Energy

Don’t Export the Oil

October 11, 2005  ·  Jamie Court

<p class="source">Marketplace Radio Program (NPR/American Public Media)</p> <p>Jamie Court (FTCR): Refineries make the residential heating oil that warms your home. Part of the reason home heating prices are skyrocketing is there are barely enough refineries to meet demand. Oil companies like it that way. A scarce commodity keeps their prices and profits high.</p>

House to vote on new energy bill

October 6, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<p class="source">Gannett News Service</p> <p>Opponents of the move say the bill would gut clean air laws at the expense of public health and won't do much to bring prices down. The legislation would scrap regulations that force plant owners to install the latest pollution-control equipment when they expand their facilities.</p>

New, expanding refineries a long-term solution, companies say

October 5, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<p class="source">Knight Ridder Washington Bureau</p> <p>"There needs to be more supply-side regulation of this industry. The industry knows it will make more money by making less gasoline," said Jamie Court, the president of the Los Angeles-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights.</p>

VOTES A TEST FOR SCHWARZENEGGER

October 2, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<p class="source">The Boston Globe</p> <p>A poll released last week by the Public Policy Institute of California indicated that one-third of adult Californians approve of the governor's job performance, his lowest standing ever, down from 61 percent a year ago.</p>

Powerful Teachers Union Is in the Thick of Ballot Battles

September 29, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<p class="source">Los Angeles Times</p> <p>"They seem to call it as they see it, and aren't afraid to take on whomever is in charge," said Doug Heller, executive director of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, a Santa Monica advocacy group.</p>

AARP Opposes Pharmaceutical Industry’s Proposition 78

September 29, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<p class="source">Los Angeles Times</p> <p>Concerns about possible legal flaws have prompted some advocates of drug price reform to remain neutral on Proposition 79. The Santa Monica-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, for example, opposes Proposition 78 but has not endorsed Proposition 79.</p>

State gas prices are said to be insulated

September 29, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<p class="source">The San Diego Union-Tribune (California)</p> <p>Consumer advocates said anti-gouging action by state attorneys general may have inhibited further price hikes. They added that a rare call for consumer conservation from the Bush administration may be causing the oil industry to hold the line on prices. "Bush is sending signals to the industry that the type of world-record profits they are recording should not be jeopardized because if prices go up much further, there might be a populist backlash," said Jamie Court, president of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights in Santa Monica.</p>

Unleashing Maria

September 28, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<font face="verdana,sans-serif" size="2">Arnold's been dropping wife Maria's name a lot lately and yesterday Shriver announced her Chief of Staff would be Democratic party hound and Gray Davis operative Daniel Zingale. A former AIDS...</font>

RITA’s AFTERMATH: Bush, Urging Conservation, Seeks to Boost Fuel Supply;

September 27, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<h3>The president stresses a need for more refining capacity. Environmental groups express worry.</h3><p class="source">Los Angeles Times</p> <p>Critics such as Jamie Court, president of the Santa Monica-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, have contended that the industry resisted expansion because keeping supplies tight boosted profits. "The answer is not more carrots for the industry, like gutting environmental laws and immunizing companies for the harm they cause, but sticks, such as forcing companies to invest in beefing up refining capacity when it is needed," Court said.</p>

Bush asks U.S. to save energy;

September 27, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<h3>With gasoline prices up almost a dollar over 2004, most Americans say they're feeling the pain. The president tells them to reduce demand.</h3><p class="source">The Wichita Eagle</p> <p>Some consumer groups have accused oil companies of deliberately restricting refining capacity to keep gasoline prices high. "They know when they make less gasoline, they make more money," said Jamie Court, president of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, a Los Angeles-based group that frequently battles oil companies in court.</p>

Supply-side regulation needed for the US oil industry

September 21, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<p class="source">Marketplace Radio Program (NPR)</p> <p>Since deregulation in 1982, oil consumption has increased 33 percent. But oil companies have reduced refining capacity by about 10 percent. Why? They know the scarcer the product, the bigger the profit. Conspiratorial? A few years ago, US Senator Ron Wyden released internal company memos proving that in late 1990s refiners realized they had to reduce supply to pump up profits and that's just what they did.</p>

Californians gouged on gasoline prices?

September 19, 2005  ·  Consumer Watchdog

<h3>Big Oil Bringing Price Controls On Itself</h3><p class="source">Ventura County Star (California)</p> <p>FTCR suggests the 20-cent post-Katrina leap was pure gouging, with no other apparent cause -- no new refinery failures, no shipwrecked oil tankers, no major new leaks on the Trans-Alaska pipeline. There have so far been neither denials from oil companies nor other explanations for why prices for all brands rose in concert to record levels.</p>