He said the sales of large-ticket items such as vehicles, kitchen appliances and television sets have all been slow over the past 5 to six months. "We have to assume that some of that is due to less spendable income caused by the price of oil," he added
On November 16, 2007, Capital Press reported that energy costs are taking a big bite out of farm businesses across the West, from keeping crops in production and moving products to markets. Propane prices at the Cal-Nevada Wholesale Nursery, near Sacramento, had increased to $2 a gallon from $1.50 the year before. The owner told Capital Press that even though it would add 25 cents to the price of each plant, he had no choice but to keep 6 heaters running at night to keep the temperature from dropping below 65, or he'd lose the crop.
He also said the nursery business has been hurt by higher freight charges to ship flowers by air. "It used to be $12 to $13 a case and now it us up to $24 a box," he told the Press.
The president of the Washington Apple Commission told Capital Press that the rising cost of fuel to power equipment to pack, process and ship the state's $1.4 billion apple crop has become a major concern. Apple shippers saw surcharges on overseas containers rise $100 per container in 2007, according to the Press.
Travel Industry
When Bush took office, the price of jet fuel was $0.86 per gallon. With a usage rate of 19.5 billion gallons of fuel a year, each penny increase per gallon adds $195 million in annual costs to the airline industry, according to the Air Transport Association.
In 2006, airlines spent a record $38 billion on fuel, 3 times the cost in 2002. Airlines raised fares a total of 12 times in 2005, and in the first quarter of 2006, American Airline raised domestic round-trip tickets by $10, and both Continental and Southwest reported a 5.4% increase.
In the fall of 2007, Carnival Cruise Lines and Royal Caribbean began charging a fee of $5 per day per passenger and both companies applied the fee to future and already existing reservations. Norwegian Cruise Lines added a fee of $7 per day to future reservations
Americans do not have the money to pay these ever rising costs. Statistics released by the Department of Labor in January showed real weekly earnings increased only 0.9 percent nationally in 2007. Median weekly earnings increased only 0.9 percent between 2000 and 2006, compared with 7.1% between 1996 and 2000, under the Clinton Administration
The Bush tax cuts have paid off well for those intended. IRS data shows that the wealthiest 1% of Americans, those with an average income of $1,316,000, earned over 21% of all income in 2005, while the workers in bottom 50% earned less than 13%.
And as far as job creation, Bush is competing with his old man to see who ends up with the worst record since Herbert Hoover over 70 years ago. As of October 5, 2007, Labor Bureau statistics show that non-farm payroll jobs increased by 5.6 million since Bush took office. More than 20 million jobs were added during the Clinton Administration.
In January 2009, we need a team of qualified experts on the ground in the White House ready to clean up the disaster that Bush left. The first Clinton Administration faced the same daunting task in 1993. Hillary Clinton is the only candidate in the race with enough knowledge and experience to get the job done.
Evelyn Pringle evelyn-pringle@sbcglobal.net
(Evelyn Pringle is a columnist for OpEd News and an investigative journalist focused on exposing corruption in government and corporate America)
Lower grades and not being president of law review - like her opponent was.
Not passing the bar like her opponent did.
Riding on your husband's record and his political machine, or building your own, like her opponent did.
Claiming her husband’s years in office to appear to have more "experience" than your opponent who actually has more years as an elected official than you.
Lacking the character to congratulate your opponent when he wins
Lying about NAFTA to dodge responsibility for the fact that you championed it and turning it around to create the false impression that your opponent supports NAFTA
Disloyally identifying with the opposing party’s candidate as having "a lifetime of experience," in common with you and mis-characterizing the 20 years of experience of your fellow Democrat as "a speech."
Casting yourself as the feminine victim: they call on me first, the press is coddling my opponent, placing people in the audience to ask if you prefer diamonds or pearls, surrounding yourself with sympathetic women who want to know "how you do it," and then getting "victimized" by men who tell you to "iron their shirts," just in time for the New Hampshire primary . . . Characterizing your opponent as getting a free pass from the press when the press reported everything they even guessed about him, and the wrongs of everyone who came into contact with him, multiple times. while never mentioning the skeletons in your closet like: travel gate; renting out the Lincoln bedroom; removing papers from Vince Edwards’ residence after his suicide; non-disclosed tax returns; undisclosed donors to Bill’s foundation; undisclosed donors to Bill’s presidential library, besides Saudi royal family $10 million donation; undisclosed earmarks; cattle futures scandal; Whitewater . . .
Not encouraging your supporters - like your opponent did, when you loose. Instead running out of town, leaving your supporters to fend for themselves when you loose, but showing up to bask in glory when you win. Kind of like George Bush making his appearance on a naval ship to announce the victory, that never was . . .
Not taking responsibility for your actions - "I voted for it but I hoped it wouldn't pass . . ." Give me credit for my husband’s administration, but not the things that go wrong, like NAFTA.
If you want a woman in the White House who perpetuates every stereotype about women who want to run with the big dogs, but who don’t want to take the responsibility that goes with that status, then Hillary's the one.
by
Hargrove (8 articles, 2 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 15 comments)
on Wednesday, March 5, 2008 at 1:38:14 PM
Gloria Steinem once said, "There won't be true equality until there are incompetent women in high places." Condolezza Rice comes to mind, and Hillary. Neither has accomplished anything of note in public life, let alone anything worthy of their lofty ambitions. All one need do for confirmation is examine the trail of utterly useless legislation Hillary has sponsored since taking her Senate seat. It's exactly the sort of chaff one might expect of a Junior Senator. It is not the sort of legislation one might expect from a presidential candidate.
There are any number of brilliant, dedicated women qualified to assume the presidency. Unfortunately, Hillary Clinton is not one of them.
JP
by
JonmarkP (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 64 comments)
on Wednesday, March 5, 2008 at 3:21:37 PM
