Raves, Rants & Roses

RANT: I see from a front-page story last week that it's time for The Associated Press' quarterly bashing of Big Oil. The whipping boy, of course, was ExxonMobil who made "the fattest operating profit in U.S. corporate history."

Wait a minute, they reported a $11.7 billion profit on sales of $138 billion. My calculator says that's about 8 1/2 percent. Excuse me, but does anyone on God's green earth that has ever been remotely connected to the business world consider that to be excessive, greedy, sacrilegious or un-American?

I think a much more interesting story would be the percentage of net profit on sales of the average upscale Mexican food restaurant. Have you ever wondered why Mexican food as an industry seems to be second only to the medical profession in Tyler?

People stand in line in the hot sun to gleefully pay $10-$12 for a platter of what is essentially about a half-pound of rice, beans and flour, a couple of ounces of hamburger meat or cheese and a little garnish of onion, tomato and pepper. Talk about excess profits. Now as to that $2 glass of iced tea. At my house three family size tea bags and 10 Saccharin tablets make a gallon of tea. That's 16 eight-ounce glasses of tea for a total cost of about 50 cents. Excess profits?

What might the percentage of net profits on sales be in the Mexican food industry?

The presumptive Democratic nominee in this fall's presidential election is using this week as a voter incentive $1,000 to help them pay for high-priced gasoline and he would fund the program with an excess profits tax on big oil. What a guy.

I've got a good idea that he can use in his campaign next week. Every American citizen of voting age would receive, for the next four years on their birthday, a gift card for an enchilada dinner complete with a glass of iced tea. Of course the program would be funded by an excess profits tax on Mexican food restaurants.

We are still trying to help. Next week we may take a look at the athletic shoe industry.

Jim Turner
Hawkins