Alaska's Runt Governor

Big Oil, Runt Government

Now that Sarah Palin's protégée wants to give away what's left of the farm, with corporate oil tax breaks some in the know are preaching will cost the state billions in lost revenues, it is time to paint the big picture show of what has been going on for some 30-years by now upon the lucrative North Slope resource exploration and exploitation frontier. With Son Parnell willing to throw more money away, he will go down as another impeachable imbecile, just like Bill Sheffield. We never had enough time to impeach Palin, she quit! OK, enough bashing upon Sarah Palin, her posy and Bill the turncoat. Anyway, it is hard to impossibly difficult to define and explain in a nutshell what oil has meant to this state. On the state side, those in authority know the state's end of the business. On the other side, “Big Oil”, it is a secretive proposition, so only a select understand what the “Frontier” has meant and means, with respect to the business “books”! So it is like apples & oranges, when one tries to filter through the monetary quagmire, through both the state and private industry data wherein the outcome is meaningful, from the money honey that is standpoint. I have been on both sides of the fence, so have a better understanding of what it all means. To date, almost 16-billion barrels of oil have been taken away from the North Slope, down the great Alaskan pipeline to West Coast refineries then the by-products of distilling used to fuel our hydrocarbon habits and addiction. That's 16 with how many zeros? A lot. For that effort, “Big Alaskan Style Oil” has made an estimated $752-billion in profits, take home loot. For the state, as “we the people” own the resources and should be rewarded for such, the state coffers have enjoyed a money transfusion totaling some $77-billion, and about half of that was lost down the drain when the market's were taken over by pirates. Once again, a whole lot of zeros. Representative John Dingle once said that Alaskan oil is the cash cow of all cash cows, when the Congress was investigating why so much welfare - a.k.a. Stevens/Young pork - was going to the 49er, well above the national average, and right in this state's own backyard where the largest producing oil fields in North America were operating! And that ratio that is received, the difference for what we get verses what they - “Big Oink Oil” - taken away with an 800-mile long smile, it is going to get worse, as the state went where no righteous revenue bureaucrat would go after the new kids on the block decided to test the ice and go where no “Big Oil” brat would go, by decreasing the oil resource royalty to the lowest allowed by statute. So there are prospects being developed right now to fill the void, wherein we will “maybe” see a pittance of what the resource is truly worth. So it is a joke when Pioneer Natural Resources' CEO Ken Sheffield goes down to Juneau crying out loud that his Texas based company needs a tax break. Ken, go home and take tour pathetic company with you. And when a giant oil company from Spain gets the same royal treatment, with royalty reduction and tax breaks, when even our own “Big Oil” cannot get the same preferential treatment – American corporations! It would be better to give “Big Oil” the royalty breaks, as they pay more, so at least the workers could make a decent wage. It is pathetic what is going on these days with our resources. So on the home front turf battle please don't giveaway our inheritance, a few billion here, a few more billion there, it doesn't really amount to all that much as the corresponding zeros of the “big picture show” confuses the minuscule corporate welfare program. And there is a reason behind these political giveaways. See, Palin gave us energy rebates and gave away half the farm to Trans-Canada. It buys favor, that is what it is all about, what is behind modern day politicians giving away someone else's loot. It is the preferred method learned form the best con artists trust us, the U.S. Congress. And Son Parnell is young, has a law practice that is on mute while he plays the gov, and in a few years, he will have to go back to work, so why not make friends with “Big Oil” and “Big Foreign Gas” entities, as I am sure there is a lucrative “retainership” waiting in the wings of opportunity. $$$$$$$