Patrick J. Rider - I agree with you in theory on the subject of taxation, but let's be clear about this. The oil doesn't belong to the oil companies. It belongs to the people of Alaska. We should receive a benefit from the sale of our oil, but currently, we are actually paying the oil companies more to produce a barrel of oil than that barrel of oil makes when sold, so the oil companies are receiving the benefit of what amounts to reverse taxation. That's WRONG!

Also, even when oil was making a large profit on a barrel of oil, Alaskans were paying much more for the production than any other oil-producing country in the world. That's WRONG!

For this season, oil companies are struggling, but they've made enormous profits in Alaska and for 30 years (the AGIA years excepted) they have done so with huge subsidies from the State. That needed to change and did, until fools voted to cut the owners throats to benefit the oil companies. That needs to change.