US House passes law making overly high gas prices a crime

Plantagenet

New law would make "excessive" gas prices a felony, with
penalties including prison and 100+ million dollar fines

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gasoline24may24,0,3926741.story?coll=la-home-center

That took care of that problem. Now we don't have to worry
about anyone charging high prices for gas due to Peak Oil
produces gas shortages.
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"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." -- George Orwell

emersonbiggins

BUMP - I thought this was the (N)OPEC story, but it looks to be the second gaffe by Congress in as many days. Wow, they sure are staying busy! Rolling Eyes

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"It's called the American Dream because you'd have to be asleep to believe it."

George Carlin

I_Like_Plants

Shows what corpgov is all about - consume, consume, consume, or die.

emersonbiggins

A better headline would've been:
Congress rules capitalism illegal

Hell, who am I kidding? We haven't had free markets in years.
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"It's called the American Dream because you'd have to be asleep to believe it."

George Carlin

Zardoz

What could demonstrate the ineffectiveness of our so-called political leadership better than this lame-ass "action"?

We get the governments we deserve...
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"Thank you for attending the oil age. We're going to scrape what we can out of these tar pits in Alberta and then shut down the machines and turn out the lights. Goodnight." - seldom_seen

Plantagenet

Congress is passing laws to sue OPEC for not selling enough oil and jail people who sell gas for a price that is too high.

Now we need a law criminalizing the earth for its inadequate oil reserves.
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"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." -- George Orwell

green_achers · Posted: Wed May 23, 2007 6:13 pm Post subject:

Well, toward the end of the Roman Empire, they had an emperor who declared war on Neptune.
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Sarah Palin: Because what we really need right now is another inexperienced, inarticulate, personable, fundamentalist governor of an oil-dependent state for president.

Revi · Fusion Joined: Apr 25, 2005 Posts: 3460 Location: Maine

I'm sure that the average person considers this to be a great idea. They are really upset about high gas prices, and they take it as a personal affront. They are screaming at their representatives and the reps want to make it look like they have some power over the price of gasoline. This will scare the retailers who aren't making any money off of selling gasoline anyway. There will be a lot of gas stations quietly closing down in the next few years. I was thinking that it would be a drag to live in a place where you couldn't get gas very often. We may be in one of those places sooner than we think.

kochevnik · Intermediate Crude Joined: Aug 20, 2004 Posts: 881

Law of Unintended Consequences.

Ring a bell ?
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"People are just bastards - bastard covered bastards with bastard filling."

steam_cannon · Expert Joined: Dec 28, 2006 Posts: 2558 Location: MA

IslandCrow

The law is crazy. However....

In most industries if the price of raw material goes up the factory profit usually drops, as they find it difficult to pass on the full costs to the consumer, BUT I constantly hear in the press of how much profit the Oil Companies make when the price of the raw material (Crude) goes up. This means that the oil companies not only can pass on the extra price but they can add a surplus*. The word profiteer springs to mind.

[My dictionary defines 'profiteer' as "one who takes advantage of an emergency to make exorbitant profits"]

*I realise that one reason that the companies can make such a profit in times of rising crude prices is because they themselves control some of the supplies of the crude so benefit from profit at that stage, and are not necessarily increasing the margin on refining.
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We should teach our children the 4-Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Rejoice.

SILENTTODD

While they' re at it maybe they can outlaw ocean tides and storms too.

King Canute wasn't very effective at that.
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Skeptical scrutiny in both Science and Religion is the means by which deep thoughts are winnowed from deep nonsense-Carl Sagan

Tuike

How does the law work anyway? Is there a fixed limit that can't be passed - for example 4.50$/gal. Sell higher than that and you go to jail? Or is the price limit relative to futures or wholesale price?

Prince · Heavy Crude Joined: Dec 26, 2005 Posts: 233

One really has to admire the hypocritical mannerisms of most Americans when they see crap like this.

Let's see...

Real estate doubles or triples in 5 years and it's "free market capitalism at work."

When gasoline sees similar price increases in the same 5-year period it's "price gouging."

MD