FTC Head Overseeing Gas Gouging Probe Was Chevron Lawyer
FTC Head Overseeing Gas Gouging Probe Was Chevron Lawyer
Yesterday, the Federal Trade Commission announced it would investigate possible post-Katrina gas price gouging.
Early evidence suggests there’s plenty of dirt to find. A new Government Accountability Office report shows that retail gas prices have risen faster than crude oil prices, and local Exxon dealers have complained anonymously that higher prices are being “decreed from the top.”
Unfortunately, the person charged with getting to the bottom of it all is FTC Chairwoman Deborah Majoras. Her old job? Representing Chevron-Texaco and “other major oil and gas interests” (though you won’t learn that fact in her official bio). To get an idea of Majoras’ priorities, check out this June 2004 release from Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) shortly after her confirmation hearing:
At the hearing, Wyden asked Majoras again what she would change at the FTC to better respond to high gasoline prices … and whether she would request new powers for the FTC to fight oligopoly control of major gasoline markets by just a few oil companies. In every case, Majoras said she would be willing to act but would not outline specific steps, which is precisely the FTC response that has led to little or no pro-consumer action on gasoline prices in recent years.
Before a face-to-face meeting with Majoras last month, Wyden submitted a letter detailing his concerns about the FTC’s inaction on oil and gasoline issues and asking whether Majoras would lead the agency to respond. During their meeting, Wyden also received no assurances from Majoras that the agency would change its policy of inaction to protect consumers.
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Henhouse, meet fox…
September 22nd, 2005 at 7:09 pmThis seems to be a standard tactic of the Bush administration: hire people from the industry, make them watchdogs over the industry, and have them work with the industry to write legislation. I recently posted Britt’s 14 defining characteristics of Fascism, and it looks like the US is well on its way. The press and most citizens, though, may be starting to wake up.
September 22nd, 2005 at 7:13 pmCommentators #1 and #2 have already expressed thoughts like mine. But perhaps to nitpick, I think Ron Wyden is from Oregon (OR), not Ohio (OH).
September 22nd, 2005 at 7:28 pmOMFG, not again. Jesus Christ, what the hell is the matter with America. Why do Americans continue to let this stuff happen. Why isn’t the MSM all up in Bush’s ass ove rthis kind of stuff.
The MSM got all bent over Katrina, like it was an isolated incident.
It was Bill Maher that asked Anderson Cooper “Why are you guys so upset about the Katrina response? Where were you for the last 5 years?”
And I guess he needs to finish with “And where are you now? Where is your outrage at the continued fvck ups?”
September 22nd, 2005 at 7:31 pmSpudge-boy, I knew about this one last year and sent scathing letters to my senators, all our important agencies are now run by the people we use to have to moniter. Yep! EPA,FDA, on and on. In fact the people who use to get fined the most for dirting up our food, soil, air and water are now incharge of those agencies, some have been for 3 or more years. I just wasen’t on this site untill a couple of months ago. Before Katrina I spent day’s on end watching C-span to see how our representatives were voting. We have been sold out by many of our own and all the right. Hate to tell ya we are in for a good fight, now that they can dirty up the nest, these birds don’t care. All greed…Blessings
September 22nd, 2005 at 8:07 pmThe discussion early in Bush’s first term was how he was going to put his paw prints on anything and everything by appointing xerox copies of himself to head agencies, investigations, circuit/appellate court judges, etc, etc, etc. My point is that if you have a complaint about price gouging, hey, no problem, take it up with Deborah Majoras. There’s no way to fight through this administration’s corruption. I can only hope that the 2006 elections, still more than a year away, will go strongly in the democrats favor so that Congress and the Senate can have some success stalling out Bush’s final two years. Otherwise, this country can plan for 3+ more years of indigestion.
September 22nd, 2005 at 8:09 pmIsn’t Ron Wyden a Democrat from Oregon rather than Ohio?
September 22nd, 2005 at 8:09 pmPlenty of oil out there.
Estimated US petroleum balance
(Average, in 1,000 bpd. Change from year-earlier period.)
