SNAKE OIL SALES DECLINING?

Following a new Rasmussen poll, showing that 67% of Americans support offshore oil drilling, the candidate of change shifts his position again.  Barack Obama now says he would accept offshore drilling as part of a comprehensive energy plan.


That admission, whether sincere or not, is significant. Obama’s energy policy has always mirrored that of the greater Democratic party---imposed conservation (even if it means lowering the citizen’s standard of living) and pursuing pipe dreams (technology not ready for prime time).  Oil was consistently presented as more of a curse than a vital necessity.


The Rasmussen poll indicates Americans now realize that such policies are incapable of solving our energy crisis.  In fact, they produced it.  By obstructing the building of new refineries for three decades, limiting circumstances in which drilling could occur, and designating our richest oil resources off limits, politicians hatched the chickens now coming home to roost.


Obama’s acceptance for the need to drill offshore, if not a genuine realization, is at least an acknowledgment that the American people understand that scarcity, not collusion, has produced higher gas prices.  Sadly for Barack, that undermines his desire to lay blame on greedy oil companies for our present situation.


Oil companies have long been portrayed by Democrats as dark entities that prey on the needs of the vulnerable as they seek to pollute, spill and otherwise spread misery.  Often, disdainful politicians refer to them in high-minded rhetoric as “they,” despite the fact that half of all Americans have an economic interest in their profits through stock holdings, mutual funds, retirement accounts and the like.   


Unlike our elected representatives, our oil companies have done an incredible job in supplying us with limitless energy at an affordable cost, allowing even the poorest Americans to live in air conditioned comfort and operate automobiles.  If not for punitive governmental policies, gasoline would continue to be both cheap and plentiful.


Nonetheless, self-serving politicians have long been on a quest to make corporate America in general, and oil companies in particular, the scapegoat for their own folly.  Being an election year, they have kicked this ploy up a notch.  


First, Congress held hearings to publicly point their bony fingers at oil company executives.  That set the stage for Obama to propose a plan to steal enough oil money (legally, of course) to give checks of $1,000 to every American household.  Apparently, the pied piper insists on being Robin Hood as well.


The result of this shortsighted redistribution scheme will obviously be higher gas prices.  Like any other cost of doing business, this money grab will simply be passed on to the consumer.  This is not the first instance where grandstand pandering has trumped logic, but it certainly qualifies as the latest.


Few Americans realize that when they pay to fill their car’s gas tank, more money goes to the government than to the oil company.  Government not only collects gas tax at the pump, they take an average of 50% of oil company profits through deployment of an army of various taxes.  That means that Exxon not only produced $11 billion for their shareholders this past quarter, they produced $11 billion for Uncle Sam as well.


It is easily understandable that many Americans hold a negative perception of the oil companies.  “Big oil” has been the Democratic party’s favorite scapegoat for the past four decades, having been blamed for global cooling in the 1970s, Vietnam, both Iraq wars and now global warming. 


Despite all of that, Congress has become an even more unpopular entity.  An earlier Rasmussen poll indicated only 9% of the public approve their performance---more evidence that the public is finally beginning to connect the proper dots.


The Rasmussen poll represents frightening news for Democrats.  It suggests the people are no longer buying their antigrowth snake oil and are refusing to be bullied into a lower standard of living, bigger government and higher energy costs. 


In a year where anger at George Bush should have virtually assured them the White House, energy policy becomes the latest issue to point up the lack of leadership offered by Democrats. 


Iraq was an issue that played well for them last year with a battle-fatigued public.  But, as the prospect for American victory increases, respect for the harbingers of defeat decreases.  Democrats who long pushed for American surrender are now scrambling to march in the Surge parade.


Polls show most Americans want to seal the borders and do not want illegal immigration rewarded, yet Democrats routinely fight against these wishes. They have even become increasingly silent on health care.  Could they be sensing that trying to sell another huge bureaucracy at a time of economic stress is yet another loser? 


When so many of their issues are at odds with the interests of the American people, it only makes sense for the Democratic party to choose a standard bearer that focuses on vague concepts of hope and change.   Sadly for them, the Rasmussen poll suggests snake oil sales are on the decline.