~ Wall Street fights rule limiting oil speculation (oil speculation is a HUGE driver of gas prices)

abaldwin360:

WASHINGTON (CNNMoney) — Wall Street is pushing to stop a new rule that would crack down on speculation in the energy markets, which many blame for contributing to the spike in gas prices.

The new rule — part of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act to reform Wall Street — would set limits  on how much traders can buy, preventing firms from grabbing large chunks of the energy market.

But those limits may not be set anytime soon. Nearly two years after the new law, the rule has yet to be fully implemented. And on Monday, two Wall Street trade groups asked a federal judge in Washington to delay or block the rule.

Representatives of the International Swaps and Derivatives Association and the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, which filed suit against the rulein December, appeared at a hearing at which they sought an injunction barring the rule’s immediate implementation.

The Wall Street groups said in a statement that the rule was lacking on an economic basis, and would harm markets if implemented.

keep reading

You have to wonder how the New Robber Barons would survive if they were actually at the mercy of “the invisible hand of the free market”.

Americans have collectively reduced oil gas consumption in the decade since 911. Couple that with the two-year uptick in domestic oil production, and the free market laws of supply & demand dictate that gas and oil prices should go down. Yet we have gas prices rising — just like in 2008, the last Presidential Election Year.

Could it be… SATAN?  

Nah. It’s just collusion between the increasingly desperate GOP and their Big Oil Pimps:

“In a closed-door meeting last week, Speaker John A. Boehner instructed fellow Republicans to embrace the gas-pump anger they find among their constituents when they return to their districts for the Presidents Day recess.”

Source: NY Times

~ Newt Gingrich refuses to credit Obama for improved economy, but admits that if it was worse he would blame him.

(Source: thesoapboxschtick)

~ Orly Taitz Is Running for U.S. Senate

Orly Taitz is running for U.S. Senate. Taitz, the Mission Viejo dentist and Rancho Santa Margarita lawyer who made a name for herself questioning the veracity of President Obama’s birth certificate, will run as a GOP candidate in an effort to unseat Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.).

(Source: sarahlee310)