June 2005 % Chg Deliveries
Gasoline 9,409 +0.9
Kero jet fuel 1,644 -1.5
Distillate fuel 4,048 +4.1
Low sulphur (diesel) 3,143 +0.8
Residual fuel 730 -11.4
All other oils 4,958 -3.7
Reclassifications -89 n/a
Total domestic 20,700 -0.4
Exports 1,257 +17.5
Total 21,957 +0.5
Supply
Crude oil 5,409 +0.2
Gas liquids 1,846 +6.2
Other domestic 2,076 +20.1
Total domestic 9,331 +5.3
Crude imports 10,076 -4.3
Product imports 2,988 -1.3
Total imports 13,064 -3.7
Total supply 22,395 -0.1
Implied stock change 439 n/a
Refinery operations
Primary inputs 16,540 -0.1
Refinery use 96.6 % (vs. 97.5 % in June 2004)
Stocks (at end of month in mm of barrels)
June 2005 May 2005 % Chg June 2004 % Chg
September 22nd, 2005 at 8:25 pmCrude 323.1 327.0 -1.2 304.8 +6.0
Gasoline 215.7 213.8R +0.9 208.5 +3.5
Kero. jet fuel 41.6 39.6 +5.1 38.8 +7.4
Distillate fuel 114.4 107.5 +6.4 114.3 +0.1
Low sulphur 70.0 69.0 +1.4 70.5 -0.8
Residual 37.8 37.9 -0.3 37.5 +0.8
Others 177.2 168.6R +5.1 160.1 10.7
Total 997.3 984.1R +1.3 956.0 +4.3
Speaking of Oil, I can’t help but post this on Iraq.
A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Thursday indicated fewer than half of Americans believe the United States will win the Iraq war, and 55 percent of those surveyed said it should speed up withdrawal plans.
And in yet another example of the gracious way Bush blames everyone but himself for his colossal failures:
“President Bush said today that mistakes made by three of his predecessors, including the Reagan administration’s response to the Marine barracks bombing in Lebanon, had emboldened global terrorists and helped set the stage for the 9/11 attacks.”
I guess that memo that said “Bin Laden plans to attack using airplans as missiles” that Bush ignored had nothing to do with the failure to prevent 9/11…
What a frigging irresponsible drunken retard!
September 22nd, 2005 at 8:44 pmPresident FUBAR is incompetent.
September 22nd, 2005 at 8:55 pmEvery venture a crony bailed-out failure.
His honest station in life would be an assistant
manager at the AutoZone (TM) in Plano.
So Ryan,
According to the quote you have there, Bush jr just blamed his dad, Reagan and Clinton? Wow, Bush Sr. should go kick jr. ass. And you know he could do it too.
September 22nd, 2005 at 8:57 pm#3 & #7…
Yes, Ron Wyden is my Senator, here in Oregon… unless there are two Senators called Ron Wyden…
September 22nd, 2005 at 9:22 pmZ.
But, I don’t wish FUBAR on AutoZone(TM).
September 22nd, 2005 at 9:23 pmThey are an early Linux conversion, and
are having to fight the SCO scum.
Spudge,
Yeah – isn’t that hard to believe? Wonder how the trolls feel about that betrayal.
September 22nd, 2005 at 9:24 pmThe GOP is now trying to axe PBS to pay for katrina. They’re using yet another disaster of their making, to futher screw up the country, undermine democracy and squash what’s left of an independent press. These fascists are clearly off of the Hitler block…
September 22nd, 2005 at 9:56 pmThis is their biggest chance yet to hammer a conservative agenda into the heart of America. They’re going to throw everything including the kitchen sink into this hurricane. Their goal is to show that conservative ideology fixes everything, and if they get their way they will destroy everything they see as “liberal” and build in its place a free market utopia.
But most of us know utopias aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.
September 22nd, 2005 at 11:58 pmHere is a word to spell: KLEPTOCRACY
September 23rd, 2005 at 12:33 am#16
Isn’t Ancient Rome always described as being a utopia? How about Ancient Greece? Ancient Egypt? Messipotamia? Babylon?
I am sure they were a utopia, for the rich. It was probably a living hell for the working class.
I hope we don’t slide too far down that slippery slope.
September 23rd, 2005 at 1:11 amSpudgeBoy,
Their ‘working class’ were slaves. In fact only athenian ‘citizens’ could vote, the slaves that actually did all of the work had no rights despite their otherwise enlightened values. And they were the ‘best’ of the early civilizations. In fact the jews were slaves in both egypt and babylon(mesopotamia) before escaping…
The practice of slavery and servitude were so entrenched in the near east. Christianity even codifies this as ‘normal’, and this was used as the basis for christians owning slaves in this country until the 19th century.
Genesis 9:25-27: “Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers. He also said, ‘Blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend the territory of Japheth; may Japeth live in the tents of Shem and may Canaan be his slave’. ”
Christians traditionally believed that Canaan had settled in Africa. The dark skin of Africans became associated with this “curse of Ham.” Thus slavery of Africans became religiously justifiable.
