Lollygagging Congress leaves gas costs unaddressed
Members of Congress will head home tomorrow for a week-long 4th of July holiday, leaving the high costs of gasoline unaddressed as Americans prepare to hit the road for the extended holiday weekend.
It’s been over 1 month since the national cost of a gallon of gasoline topped $4, and Congress has yet to take action, apart from the usual bantering and blame-casting, to address the costs. Measures that would have opened the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge and the Outer Continental Shelf to oil exploration were shot down by the Democratic majority. The Democrats’ only effort to address the issue — legislation that would crack down on price gouging by oil companies and vendors — has been stymied by filibuster.
The issue of high gas costs is almost certain to come up again after the Independence Day holiday and before Congress recesses for the summer, and likely will have some legislative efforts attached. But those efforts will largely be oversight efforts that aren’t likely to do anything to ease the pain at the pump in the short-term or long-term. These efforts include “use it or lose it” legislation that would require oil companies to relinquish federal leases not being tapped for oil and gas, and a crackdown on commodity traders who critics say are driving up the price of oil through speculation, in addition to the price-gouging legislation, which has thus far failed to garner the two-thirds majority vote needed to get past the minority filibuster.
The so-called “use it or lose it” legislation is aimed at allowing Democrats to counter ceaseless rhetoric from the Republicans that oil exploration restrictions should be lifted. The bill’s sponsors argue that nearly 70 million acres of land in the U.S. are currently under lease but aren’t being tapped. The Department of the Interior has rejected that argument, however, stating “The views contained in the report [issued by Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee] are based on a misunderstanding of the very lengthy regulatory process.”
The speculation argument draws a broader base of support, from both sides of the political spectrum. As Chris Brooks pointed out last week, OPEC is on board the speculation blame train as well. However, U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel W. Bodman has rejected that notion.
In the meantime, Congress continues to ignore the apparent will of the American people on the issue of off-shore drilling, as polls have found that as many as three out of four Americans support such action, depending on which poll you believe (here, here, and here).
Obviously, opening more protected lands to drilling wouldn’t immediately provide relief for the pain at the pump. Perhaps the only thing that could immediately lower gas prices — other than a significant increase in production by OPEC; so far, the only production increases have been token — is a suspension of the federal gas tax, which has been proposed by Sen. John McCain and was proposed by Sen. Hillary Clinton during her presidential bid (and has also received the support of the House Republican Conference). So far, however, Congress has rejected consideration of that measure as well.