They're Reading The Blog -- July 31, 2017

From Investor's Business Daily:

Energy: Last week Royal Dutch Shell (RDSA) told investors that it expects oil prices to be "lower forever." We're still waiting for all those people who were only recently complaining about higher-forever oil prices to admit their mistake. It wasn't that long ago that President Obama was mocking Republicans for their "three-point plan for $2 gas: Step one is drill, step two is drill, and step three is keeping drilling."

He went on to say that "the American people aren't stupid. They know that's not a plan." Renewable energy, he said, was the only way to solve the "problem" of high oil prices.

And he kept pushing for new taxes on "old" energy to support federal subsidies for the energy supplies "of the future."

Of course, Obama wasn't the only one. There was endless talk about how Big Oil was making obscene profits while gas prices skyrocketed. There were calls for investigations into collusion among oil companies. Some wanted to bring back the Jimmy Carter-era "windfall profits tax."

Turns out drill, baby, drill was exactly what was needed.

Domestic oil production was skyrocketing even as Obama made those remarks — thanks to advanced drilling technologies that have opened up vast new domestic supplies to production.

The Energy Information Administration projects that, next year, U.S. oil production will average almost 10 billion barrels a day, which would beat the previous record of 9.6 billion in 1970. What's more, a quarter of this production is coming from one oil field: the Permian Basin in West Texas.

One might also ask where all those speculators are that are always being blamed for driving up prices of crude oil and gasoline. Many onshore oil companies have declared bankruptcy in the past year, and shares of XOM are trading at 52-week lows. Why aren't the speculators doing more to help these companies? Inquiring minds want to know. 

What a doofus