Well after Thanksgiving we now have much more for which to be thankful.
West Texas Intermediate crude oil slashed below $65 today as the market continued to chew on oversupply in face of a global economic slowdown.
On Thanksgiving Day the cartel formerly known as OPEC met and decided to leave output unchanged and let free markets correct price and supply issues.
Oil prices then plunged over ten percent on Friday, and some are asking if oil will go as low as $40 a barrel.
I don’t know about that, but since June when West Texas oil hit $108 prices have fallen $43 saving the economy on an annual basis $282 billion dollars.
That’s close to $1,000 for every man, woman and child in the United States.
And guess whom it helps the most?
Poor people.
Drill on that Obama.
If the president had his way, oil prices would still be above $100.
Remember this is a guy who told us we could not drill our way out of our energy problems. And then was promptly backed up by those phony fact-check fascists at TV and newspapers around the country.
“So what does this mean for America?” said Obama even as late as 2012 when he ought to have known better. “It means that anyone who tells you we can drill our way out of this problem doesn’t know what they’re talking about – or isn’t telling you the truth.The United States consumes more than a fifth of the world’s oil.But we only have 2% of the world’s oil reserves.”
(Note: These “fact check” stories supporting Obama on energy in 2008 have been removed from the award-winning FactCheck.org site. Wow! Another triumph of transparency!
Gas Price Fixes that Won't May 2 Removed
McCain's Power Outage June 20 Removed
Distorting Obama June 26 Removed
A Full Tank of Nonsense July 22 Removed
Wind Power Puffery August 8 Removed)
NOTE: I was contacted by Eugene Kiely, director of FactCheck who says that the pages were not removed but rather a redesign of the site broke the links. He says he has subsequently fixed the links. He expressed disappointment that I questioned FactCheck' motives and thinks I should have contacted him. I expressed disappointment in FactCheck's motives and think he should get a real job. Thank you- the editor.
While it’s true that the global slow down in economic growth is helping push prices down, it’s also true that the fracking revolution has done more for our energy security than anything any president, congress, legislation, lobbyist, special interest, environmental scientist, all-star actor or actress has.
The mere ability to satisfy much of our demand domestically means that OPEC is powerless.
A year ago gas prices were 53 cents higher nationwide. That translates into about $170 per year just in gas money savings just for someone with a 15-mile commute.
Meanwhile, interest rates are making like crude oil prices, plunging to levels not seen since the summer of 2012. The benchmark ten year Treasury started the year at 2.73% and closed the day Friday at 2.19%.
While low interest rates will certainly help real estate, it’s rather strange behavior for an economy that supposed to be picking up steam.
The latest survey indicates that retail sales might be down so far for the holiday shopping season, and another survey says that factory output has slowed.
So money that is being saved at the pump is not yet being spent by consumers.
Right now the experts who are running – ruining is more like it—our economy are trying hard to ignite inflation. That’s part of the reason interest rates are so low. But as the example of oil show, deflation, especially in absence of wage increases, is not the worst thing ever.
It saves people money.
Perhaps it’s time that the fact-check fascists start worrying about the real problem: People don’t have jobs in this backward economy that Obama has created.
It’s an economy run by experts, backed by fact checkers who think that “facts”-- which for them are really just opinions disguised as news—are more important than people are.
We’d have even more to be thankful if the fake fact checkers could apologize now for getting so many facts wrong for so long on energy.
And then there is Obamacare…