T. Boone Pickens: Still Controversial After All This Time

Being a blond, I usually rock on with whatever is thrown my way (if it doesn't go right over my head) and adjust to the situation accordingly. I am certainly not expected to have a mind.

However, after watching Maria Bartiroma, Wall Street Journal Report, interview T. Boone Pickens, Sunday, I could no longer be silent. When asked his opinion of the current extreme rise in gasoline prices over the past two weeks, he suggested that the price be raised even further to $5.00/gallon! His theory is based on "supply and demand" and that if the price is raised or taxed so high that it forces us to stop driving then it will in turn bring the prices down.

Now I ask you, do we all have "stupid" stamped on our foreheads? Have you changed your driving habits in the past two weeks...or even in the past two months? Will they change if you have to pay $5.00/gallon? In other words, will you discontinue taking your children to school? Will you take a day off from work every week because it's too expensive to drive? I think not.

Living in East Texas myself, I am twelve miles from nowhere; meaning twelve miles from the nearest grocery, gas station or civilization in general. I plan my trips to town and carefully plot my errands. Thank God my vehicle is paid off and therefore I do not have that expense, but gasoline is a necessary commodity.

There is something definitely wrong here. Perhaps the solution is to purchase stock from Exxon, BP or other major oil companies in order to recoup the prices we are forced to pay at the pump. The only people cheering on big oil executives, like T. Boone, are the stockholders.

Here is a portion of yet another interview with T. Boone last year also touting the same idea.

T. Boone Pickens: Still Courting Controversy
April 27, 2006 by Christopher Palmeri

The Eighties-vintage corporate raider and ex-CEO of Mesa Petroleum dismisses his critics and says that a gas price of $5 a gallon is a good thing.

Being a prominent voice in the industry, Pickens meets frequently with politicians and pundits who ask him what to do about today's high prices.

Fox News (NWS ) host Bill O'Reilly, for example, once asked: "If Exxon's cost to produce oil is $20 a barrel why can't they sell it for $30?" Pickens' response: "They're not fools." Pickens says he had a Congressman suggest recently that Washington should put caps on prices. "It's never worked," Pickens told him. His solution is just the opposite -- raise the price of gasoline by putting more taxes on it. He suggested bringing the total price to $5 a gallon, much as it in the rest of the world. "Price will kill demand," he says.

Enough is enough.