After all this time, things have finally become clear. The U.S. oil industry has two sides, and only two. One side thinks its customers should pay higher taxes on oil and gas, especially oil, so the federal government can make more money. The other side includes sinister special interests that care only about their own pocketbooks and nothing about deficit reduction.
It used to seem as though the industry represented a tangle of views and opinions, generally reflecting the complex commercial interests characteristic of any group of corporations. It used to seem as though all corporations were special interests inasmuch as they mostly tended to their business. It used to seem as though commercial pursuit of this type wasn't such a bad thing. To the contrary: There are good companies and bad companies. Good companies obey their political guardians; bad companies pursue their special interests. Things sure have become simpler since Bill Clinton became President.
MAKING A LIST
Treasury Sec. Lloyd Bentsen is making a list, checking it twice, gonna find out who's naughty and nice. Nice oil companies support the Clinton energy tax. Naughty companies don't care anything about deficit reduction. The administration rewards nice companies by returning their telephone calls. It punishes naughty companies by ignoring them. Some call this hardball politics.
If so, it belongs in the little league. The world does not divide so neatly between the good and the bad. Issues do not always fit into neat categories. And democracy is supposed to accommodate dissent.
It is possible to oppose the Clinton plan and still support deficit reduction. The choice is not between supporting Clinton and doing nothing about the deficit, as the President so often suggests.
It is even possible to think that the Clinton plan will make the federal deficit grow. A glance at recent history, during which several tax hikes have failed to stop deficit growth, should at least raise doubts about revenues likely to accrue from more taxes and about the government's ability to control its spendthrift urges.
It is possible, therefore, to fear that the Clinton proposal will do nothing but hurt the U.S. economy. And not one commercial, special-interest string attaches to this view.
What if Clinton's doubters are correct? What if higher marginal tax rates suppress economic activity, divert top incomes into shelters, and shrink the tax base? What if revenues stagnate, new spending programs replace superficial cuts taking place now, and the deficit keeps growing? The U.S. economy-workers, consumers, people-will have undertaken huge sacrifice for naught. It has happened before. And government keeps coming back, asking for more.
Clinton will have no such contrary talk. And the game he has dispatched Bentsen to play with oil companies makes his trademark confidence look like juvenile arrogance. In the U.S. capital, this is hardly unique, but national interests are at stake. A little adult caution would be refreshing.
SUCKER'S GAME
Oil companies must not get caught in this sucker's game. Those that somehow see economic benefit in Clinton's program should support it. Companies that see economic poison in the proposal should vigorously oppose it. The hope here is that the latter group will prevail.
What companies must not do is lend coy support to a proposal they know to be flawed for the sake of precious "access" or, worse, to stay off Bentsen's naughty list. Companies will answer to their customers for the possible outcome of such corporate realpolitik, and the nation will suffer because of it.
Copyright 1993 Oil & Gas Journal. All Rights Reserved.
