Honestly, I'm not that much of an oil analyst but if you really think about it, gas prices are high. "No DUH!" you might say. Hey, me too! You know, when oil prices were around 98 bucks a barrel the gas was, well, cheap! If I can remember correctly, they were around $2.59 per gallon?

Hmm, so is it just me noticing the cheap oil prices versus the high gas prices?

Ok, how about this one. CNN, ABC, MSNBC, hell all the news networks are saying "Oh well the price of oil is down because supply is higher than demand..." Screw them. If the supply was REALLY higher than the damn demand, don't you think the GAS FREAKING PRICES WOULD BE DOWN?!?! Ahem, I do.

Ok, MAYBE! Just maybe hurricane Ike just jacked up and destroyed tons of refineries, I think 2, and the prices are higher? Neh, we do have refineries that are still operational. Even after Ike came and went. So... this leads me to my next question.

Did the oil companies really like the income from before? HA! HA! HA! If you don't think so, consider this. You are the owner of a restaurant, the ONLY one in town. Prices for cheese go up. Heck, you jack up the prices in the menu. Then prices go down. Jeez, all the money was good huh. You can just keep the prices high to get more cash. Maybe you aren't like that. Maybe you are nice. Oil companies aren't nice. I think oil companies loved all the money coming in that they just decided to keep the prices high.

They are buying one (1) 42 gallon barrel of oil for $97 currently. If they refine the oil, they get about 19.5 gallons of gas per barrel. Not including other oil based products such as: diesel, asphalt, kerosene, and other products. Ok, I got my GED November 2007 so I know how to use a calculator. 19.5 gallons (times) $3.50 (average gas price) (equals) $68.25. Now diesel, one (1) barrel makes about 9 gallons. At $4.00 average that's another $36 dollars. Hmm, 104? Ok, I know. DO NOT FORGET the leftovers from the refining. Nothing goes to waste! All in all, that's about another $50 to $100 extra per barrel. I don't think they are playing very nice.

Consider this. $2.60 versus what you are paying now for the same price oil.

Check out Wikipedia's page for products based on refined oil to see the list of products made from ONE barrel and look up at how much they are sold for...

I'm out! Until later my good people.