What is a "Windfall" profit, and how big should it be? And who should it belong to?

And how do the profits of "greedy" Oil companies compare to the profits of other businesses? This piece from the Wall Street Journal looks at those very questions:

What Is a 'Windfall' Profit?

[...] Take Exxon Mobil, which on Thursday reported the highest quarterly profit ever and is the main target of any "windfall" tax surcharge. Yet if its profits are at record highs, its tax bills are already at record highs too. Between 2003 and 2007, Exxon paid $64.7 billion in U.S. taxes, exceeding its after-tax U.S. earnings by more than $19 billion. That sounds like a government windfall to us, but perhaps we're missing some Obama-Durbin business subtlety.

Maybe they have in mind profit margins as a percentage of sales. Yet by that standard Exxon's profits don't seem so large. Exxon's profit margin stood at 10% for 2007, which is hardly out of line with the oil and gas industry average of 8.3%, or the 8.9% for U.S. manufacturing (excluding the sputtering auto makers).

If that's what constitutes windfall profits, most of corporate America would qualify. Take aerospace or machinery -- both 8.2% in 2007. Chemicals had an average margin of 12.7%. Computers: 13.7%. Electronics and appliances: 14.5%. Pharmaceuticals (18.4%) and beverages and tobacco (19.1%) round out the Census Bureau's industry rankings. The latter two double the returns of Big Oil, though of course government has already became a tacit shareholder in Big Tobacco through the various legal settlements that guarantee a revenue stream for years to come.

In a tax bill on oil earlier this summer, no fewer than 51 Senators voted to impose a 25% windfall tax on a U.S.-based oil company whose profits grew by more than 10% in a single year and wasn't investing enough in "renewable" energy. This suggests that a windfall is defined by profits growing too fast. No one knows where that 10% came from, besides political convenience. But if 10% is the new standard, the tech industry is going to have to rethink its growth arc. So will LG, the electronics company, which saw its profits grow by 505% in 2007. Abbott Laboratories hit 110%.

If Senator Obama is as exercised about "outrageous" profits as he says he is, he might also have to turn on a few liberal darlings. [...]

It goes on to give some examples of institutions that are regarded highly by liberals, that have greater profit margins than big oil. Why not seize their profits?

Because this is about politics, not economics. What Obama and the Democrats are proposing is the Venezuela solution. We don't need that kind of thuggery in our government.

How about a bi-partisian American Solution instead?

Who is benefiting from Oil company profits? Neal Boortz spells it out:

OBAMA HEADING BLUE COLLAR THIS WEEK

[...] Just who owns the profits these oil companies have earned? That would be the stockholders. And just who might these stockholders be? Well, about 1.5 percent of them are oil company executives. The rest are the rank and file Americans who own mutual funds and workers who will rely on pension plans for their retirements. Pension plans and mutual funds, you may not know, are major investors in oil company stocks. This means that the retirement incomes of school teachers, firemen, police officers, municipal workers, flight attendants, warehousemen, truck drivers, hotel employees and other service sector workers and others may rely in part on the financial health of the oil companies in which their pension funds hold stock. Obama the Magnificent wants these pension funds to cough up some of their earnings so that he can hand out checks to voters. Too bad the government-educated masses can't see through this, and too bad the media won't point it out to them.

Bold emphasis mine. It's more Democrat wealth redistribution. Are you folks living on pensions ready to have YOUR money confiscated?
     

The Democrat CONTROL Agenda

Not Even At $10 A Gallon?

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell asks that the Senate consider a bill to allow offshore drilling, but Democrats, led by Sen. Ken Salazar (D-CO) object.

Sen. McConnell then asks if the bill could be triggered when gas reaches $4.50 per gallon, then $5 per gallon, then $7.50 per gallon, and finally $10 per gallon. All objected to.

So how high does the gas price have to be for Democrats to agree to more oil drilling?

Hat tip to TammyBruce.com for video. Her comments on it were right on the mark:

McConnell exposing the Dems as they object to drilling even if gas gets to $10 a gallon. You see, it's not that they have some bigger, better, superior idea about how the make the world better. They simply want and need Americans to be victims. That, in fact, is the only way the left gains power, is when a population is already suffering and feels vulnerable and hopeless. Keep that in mind as you watch this.

That is the very thing that has put me off the Democrat Party long ago. They derive their power from making people feel like victims, and treating their voters like victims. The dominant Left in the party have and investment in keeping the populace aggrieved, angry and unhappy; the Democrat Left never work to solve problems, and their proposed solutions often create more problems, which require even more Democrat government interference and control.

