Thursday, February 08, 2007

What if America's oil industry were nationalized?

Some of the best stories are often buried on page C13 of the newspaper.

Take for example, the story on page C13 of today's New York Times. The very last sentence in the article contained information that made my eyes bug out--cartoon style:
"Last year, Pemex [Mexico's state owned oil monopoly] sales surpassed $100 billion [that's with a b] but it paid $79 billion in taxes [also with a b], which accounted for almost 40 percent of Mexico's federal budget."
Imagine if all the oil reserves in the United States were nationalized. It's our oil, as a democracy we can choose to do what we want with it right? Imagine if Exxon and Shell and every other oil company that does business in the U.S. paid 80% of their revenue into the U.S. treasury. We could pay for health care for every American (several times over). We could build new schools and parks, and cure cancer, malaria, and AIDS--all while lowering taxes for every American. Sometimes the best solutions are simple, obvious, and right in front of our nose.

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