oil industry mad at the bush administration

President Bush's proposed budget cuts will eliminate $50 Million that was supposed to go for new oil and natrual gas exploration R&D at the department of energy. This has the oil industry fuming mad, which in my opinion doesn't make sense. I mean its not like the oil industry needs this money - seriously... ExxonMobil reported over $35 Billion in profits alone for FY2005. Chevron reported $4.4 Billion in profits last quarter as well.

Many people can't afford to even gas up their cars anymore to drive to their minimum wage jobs, so did the industry even need that $50 Million? I'm thinking not. As much though, as I want to laud the Bush administration for helping reduce America's dependence on foreign oil by fostering support for the R&D of alternative energy sources, my thinking is that this is not a large enough step to turn the tide in that direction. If anything, his tax cuts are also cutting out of other important social programs like financial aid and medicare and all these tax cuts are mostly realized by the upper 1% of all income earners so the money will all eventually flow back into the oil industry anyway. Those who pay less in taxes, have more to invest back into these companies that see ridiculous profits at the expense of the common man. My thoughts are that these tax cuts are only serving to widen the income gap and eliminate the middle class, not to mention we have record spending deficits of over $350 Billion for the United States next year.

Since I voted for Dubya in 2000, I can rightfully state that he let us all down... whatever happened to his promise of "ushering in an era of responsibility"?