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Saturday, January 31, 2009

A bad situation, that should be a good one

Everyone knows the oil companies are doing great--and have been, ever since 2000 when they got one of their own in the White House.

Exxon-Mobil has enjoyed the largest profits, year after year, of any corporation in the history of the United States, as an example, for the last few years. They just announced more record profits, too, recently so the gorging hasn't stopped, even at the expense of their fellow Americans.

You would think that, with all that money, there might be a remote chance that the people who work for those same companies could and would share in all this profit, wouldn't you?

You would if you lived in Europe, anyway.

Well, this is the good old U.S. of A, where profits are profits and employees are things to be tolerated, if not abused.

Get this, according to the Associated Press:

"With a third contract offer rejected, some 24,000 refinery workers from the Gulf of Mexico to Montana prepared to head to the picket lines Saturday just hours before an existing labor agreement expires."

"The nation's biggest refiner, Valero Energy Corp., said it would shut down some facilities if workers strike. So did European oil company BP PLC."

See, with all those profits, the "little guy"--the Unions and the employees--figure there's money to be shared.

You might think so.

But this is Amerika, where the corporation is king and it operates for its own benefit and existence, employees be damned.

The heck of it is, since Big Oil has so much money, far from being ready to share it with its own employees, what they're going to do is tell those same employees--you know, the ones who make the corporation work and make money?--to just keep waiting for any raises.

With all their profits and the low oil prices per barrel, it BENEFITS the companies to have those same employees go out on strike. With that, there is an extremely high likelihood that the price of oil per barrel will go up.

The corporations nothing but win.

The employees lose.

The American people--and everyone buying gasoline and heating fuel--get screwed.

So get ready for it, ladies and gentlemen.

We are about to get collectively screwed.

Again.

Some more.

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