Jeg heiv meg paa oppfordringen og Obama har allerede svart:
Dear Tommy:
Thank you for contacting me regarding the high cost of gasoline. I appreciate hearing from you.
Today, motorists are paying record prices while oil companies are reporting record profits. Current gas prices are due primarily to this nation’s dependence on oil imported from abroad, including countries of the Middle East. Other factors that affect price include supply disruptions due to weather-related events, and the growing energy demands of developing nations like China and India.
In the short-term, there are several ways to reduce the price of gasoline. I have called for suspending the diversion of oil to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which would increase supply in the commercial marketplace. I support imposing a windfall profits tax on oil companies and using the money to fund the development of alternative fuels like E-85, to provide heating and cooling assistance to low-income people, and to help Americans weatherize their homes. All of these policies would decrease the use of oil and help reduce the price that consumers pay.
In January 2007, I introduced S. 133, the Oil Subsidy Elimination for New Strategies on Energy (Oil SENSE) Act to repeal more than $3.7 billion of outdated subsidies, programs, and tax incentives for oil and gas that are no longer necessary given the magnitude of oil company profits. Congress also needs to consider methods to provide greater transparency in the energy financial markets to prevent abuses and manipulation among speculators, and I support increasing authority by the Federal Trade Commission to investigate questionable gas price patterns.
The real answer to high gasoline prices, however, rests with long-term solutions, and that means we must begin now to implement key policies that have been neglected for years by Congress. For two decades, Congress failed to act on improving fuel economy in cars and trucks, stalling vehicle mileage at 27.5 miles per gallon since 1985. In 2006, I joined my colleague Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) to author the “Fuel Economy Reform Act” to increase fuel economy. This bill formed a large part of the agreement in the 2007 Energy Bill to raise the average mileage of new cars and light trucks to 35 miles per gallon by 2020.
We also must encourage the development of home-grown biofuels which will reduce our dependence on foreign oil. As a member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, I worked to enact the Renewable Fuels Standard to increase biofuels in the nation’s fuel supply to 7.5 billion gallons by 2012, and to update that target to 18.7 billion gallons in the 2007 Energy Bill. In 2005, I enacted a tax credit to encourage more installations of biofuel pumps at gas stations across the country.
In the 109th and 110th Congress, I joined with Senator Lugar to introduce the American Fuels Act, which included the first production mandate for biodiesel into the national fuel supply, the first requirement that all federal refueling facilities have at least one biofuels pump, and prohibited gas stations franchise contracts from preventing the installation of alternative fuel pumps on the premises. All of these provisions were incorporated into the 2007 Energy Bill. I also joined Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) in introducing the FREEDOM Act, which included tax incentives for greater deployment of plug-in electric hybrid vehicles into the marketplace.
Ultimately, the answer to high gas prices is to increase the availability of alternative fuels and decrease our use of foreign oil so that Americans are no longer are beholden to oil cartels. It is time to concentrate on the pursuit of energy independence as the great project of our time.
Again, thank you for writing.
Sincerely,
Barack Obama
United States Senator