third--announce that regulations restricting the building of new refineries are going to be loosened to something sane.
That's three.
There are so many things that can be done to get the price of gas to under $2. Why can't you see any of them?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt is strange how there is an odd blindness to this fact. Oil prices tumbled when Bush played with the offshore drilling moratorium--doesn't anyone remember that?
There's one thing, Daniel, that she can do that will start oil prices downward--re-affirm the end of the offshore drilling moratorium.
Here's another--get rid of Obama's de facto Gulf moratorium.
That's two.
Here's a third--announce that regulations restricting the building of new refineries are going to be loosened to something sane.
That's three.
There are so many things that can be done to get the price of gas to under $2. Why can't you see any of them?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe price of oil or any other commodity is susceptible to events (like Bush and offshore drilling). But the price didn't stay lower for very long.
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Sure, if we opened up ANWR to drilling, the price of oil would drop--for about six months, as speculators fled oil temporarily. And then it would start rising again.
The only thing that produced a real long-lasting drop in the price of oil was the deep recession the world got itself into after the financial market problems of 2008. A deep recession reduces demand for raw materials. But we can't have a permanent slowdown in our economy just to reduce the price of oil.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe market will set the right price for energy resources if government will stop interfering with the market.
If government will stop interfering, the market will also drive an exactly appropriate level of development of alternative energy sources. But it's likely -- since much of the government interference in the market takes the form of artificially constricting supply of cost-effective sources from cost-effective locations -- that current prices would drop if government got out of the regulation game.
No one -- Democrat or Republican, including both Barack Obama and Michelle Bachmann -- is smart enough to do a better job of this than free market forces would do if government would simply get out of the picture.
Beyond maintaining a genuine strategic defense reserve (which we're not doing, and which Obama has undercut), the government has no business being in this business. And that's the beginning and end of what Bachmann, or any GOP candidate, should be saying about gasoline prices, or about energy in general.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOil is priced in dollars. She would take steps to strengthen the dollar.
See John Tamny on how Reagan knew that commodity prices would fall due to his election.
"For background, it's worth mentioning that not long after he was inaugurated as our 40th president, Ronald Reagan predicted a fall in the price of a barrel of oil. What made Reagan so confident?
Aware of the historical relationship between gold and oil, Reagan deduced that oil was due for a correction based on a 20% drop in the price of an ounce of gold since his election. Sure enough, by December of 1981 the price of a barrel of oil was nearly 20% lower than it had been one year before."
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Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMeh. Much ado about nothing.
I distinctly remember GWB promising to lower oil prices in one of his election campaigns. Nothing new there. Bachmann's mistake was probably to pinpoint a price per gallon figure.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI don't see a major problem with this prediction, if only because crude prices are driven by the future expectations of supply. If policies are clearly implemented that will increase drilling and refining as well as strengthen the U.S. dollar than the only thing left to keep gas prices at late-90s levels instead of early-90s levels would be a concerted effort by O.P.E.C. to cut off their own noses.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDear friend who is probably to the right of Bachmann and who loved Palin just declared Bachmann insane.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBachmann is a fine congresswoman. She's not ready for the presidency. She also has no more executive experience than did Obama.
She misreads how her statements will be taken, miscues followers, and it is appearing that her staff is essentially at or near the limits of their capability.
Like it or not, at the moment it's a Perry-Romney race and (for what it's worth) I'll go with the Texan.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"... but remember: oil is priced, bought, and sold globally."
Does it have to be?
There are export restrictions on many items. Why not American oil? I am not saying that this particular idea is the solution. What I am saying is that contract terms do not have to be unchanging.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis is commissar thinking.
It's been tried. It failed. It will always fail.
It's a very, very stupid idea -- so stupid that it could only be taken seriously by statists (i.e., Democrats).
Are you a troll?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe price of oil isn't determined solely by real supply and demand; it is determined to a large extent by OPEC, a cartel that turns the spigots on and off based on what it feels it can get away with. When President Bush lifted the ban on U.S. offshore oil exploration in 2008, the price of oil immediately dropped $10 a barrel despite not a single drop of oil having been added to the world supply. If a President Bachmann were to remove all impediments to drilling for oil in ANWR, the Gulf of Mexico (including the Florida coast, other offshore areas, etc., and provided incentives for the recovery of shale oil, tar-sand oil and other potentially large reserves within the U.S., it wouldn't bring about a quick increase in the amount of oil being pumped in the U.S., but it would likely lead OPEC to lower prices so as to try to forestall investments in oil recovery within the U.S. (no matter what tax or other incentives the federal government provides for the recovery of shale oil, no one will invest to recover it if oil prices have dropped to $60 a barrel).
Would OPEC lowering oil prices, combined with a reduction in the federal gasoline tax, be enough to lower prices to $2.00 a gallon? Well, maybe not, but my point is that one can't just assume that reductions in the price of gas that could come about by a president pushing pro-drilling policies are merely a measure of the effect on the real oil supply of an increase in domestic production.
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