US House Representative Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) is a member of the the House Appropriations Committee and has been known as one of the leading opponents of allowing oil drilling off the coasts of the US.
During a press briefing yesterday, he was quoted by several news sources including MSNBC as saying,
“We (the government) should own the refineries. Then we can control how much gets out into the market.”
Yeah. Right. That’ll help a lot.
Of course if you don’t actually let the oil companies drill, what is there to refine?
Also, note that he didn’t say that the government would actually increase the amoint of oil refined if they nationalized the refineries. He said that the government would control it. Not the same thing by any stretch of the imagination.