Not necessarily a bad thing -- I'd rather we tax oil to make prices high rather than fund our enemies in the war on terrorism, but low *and fluctuating* oil prices has been a barrier to a sane alternative energy program in the past -- permanently higher prices might help convince financers...oh yeah, credit crisis.  Damn.

It is getting more and more costly to replace reserves, The high profits of oil companies reflect future capital expenditure to keep up or invest in new energy technologies. It would be a huge mistake to pursue windfall profits taxes as explicitly stated by Obama and implied by Clinton.

Nonsense r-ennis.  The oil companies are not going to invest those huge profits in oil production.  They are going to pay them out or hoard them.  They idea that they are necessary for future oil production is pettifoggery, my favorite word of the day.  Future investment will based on future returns and there is not the slightest reason to believe that that investment will not be financed without a windfall today on past investment.  Your position is pure ideology.  Has nothing whatever to do with economics.

Mr. roidubouloi, I will not respond in the irritating and insulting manner you have, but do the arithmetic. The world uses about 80 million barrels per day of crude oil. At $100 per day, that amounts to $8 billion per day required to replace reserves. All the money in all the oil companies cannot possibly keep up even without being severely penalized with windfall profits taxes. Exxon's profit sound high, but their return on invested capital is in the single digits. Check it out.