For This We Elect Republicans

Senate Majority Leader and Presidential Wannabe, Bill Frist, is holding hearings of oil company executives for serving the interests of their shareholders.

John Fund (Taranto is out monkeyfishing today I guess...) worries about "Pump Panic."

What's most worrisome is how quickly the Republican leadership in Congress exhibits signs of panic. Mid-term elections are a year away, and yet this week's announcements of record profits by some oil companies are causing GOP leaders to stampede into panic over high gas prices.

Yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist called for Senate hearings in which the heads of the nation's major oil companies would be called to justify the fact they are making money. I had thought such a scene--common during the 1970s government-induced energy crisis--wouldn't return in a GOP Congress. But political expediency seems to trump principle and common sense if the price at the pump goes high enough.

Fund suggests that a relaxation of regulation on refineries and drilling might serve the public better, but it won’t generate the publicity of a good ol' witch hunt.

Republicans. Republicans.

UPDATE: Just got email from Frist's VOLPAC:

The energy bill we passed this summer was a good first step, but we need to do more.

First and foremost, we need to aggressively prosecute price gouging wherever it is occurring. That's why I've ordered a Senate hearing that will call upon major oil company executives to testify as to WHY oil prices are so high.

If we find that certain oil companies are abusing the free enterprise system to enrich themselves and their businesses at the expense of the American people, we will act swiftly.

If the facts warrant it, I will support a federal anti-price gouging law.

In addition, we need to look to the future. We need to reduce our dangerous dependence on foreign sources of oil, and focus our efforts on ENERGY INDEPENDENCE. That is why - next week - we will approve the Deficit Reduction bill, which will open ANWR to oil exploration.

I guess I can hope that the hearings result in no more than Senatorial, stentorian preening and that opening ANWR results in real legislation. I would prefer to have my party avoid ill-economic nonsense but there may be a pony under that tree somewhere...

Economics and Markets Posted by jk at October 28, 2005 1:22 PM