Posted on 05/20/2008 10:57:54 AM PDT by Sub-Driver
House passes bill to sue OPEC over oil prices Tue May 20, 2008 1:53pm EDT
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved legislation on Tuesday allowing the Justice Department to sue OPEC members for limiting oil supplies and working together to set crude prices, but the White House threatened to veto the measure.
The bill would subject OPEC oil producers, including Saudi Arabia, Iran and Venezuela, to the same antitrust laws that U.S. companies must follow.
The measure passed in a 324-84 vote, a big enough margin to override a presidential veto.
The legislation also creates a Justice Department task force to aggressively investigate gasoline price gouging and energy market manipulation.
"This bill guarantees that oil prices will reflect supply and demand economic rules -- instead of wildly speculative and perhaps illegal activities," said Democratic Rep. Steve Kagen of Wisconsin, who sponsored the legislation.
The White House opposed the bill, saying that targeting OPEC investment in the United States as a source for damage awards "would likely spur retaliatory action against American interests in those countries and lead to a reduction in oil available to U.S. refiners."
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
I am not optimistic that what we will endure will be easy. The country has endured such catastrophic financial events like the Great Depression.
The hard part of knowing history is also knowing global downturns create big military misadventures. In a world of nuclear proliferation it becomes a somewhat scary prospect to not tuck tail and run. However, thinking of history our early nation was bankrupt at the end of the Revolution. The military was a joke and even after 35 years since the conflict ended the British came in and burned Washington D.C. in 1812.
That all being said, this nation does have some technology advances in communication and we still have the most advanced military the world has ever seen. I speculate we will be forced to step down from being the global policemen and the financial epicenter of the globe for a time.
Look at the British Empire. Britain held onto there empire expanding and receeding for hundreds of years until WWII where America took over as the global empire. Remember, the dawn always follows the darkest night. It’s black out here but 20 years from now they will also call us a ‘great generation’.
Their masses would, the ones barely getting by already.
Screw the global citizen, I'm an American! If we opened our veins the global citizen still wouldn't be happy. To hell with them.
Yep that’s the whole game. Democrats are not getting punished in the polls for high gas prices because they’re blaming President Bush and the Republicans.
You two are optimists. I am not sure we have five years.
The Democrats/Liberals are doing what they can to f_____ with the system for their own amusement. I’m just saying the President ought call their bluff.
The Congress should sue the environmentalist wackos who are responsible for our nation’s lack of an energy policy.
Then again, the democrats, and some moonbat republicans, are in bed with these tree huggers who won’t allow domestic drilling, the construction of oil refineries, the building of nuclear power plants, etc.
...and people wonder why the Euros and others want more of these kinds of pols in our government...having these folks in charge of our country makes it a lot easier for other countries to take advantage of us.
Where are the adults?
Epitomizes the unwitting arrogance of Washington.
“I’d like to sue Congress for being stupid.........”
What’s that say for us since we elected the idiots?
Just goes to show how dumb and stupid the Congresscritters think the American sheeple are.
And ladies and gentlemen we have a winner here......
I am wondering if your missing the point. The globe operates as one economy where America has to now compete. The willful ignorance of global competition along with our non-sustainable financial and energy model has reached a tipping point and indeed is causing Americans real economic pain. I am for globalization myself, by my opinion is America attempted it 40 years too early.
There are always options to secure our energy supply but not all of them are pleasant. It all requires sacrifice now that no politician is going to do during an election year.
The best solution is energy independence but is this occuring? The point Quant was making is we have no leverage of the Saudi’s, including food and Quant is correct. As Americans, we must fix our problem.
I bet the President feels very betrayed by the Saudi’s, after all it was a 60 year solid business relationship but it was just that, business. That’s our problem with our government buddy, they treat the world as if we all think alike. The guys hired to pay attention in government didn’t and lived in a dream of lofty idealogies where everything in this world is ‘fair’.
You nailed it. Both Republicans and Democrats are allowed to own energy stocks. Both get inside information as it is required to run the government, inside information traders go to jail for. Any futher questions as to why we are not energy independent?
They should tell the Arabs what they can do with their oil!
I’ll never understand with all the oil available to us in
our own country, that we allow these characters to give us
the “sign” while mooning us!
We will pay a trillion dollars for crude oil this year, at present prices. What if they decide to raise the price to 200 dollars a barrel?
Compare that number to the govt. is only taking in 2.5 trillion in revenue, and we are facing a very serious economic problem.
Saudis can produce a barrel of oil at a cost of about $5.
Their production hasn't changed for about 20, maybe thirty years. They could easily pump twice as much oil, if they wanted. They are driving the prices up, and buying up US interests with the profits. Meanwhile the Pres goes over to Saudi to kiss the ring of the prince.
Hehehe...my dem congressman Lampson voted against this. Of course...he’s in Delay’s old district...he better act like a conservative in Oil Town.
103 Republicans voted for the bill, including Duncan Hunter.
Once upon a time, we’d use (or at least threaten) military force to make sure that such price-setting (interesting that it isn’t “gouging” when OPEC does it) didn’t make such a significant impact on our nation’s vitality.
The House action beggars belief. There is no hope here.
I’ve often thought that so many representatives being lawyers is part of the problem. We need to have other occupations widely represented. Not sure how we get to that result though.
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