A theologic ‘antidote’ was found in Paul’s writing, and eventually this was accepted by rightwing churches as a face saving method of ‘getting over’ slavery. But as some of the republican trolls have shown on here, the underlying bigotry that is part of that legacy of slavery never went away…
Galatians 3:28: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free…for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.”
Utopias have always been such for the rich – as they tend to write and control the history. And this isn’t just an issue with western culture. A ’slave class’ always ends up getting exploited in most cultures. The maya crashed and burned because they exploited the farmers. China has long exploited the peasants for the benefit of the emperor. This is an old and honorable tradition of exploitation..
September 23rd, 2005 at 1:31 amRyan,
Yep.
Exactly.
We are much alike you and I.
September 23rd, 2005 at 1:41 am[...] Checking in with Think Progress finds surprising news about the woman overseeing the latest gas gouging probe: [...]
September 23rd, 2005 at 5:48 amHow long before we all pay with scrip at the company store?
September 23rd, 2005 at 8:47 amI’m convinced that this is a one giant energy scam perpetrated on the American public, and if we ever get out of this administration’s mess, we will find out just how badly we have been duped.
check this out…http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemID=19648
Damn it!
September 23rd, 2005 at 9:16 amYet another politician following the footsteps of the previous president. Get your second term and forget about the working class and stuff your pocket with donation money and retirement job availability. I voted for Bush because I know the country would be worse off with him in office. But I guess we were all dupped again. Bush has the means and the authority to cap the prices of gasoline, yet he refuses to do so because of his election supporters in Texas. What is going to happen to the poor pea-on barely making ends meet (working for the government no less) and facing the prospect of paying 5.00 dollars a gallon for heating oil, and 5.00 for natural gas! What are we supposed to do freeze while accepting displaced refugees from Katrina and Rita.
September 23rd, 2005 at 10:24 amThe hurricanes are a perfect smoke screen for the Bushco crowd to slip in all the dirty little tricks they want, while the networks yell and scream like nothing else is happening.
September 23rd, 2005 at 10:39 am[...] (via thinkprogress.org) [...]
September 23rd, 2005 at 11:41 amWell we all know why a tiny group of families, who control most of America, have put their minions into office to investigate themselves, to doubletalk us into believing that everythings ok and they aren’t criminals. We can see they are lying. When an ex-Chevron attorney because the head of the FTC we can see big business and the military industrial complex pulling the strings they have connected over our constitutional republic. They set up the office to control issues and they install their spies to take down our freedom and empower their oligopoly. Find more info on these evil geniuses at Prisonplanet.tv InfoWars.com PropagandaMatrix.com
September 27th, 2005 at 12:47 pmi read think progress everyday and i am always “jaw-dropped” astonded at the bull sh*t that this administration shoves down our throats. god these jokers simply must be replaced. how embarassing to be a registered republican! i’m not a big fan of the dems, but someone, somewhere has to get our collective poop together or we all face certain extinction as a nation, if not a species. this admistration would just as soon blow us all up (remember their amageddon death wish!) as give up one cent to improving our lives!!!!
September 27th, 2005 at 5:41 pmI was wandering how oil companies can make record profits when we are paying record prices? me being a college student I have to drive a couple of hours just to go home and it is getting to expensive just to go see my family and I really want to know what is actually going to happen with the gas prices.
April 27th, 2006 at 10:16 am[...] The bill, modeled after legislation put forward by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI), is an important first step. But even it becomes law, cracking down on price gouging will still require aggressive action by the Bush administration, specifically the Federal Trade Commission. Unfortunately, the Bush-appointed chair of the FTC is Deborah Majoras. Her previous job experience: representing Chevron-Texaco and “other major oil and gas interests.” [...]
May 3rd, 2006 at 8:32 pm[...] If this policy had been in place before the Enron collapse no one would be on trial now. It could have been handled like the Federal Trade Commission investigation into the big oil price gouging. The FTC head was pulled from the corporate attorney’s for Texaco. Now that’s efficency. [...]
May 27th, 2006 at 2:03 pmIt is strange how I remember the oil embargo back in 72-74? When people in Los Angeles had to wait 3 or more hours in a gas station line to fill up, the local government also imposed odd and even days meaning that if your license plate ended in a even number on a particular day you could fill up your tank. However, what has been done since this time to assure that the same oil shortages do not occur? Where is the funding for research on alternatives fuels been for the last 30 years? There is none because big oil want their pockets lined at the expense of the hard working american. It’s time we changed our thinking and start seriously focusing on alternative measures of fuel consumption. Just don’t know where to start!!
February 15th, 2007 at 2:06 pm