by Linda Burleson

Created on: July 22, 2008   Last Updated: July 27, 2008

This seems to be the mantra of Americans. Who can we blame? Oh, let's blame President Bush. Do you understand the way our government is set up? Do you realize that our government has three distinct branches to balance each other out - the Executive Branch, the Legislative Branch and the Judicial Branch. The President's powers are limited, particularly if his influence wanes. His greatest power is the veto, with the exception of being the Military Commander in Chief. If any branch of the government must take the blame for things gone wrong it is usually the Legislative Branch that is the culprit.

Oh, well if we can't blame the President, let's blame the greedy CEOs of the oil companies. Have you done any research to determine why they deserve the blame? Do you know how big is a barrel of oil? We hear the price of a barrel every day, but how does that break down? A barrel is 42 gallons which divides out to around $3.33 per gallon, depending on the daily price. What nation supplies the most crude oil and petroleum to the United States? The United States does. According to the Energy Information Agency (www.eia.doe.gov), our country supplied 41% of the oil we consumed in March of this year. Next in the line of suppliers is Canada accounting for about 12% of our oil and 20% of what we import. The top five suppliers below these two in order are Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Nigeria, and Mexico. How much oil do we import from Persian Gulf countries? Believe it or not that amount is about 16%. How much gasoline does one barrel of crude oil yield? One barrel of crude oil yields about 19.6 gallons of gasoline. Crude oil is used in many other products such as heating oil, lubricants, asphalt, plastics, synthetic fibers, detergents, fertilizer, etc.. How much of the cost of oil goes into the price of gasoline?

We consumed about 390 million gallons of gas per day in our personal vehicles, recreation vehicles, farm implements and construction and landscaping equipment. What percentage of the cost of a gallon of gasoline does the price of crude oil account for. The answer is 77% at $4.00 per gallon. How many products that you pruchase on a regular basis are sold with tax included? For most products tax is added at checkout so that you know what you are paying. Gasoline is one of very very few things that has tax built into the price. States asses those taxes with California being the highest at 63.9 cents per gallon, that being the base. Motorists there also pay an additional 6%

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