"Whatever Became of the Anti-Trust Division of the Justice Department - And Has Anyone Reported It Missing?"

Almost nine months ago, following hurricane Katrina, our courageous president said, "There ought to be zero tolerance of people breaking the law during an emergency such as this, whether it be looting or price-gouging at the gasoline pump..."

Of course I loved it when he said it, and I loved it when he said the same thing about price gouging yesterday in response to $75 plus oil.

Quoting from an article written by Derrick Z. Jackson following Katrina: "...big oil looted the nation... Everyone knows that Bush does not really mean what he says about price-gouging at the pump, since he just gave energy companies the bulk of $14.5 billion in tax breaks in the new energy bill."

Allowing an industry such as big oil to reduce or eliminate competition and make as much money as possible and then feigning outrage when they do just that is incredible to me. It is just like the old joke about the scorpion that is asked why it kills things and replies, "That's what I do."

In Bush's two elections, oil and gas companies gave Republicans 79 percent of their $61.5 million in campaign contributions.

Executives from Exxon Mobil, Conoco, Shell Oil Co. and BP America Inc. met in the White House complex with Cheney aides who were developing a national energy policy, parts of which became law. Chevron was one of several companies that provided energy policy recommendations to the task force. Corporations like Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, and Chevron are primarily interested in their own profitability-not society's well being.

This is in the "what do I know" department:

A complicit Congress helped create the energy problem.

A complicit Administration helped create the energy problem.

A complicit Network Television helped create the energy problem.

But - most of all - a complicit Justice department helped create the energy problem.

As a society, we are as free as long as we have the media checking up on things. Our nation has created an ever-increasing array of hurdles for the media to overcome. I just love to hear a technocrat like Porter Goss speak to the issue of "security," while the rest of us sadly watch the shredding of our constitution and our freedoms.

In the brilliant Broadway presentation of the musical "1776," John Adams plaintively sings to an empty chamber: "Is anybody there? Does anybody care? Does anybody see what I see?"

Norman Horowitz

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