Tomas, hello again,
This brings to mind the public vilification of the oil companies in the oil crisis of '72. If you recall, the television coverage of the time showed the testimony of oil company executives behaving in essentially a pragmatic, rational manner to which they were accustomed - providing fertile fodder indeed to the spin doctors who presented them as vicious, consummate economic predators.
The oil companies have since gained a healthy respect for the value and power of public perception - but by the same token, the machinery of public opinion, working in the industrial arenas of politics and mass media, is considerably more complex and sophisticated than it was in the 1970's. One must struggle to keep up.
The lesson from our modern politicians is that there is essentially no way to defend oneself from a direct attack when it is launched from this quarter. I look for the events of the 1972 to replay themselves in one form or another: There will again be testimony on Capitol Hill from oil company executives. The politicians will be satisfied to accuse oil companies of gouging, even when they know it to be false, if only to get the executives to deny it on National TV. And then the press will take the baton.
Windfall profits taxes are on the way back in to favor - not for economic reasons (minimal impact, really), but because this is an election year, and beating up oil companies is as much of a politician's no-brainer pander-to-the-voters-for-votes as proposing a crime bill. Who's going to vote for the criminals?
I'll be watching this one closely, in order to jump right out of the E&P sector as soon these taxes are proposed.
Regards to all,
Aggie |