The Republicans have unfortunately mismanaged many things while they had a majority. People are rightly fed up. The Democrats have been able to capitalize on that dissatisfaction, but instead of using the opportunity to offer real solutions, they are using it to consolidate control over the American populace. Many of them have no problem with having us living with high gas prices, because the crisis gives them the means to implement more restrictions, to assume more power over US.

We need to vote for people who are actually interested in dealing with and solving problems, not creating them.

Rock the House: What should Republicans do now? It’s on…Culberson: Every day on the House floor this week
     

Drilling in ANWR... some important details

Here is an email I got recently:

FIRST. do you know what ANWR is?

ANWR = Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

..

Now. A comparison



And some perspective.



NOTE WHERE THE PROPOSED DEVELOPMENT AREA IS.
(it's in the "ANWR Coastal Plain")



THIS IS WHAT THE DEMOCRATS, LIBERALS AND "GREENS" SHOW YOU WHEN THEY TALK ABOUT ANWR and they are right. these ARE photographs of ANWR







ISN'T ANWR BEAUTIFUL? WHY SHOULD WE DRILL HERE (AND DESTROY) THIS BEAUTIFUL PLACE?
.
.

WELL. THAT'S NOT EXACTLY THE TRUTH


Do you remember the map?

The map showed that the proposed drilling area is in the ANWR Coastal Plain

Do those photographs look like a coastal plain to you?


WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?
.
..
...
...
...
...
...
..
.


THE ANSWER IS SIMPLE.

THAT IS NOT WHERE THEY ARE WANTING TO DRILL!

THIS IS WHAT THE PROPOSED EXPLORATION AREA ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE IN THE WINTER



AND THIS IS WHAT IT ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE IN THE SUMMER







HERE ARE A COUPLE SCREEN SHOTS FROM GOOGLE EARTH





AS YOU CAN SEE, THE AREA WHERE THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT DRILLING IS A BARREN WASTELAND.

OH. AND THEY SAY THAT THEY ARE CONCERNED ABOUT THE EFFECT ON THE LOCAL WILDLIFE.

HERE IS A PHOTO (SHOT DURING THE SUMMER) OF THE "DEPLETED WILDLIFE" SITUATION CREATED BY DRILLING AROUND PRUDHOE BAY*.

DON'T YOU THINK THAT THE CARIBOU REALLY HATE THAT DRILLING?



HERE'S THAT SAME SPOT DURING THE WINTER.



HEY, THIS BEAR SEEMS TO REALLY HATE THE PIPELINE NEAR PRUDHOE BAY*.


*The Prudhoe bay area accounts for 17% of U.S. domestic oil production


NOW, WHY DO YOU THINK THAT THE DEMOCRATS ARE LYING ABOUT ANWR?

REMEMBER WHEN AL GORE SAID THAT THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD WORK TO ARTIFICIALLY RAISE GAS PRICES TO $5.00 A GALLON?

WELL.
AL GORE AND HIS FELLOW DEMOCRATS HAVE ALMOST REACHED THEIR GOAL!


NOW THAT YOU KNOW THAT THE DEMOCRATS HAVE BEEN LYING,
WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT?


YOU CAN START BY FORWARDING THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW.
SO THAT THEY WILL KNOW THE TRUTH.

[END]

Is it true? There is a page about it at Snopes.com: The Truth About ANWR, but at this time, they list the status of the accuracy of the email as being "undetermined". Presumably they are researching it.

It would be nice to have the maps and the photos verified. But I don't doubt the basic premise, because I've heard this before from other sources. The area they want to drill in is the size of a football field. It's a frozen plain in the winter, and a muddy mosquito mess in the summer.

I'm tired of hearing that "we can't drill our way out of this". The only thing stopping us from drilling is the Democrats, who have many reasons for wanting gas prices to rise.

It's true that starting drilling now won't have an immediate effect on the availability of oil; but that's all the more reason to start NOW. Doing so may also end some of the market speculation that some claim is driving prices up. Drilling isn't a short term answer, or a long term answer, but it is a medium term answer. We are going to need more oil, until we can develop alternatives. Right now we are too dependent on foreign sources, and we have the means to do something about it.

Drilling alone won't solve our energy problems, but drilling plus nuclear and other alternative energy sources, seriously applied, along with building more refineries and energy conservation too, will make an enormous difference in moving us to energy independence and ultimately away from oil. When are we going to get serious about it, and stop shooting ourselves in the foot?