True North

Some days I don’t think I’ve got a dog in this fight.

“I don’t think it’s going much lower, and it could go higher,” McCain said on NBC’s “Today Show.” “I don’t think so, not when you’ve got a finite supply, basically, and a cartel controlling it.”

Although the GOP presidential candidate didn't address the question of raising taxes on oil companies, he said the companies “absolutely” should return some profits to consumers. “And they should be embarking on research and development that will pay off in reducing our dependence on foreign oil,” he said.

“The point is, oil companies have got to be more participatory in alternate energy, in sharing their profits in a variety of ways, and there is very strong and justifiable emotion about their profits,” McCain said.

Where to begin?

Everything has a finite supply, including oil. That said, there are centuries worth of the stuff left. How about tapping into some of it on our own soil so that less of it is coming from the “cartel”?

Private companies should “return some profits to consumers?” The totalitarian tendency displayed here is staggering. Is Mr. McCain advocating the federal government should dictate what “reasonable” profits can be made? Why stop with the oil industry? This is the very definition of fascism — some industries are nationalized but private property is allowed provided it serves the interests of the state. Finally, the long misapplied epithet ‘fascist’, commonly attributed to conservatives (more accurately applied to liberal state-centric economic policy), has some validity.

And for the record, oil companies are investing vast sums in alternative energy — and why wouldn’t they when oil exploration is vilified while much less efficient energies are subsidized by the taxpayer?

Mr. McCain is right about one thing: gas prices will continue to go skyward as elementary economic theory dictates they should. Threaten an industry with more taxes and they will produce less.

Atlas is about to muther funkin’ shrug and the joke will be on policy makers, consumers and (if McCain has his way) the GOP.

Cross-posted at Truth Vs. The Machine. Comments welcome.