Protest Jack Conway, Buy Marathon
Recently Jack Conway has been making a little noise. One would think after the political beating he took at the hands of Rand Paul he would hang it up politically. However, he plans to seek a second term and the sad thing is he could win as his Republican opponent is just a light version of him.
So what has Jack been up to? Well going after oil companies for price gouging. Well actually just one oil company, Marathon. So really, Marathon is the only oil company in the entire state to price gouge, and no other? What is Jack's logic for why they would do this, the bad weather and floods.
For the record I am not pleased with high gas prices, but let's examine this to see if he may be correct or just full of hot air.
Gas prices went up all across the country, not just Kentucky.
Gas prices went up at every gas station, not just Marathon stations
Yes Jack is correct, the flooding probably had something to do with it, it's called supply chain problems. For some time nothing could be shipped up the Mississippi and there is still some difficulty, but that's not price gouging
This is also the time of year when oil companies have to change to a summer blend due to government regulation. Those who know accounting and business know that there is such a thing as change out costs.
Let's see, oh people start traveling more in the summer which means demand goes up, which means price goes up.
Also the government is wanting to look at a new way to tax oil companies.
Oh and the final reason it might happen, we can't go after our own oil and have to primarily rely upon foreign oil.
So all this has those "evil" speculators, speculating that oil prices will have to go up and what do you know, it does. Course everyone who bought Southwest Airlines tickets back in the Bush Administration did not complain about the cheap prices, partly because most don't know that Southwest speculated and bought gas cheap and was able to lock in low prices while all the other airlines had to keep jacking theirs up.
So far it's looking like a bunch of hot air. So what's the real reason in going after Kentucky's biggest oil supplier and no other? Oh that's right bet most don't know that Marathon is the largest supplier of Kentuckians oil. So why is Jack trying to cause problems for the company that supplies most of Kentucky with its oil?
Fortunately a Judge in Frankfort, the Honorable Thomas Wingate struck down Jack's case on the grounds that it lacked evidence. Imagine that, no real evidence, just a bunch of political grandstanding by Jack Conway because he thought he would give his re-election bid and public image a boost by going after Marathon, instead it just backfired cause he's not even a good enough lawyer to gather enough evidence to have his case heard in court even though he was willing to go forward with it. Fortunately this turned out to be nothing for the moment. However in the grand scheme of things this was another attempt by the liberal elitist politicians to take down the free market and affect our energy independence.
Sure some think the oil companies ought to be "taught a lesson" because they make too much profit and yes they do, because we have a petrol based society basically. However, their profit margins on average are around 7 to 11%, all the while the federal and state governments tack on about a 35% tax. So who is gouging who, the oil companies who make about 11 cents per dollar profit off the consumer, or the government making about 35 cents per dollar on a product they don't sell off taxpayers.
Ironically though to this observer locally during this increase in gas prices Marathon has actually been the cheapest. In fact there has been times it was a good 20 cents cheaper and I was just floored and had to pull over and get it even when I did not need it. Right now prices seem to be dipping again, like most national analysts predicted. How long will that last I do not know. However, I will still buy based on the cheapest gas, but if there happens to be no difference, well then just for my own personal little protest of Jack Conway, I'll buy Marathon.