Democrats in the U.S. Senate unveiled a new energy package this week that again tries to revoke billions of dollars in tax credits for big oil companies. This time they’ve upped the ante, adding a measure to impose a 25% windfall profits tax on firms that don’t invest in new energy sources.
Majority leader Harry Reid and other Democrat leaders put together the Consumer-First Energy Act, which would also attempt to reduce pump prices by halting purchases of oil for the U.S. strategic reserve and initiate measures to slow oil market speculation.
As oil prices pushed to a new peak of more than $123 a barrel, Democrats pointed the blame at the Bush administration.
"The Bush administration has led us down the path of the most significant energy crisis we have had in decades, if not in all time," Reid said.
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell came to the defense, saying, "None of these proposals will lower the price at the pump. All will increase the strain on the family budget."
He and fellow Republicans proposed competing legislation, supported by the Bush administration, to increase U.S. oil production by opening up offshore areas and Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling.
Ultimately, both sides are engaged in election-season finger pointing that will result in neither new legislation nor reduced gasoline prices.
Senate Democrats have been unable to pass punitive measures on the big oil companies on at least two recent occasions, and this even more ambitious attempt will draw stiffer Republican resistance and a guaranteed presidential veto.
Republicans are using painfully high gas prices as an opportunity to push for long-wanted access to oil supplies in ecologically sensitive areas, regardless of the fact that the supplies would take years to reach market, where they would quickly be sucked up with little change in demand-driven prices.
Neither side seems willing to stop pandering to the cash-strapped American consumer and offer the hard truth: There is no quick, painless solution.
We are entering an energy crisis that requires long-term planning and short-term courage.
Loading...