On April 30, 2008, NPR Host Steve Inskeep interviewed Vijay Vaitheeswaran of “The Economist” on NPR (National Public Radio) and asked him (as an expert): “Why has the price of oil risen so dramatically?” And: “Why is there a shortage of crude?”
Vaitheeswaran answered: “There is plenty of crude available.”

I was quickly reminded of the numerous articles I had written, starting in the 1998 and especially in 2000, just before George W. Bush’s election. I outlined the “Oil Hustle” being perpetrated on the American public and all other oil consuming nations.
In the year 2000, there was a tremendous glut of oil in the world market. Supertankers were fully loaded and standing off-shore with no takers, no room in the land-based tank farms, no capacity at the refineries (or so we were told). The multinational oil companies and countries were inexplicably NOT ordering the available crude into storage tanks at their cracking plants. In effect, a world wide glut of crude oil was being described as a shortage.

The Media and US Congress went along with the sham and did not challenge the oil executives. Keep in mind the timing. George W. Bush was running for President against Al Gore and Bush needed the donor funds from the oil companies, oil countries and the other polluting industries -- particularly the big power companies whose major fuel was oil and coal, both highly polluting and with a finite quantity as a limited natural resource -- not ever renewable.
Naturally, George W.’s father -- President #41, George Herbert Walker Bush and his former Secretary of State James Baker III were on the OIL team. Remember they all emanated from the centre of Texas oil country. There were also others in the shadows, such as Brent Scowcroft and most of George Herbert Walker Bush’s Cabinet when he was President. Many of them came from those industrial companies, doing the major building and infrastructure for Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Oil States.

As I wrote then, their “idea” was to use a fake shortage to push Congress to override all conservation laws and allow drilling in Alaska, along the environmentally fragile Florida coast, closer to land on the continental shelf in the Gulf of Mexico and also along the California coast -- all areas extremely sensitive to destruction by inevitable oil spills that accompany most drilling sites.
But, IF the oil companies got the population screaming to their Congressmen because of the rise in the costs of gasoline, heating fuel, jet fuel, etc., Congressmen would move to please their constituents and over-ride all Environmental Protection Laws. They would “have to”.

We had experts testify and present the facts to Congressmen about this “swindle” but, they refused to buck their Party and the man who was to become President. Something fishy happened with the deciding vote in Florida and Bush became President. His opponent, Al Gore, continued circling the globe describing the exponential rise in the earth’s temperature, melting ice, polluted air, water and soil -- mostly due to carbon emissions from oil. Gore offered many practical and potential solutions as well in his documentary “An Inconvenient Truth”.
Since that election, Bush has repaid his donors for their financial assistance by being willing to destroy the laws that protect our mutual world environment. Air, water, land be damned IF there were business profits to be made. Everyone invested in the rising price of oil made fortunes: the Saudis, all the oil companies and all those families and individuals who made fortunes and are still piling on the greenbacks.

Only the people all over the world suffered.
Congress occasionally had well-choreographed “show” hearings where the oil company executives were asked rehearsed questions and the pretence continued.
The “swindle” expanded once the oil companies and the suppliers found they could get away with raising prices every other day. No one stopped them. They had a “friend” who came fromTexas oil country in the White House. The Media simply never did due diligence in digging out the facts. Those facts were readily available to anyone with a mind and a computer to do a search. We had already given them the needed information with which to begin in 2000.

The American people were "swindled” by their own government and those tied to the Saudis as well as other large suppliers of crude oil. The rest of the world suffered greatly as well. The soaring cost of oil fuelled a huge drop in the value of the American dollar, peoples’ equity in their homes and the current “recession” (or is it the beginning of a depression?) was all of which was caused by oil greed and manipulation!
Perhaps these greedy folks have gone too far -- as our economy is in recession; banks are on the verge of closing; and bread is reaching $ 4-5 a loaf. Food riots are breaking out world-wide. The price of rice is rising exponentially and Ms Condi Rice has some hand in what is causing this oil swindle as a former board member of the Chevron Oil Company.
Wait until the inner cities start rioting over a $ 5 loaf of bread. It all started with the oil swindle and now that has a life of its own.

So, what can be done?
We could nationalize the oil industry as critical to national security.
We could tax the exorbitant profits and use those taxes to help people keep their homes -- as well as investing those taxes in research and development of alternative sources of renewable energy.
We could hold real Congressional Hearings with teeth, and full public exposure in the Media.
We could start jailing the Swindlers who ruined so many people -- as well as the politicians who assisted.

If you want testimony under subpoena, I would start with George Herbert Walker Bush, Dick Cheney, James Baker, the Cabinet that served under Bush #41, the current President Bush #43, the past and present Secretaries of State, including especially Condoleezza Rice who served as a Board Member of Chevron Oil Company.
There are more -- but that would be a significant beginning.

Source: www.expertclick.com