A Citizen’s Guide

To the editor:

I don’t know why things are so complicated. It is our natural resource. Gas should be sold by the cubic foot, oil sold by the barrel, gold/silver by the troy ounce, timber by the board foot, seafood by the pound, etc.

That is how the market values it; that’s how we should sell it. If a barrel of oil comes out of our ground, we should be paid for it whether it comes from a marginal field or the “mother lode.”

A company’s profit is none of our business. Profits can be reported falsely by any accountant and reported as companies want it reported.

After Enron (and others), how can we believe numbers given by anyone?

We could build the pipeline ourselves. It is a part of state infrastructure just like highways, bridges, railroads, etc. We would set transportation costs rather than being at the mercy of big business and their efforts to reduce royalty payments.

When was it legal for the state to market anything in direct competition with private business? If we take gas instead of money for our gas, wouldn’t we have to find a market for it? Should we give someone 80 of our crop if they would just leave us 20 percent to sell? Why do we need a battalion of lawyers to decipher the contract terms?

Our governor chooses to keep his negotiations in secret and feeds issues to our elected legislators a “spoonful” at a time.

I thought he was elected as governor, not God! His ego is too large and his demand for unquestionable respect is out of place. He gives no respect to our legislators or the residents of this state.

My first thought when Gov. Murkowski announced he would run again for governor, was, “Please, dear God, no!”

Perhaps the oil companies should take their ball and go home since their profits don’t warrant further investment.

Young companies will take their place since they are so tired and poor.

Charles L. Saylor

Healy