CTV News is reporting that "Gas prices have spiked in parts of Western Canada this week, with some stations in Metro Vancouver charging $1.46 per litre on Friday. Soaring prices stunned commuters and analysts, leaving the latter confused over the timing of the spike."
There is nothing shocking about the fraud spike. Corporate monopolies are never a good thing. They will charge consumers whatever the market can take. CBC is reporting that "Vancouver has traditionally been subject to the highest prices for gasoline anywhere in North America and this certainly is the case today," said gas price analyst Dan McTeague.
It's like the price of hockey tickets in Canada compared to the US. It's the same hockey league. They charge more here simply because they can. Many years ago, when John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil used hostile take overs to obtain a monopoly on the oil industry in the US, the Supreme Court cited anti trust laws and deemed that monopoly illegal. Times have changed. Now dirty politicians line their pockets with campaign contributions and say corporate monopolies are good. No they are not. They destroy the free market and the democratic system.
Corporate monopolies are also bad in the News industry because they destroy the freedom of the press. Today the Post Media News monopoly was working overtime on the propaganda in more ways than one. They cited one "analyst" and said we just have to get used to the spike in gas prices trying to brain wash us into submission. No we do not. We could do what Norway did and nationalize our oil. That would make sense. The only time a corporate monopoly is good is when the consumers are shareholders in that monopoly. What we have now is NOT a free market.
Allowing the oil companies to form a monopoly was bad enough. Giving that monopoly to Communist China was even worse. It's time to stop the fraud and take back the monopoly once and for all just like Norway did. That would be in consumers and taxpayers best interest.
What Canada and Alberta could learn from Norway
Surprisingly (to me anyway) I find myself agreeing with you about nationalization of Canada's oil, but only as a way of neutralizing the treasonous sale of the rights to that and other natural resources to China. I guarantee you the politicians who made that happen got paid, but if I know the Chinese (and I do) they got sold for cheap.
ReplyDeleteA better alternative might be a government mandated fixed price at the pump. This would encourage efficiency on the part of the oil companies to be able to maximize their profits while having to sell at a certain price.
Nationalization is not necessarily a cure all, witness the third world countries where the government just loots that industry directly. What would stop people like Harper from selling a part of the national oil company directly as stock, such as Campbell did with BC Hyrdo? You have to realize, there is no EFFECTIVE medium at present for controlling scumbag politicians bent on taking as much as they can, THEY have their hands on the reins of power more directly than the electorate. Cause trouble and they'll send the RCMP after you to protect themselves, and the RCMP will happily do their bidding in exchange for "we can do whatever we want". The citizenry outnumber the state enforcers thousands to one, but they have been disarmed and brainwashed over decades not to ever even consider holding some treasonous scumbag politician like Campbell
directly accountable. Indirectly, they stall, obfuscate, lie, and in the end their "committee" finds no wrong doing, and the band plays on.....
I promise you that if bad things happened to bad politicians, "pour encourager les autres", those left would suddenly rediscover their duty to behave themselves.
There is a reason that "making an example" is such a time honored (but not recently) tradition, it's because it works. But that's not the modern Canadian way, and so as I said, the band plays on.
Where's the Committee for Aesthetic Deletion when you really need them? ;-)
Curious as to why you removed my post??
ReplyDeleteThat's a good question. I didn't but it's not there so I must have deleted it by accident. Feel free to repost it.
DeleteIt's time for a national enquiry into fuel price fixing. In the meantime Canadians need to start a fuel price protest group which would consist of a serious and sustained revolving boycott of the gas retailers. Monday's could be Chevron, Tuesdays Shell, Wednesdays Petroleum Canada etc. I guarantee that missing revenue for a day would get the industry's attention. Or we can just sit back on the couch with a doobie and a beer and take it all in just as they expect us to do! No wonder why we pay more than the rest of Canada.
ReplyDeleteah, yes the sudden increase in the price of gas. Its $1.30 or $1.33 per litre over on Vancouver Island. The day before $1.23 per litre.
ReplyDeleteFor every dollar which goes into the pockets of oil companies its a dollar not spent in local economies. They could pass a regulation requiring gas companies to give two weeks notice of price increases at least.
of course its a monopoly. that is not going to change. Trudeau Sr. tried it with Petro Canada and we know how that turned out. They still talk about it in Alberta.
We don't have to get used to it. we produce the stuff. we ought to have our own refineries so Canada can control the price. Right now too much money is leaving the country and there is too much outside control. Foreign ownership needs to be eliminated of our natural resources. It won't end well for Canadians if that continues. All that tar being sent by pipeline through B.C. and then refined elsewhere. Hell we wind up buying it back one way or another. Not good practises for the people of this country. If we kept it for our own use, we wouldn't have to worry about fouling our coast line because of tanker spills.