Analysts estimate that every $1 increase in the price of a barrel
of oil translates into 1.5% increase in ExxonMobil’s earnings;
ExxonMobil announced record earnings for 2005 - $36.13bn. Shareholders
of the energy company stock made windfalls, but these paled in
comparison with the cash-in of the company executives. This is
something unrelated to good management of the company.

If you took the top nine major oil companies and looked at their
returns and chose the one that performed worst, you still find that the
executives made very large gains from their options even though they
performed as badly as one could do.

America’s chief executives earn almost twice as much as their
European counterparts thanks mainly to the greater use of incentive
schemes, such as stock options - the typical CEO of a $500 million
company in America earned 42.2m in 2005. Of this only $600,000, or less
than 30%, came from salary.

In the case of ExxonMobil, the 2004 figures for Mr. Lee R. Raymond
(2005 figures not available) received $7.5m in salary and bonus, plus
$28m worth of restricted stock awards and $2.16m in long-term incentive
pay. Mr. Raymond retired from the company in December 2005. In effect
ExxonMobil distributed in 2004 $184m to its top 1,300 employees - the
top 5 executives received almost 7% of this - a total of $12.85m. Now,
what did they do to deserve the windfall from the global increase in
the price of a barrel of oil? What do we expect from them to do in
order to decrease OUR dependence on oil ? Who is being fooled here by
the word ADDICTION?

For 2005 we believe that these extras will amount to $220m for
ExxonMobil or $14.3m for the top 5 executives.

Comedian Jon Stewart said: “I was reading today about Exxon’s
profits. Boy, they are doing so well. You can’t not be happy for them.”
Jay Leno said: “Let me sum up the State of the Union for you. We’re in
good shape. Not as good as Exxon, but still pretty good.”

Former US Senator Gary Hart said: “One factor always missing in
the
continuing energy debate is the cost of maintaining military forces
required to guarantee our access to Persian Gulf oil. If the cost of
those forces were amortized into the total cost of petroleum, the true
cost of energy, at the gas pump, would be at least $4 or $5 per gallon.
And this calculation does not include American lives lost in Gulf wars
I and II, and probably III, IV, V.” We, here at SustainabiliTank are
further intrigued, how would the above effect the income of the
ExxonMobil or Halliburton CEOs?

The President’s speech, like the President’s previous so called
Energy Policy, did not mention regulations that might actually
encourage the market to ditch dirty technologies in favor of clean
ones. And it is still avoiding any attempt to make Americans pay the
true cost of the energy they guzzle - and that effectively enrich the
oil company executives. In Europe, the folks already pay $4 t0 $5 per
gallon, and they have learned to adjust. All what the President seems
to be building towards is another billions of dollars give-away in
subsidies that may end up in the wrong hands, and still not decrease
our dependence on imports of oil that enrich ExxonMobil executives.
What could actually help is exactly what was omitted - carbon taxes,
carbon trading, and tightening vehicle fuel-economy rules.

Conservation is the easiest way for increasing energy
availability;
it will be needed even if we come up with new energy technologies as
suggested. But conservation would harm the oil companies and their CEOs
would not advise the President to go this route. THAT IS THE RUB! Vice
President Cheney thought to make energy policy by asking CEOs for their
advice - and what did we expect from this?

The title of this article came to me because of a TV show I
watched
today. Please pardon the bluntness of the story:

Mr. Bob Schiefer, on CBS TV - “Face the Nation” - told how in what
was sort of his first interview of a President, in his long career as a
journalist, he asked president Nixon about the appointment of a new
group of advisers - “will they be in-house people or people from the
outside.” Nixon answered “outhouse advisers, and when he realized what
he just said he offered - you know what I mean.” This story seems to be
the fitting comment to what went on in Washington when tackling the
energy problem, if one has some doubts, please read in your fasvorite
newsp[aper about the influence of industry lobbyists upon
government.

Further, also from material that became available today - “The
Week” magazine, dated February 10, 2006 (see page 4 of the magazine).
The prestigious Yale University, alma matter to many residents of the
White House and their advisers, “had a policy not to stock soap in its
dormitory bathrooms, citing the estimated $100,000 annual cost. After
years of student pressure. Yale has finally relented. The university
will soon install liquid-soap dispensers in three of its 12 residential
colleges, and the rest of the dorms could be covered by next year.”
Now! - this may perhaps help us understand the place of the “outhouse”
in White House culture.