On a table in front of you lie 4 one dollar bills. Beside them sits a certificate good for one gallon of gasoline worth about $4.00. Given the choice of the cash or the certificate which would you choose?

That would depend on how soon you intended to spend them. If you just had to have that Big Mac and fries you’d grab the cash and get on down to Micky D’s. But if you were considering the investment possibilities of these options you would certainly choose the certificate. Looking ahead as little as two months that $4.00 could lose as much as 15% of its purchasing power making it worth only $3.40. Meanwhile that gallon of gas might rise by the same percentage to $4.60. Over the last year, in fact, the price of gasoline has more than doubled. That’s about 17% every two months!

The threat to all Western economies right now due to gas shortages is terrifying. But not to worry. In the midst of our present day political correctness insanity our political leaders have come up with a solution to impossibly high gas prices. They will raise taxes on the oil companies. This will force the gas companies to raise the price of gas even higher. Viola. The People will be unable to buy gas at all. No more gas shortage. We’ll have plenty of gasoline. We just won’t be able to use it to fuel industry and agriculture – or put food on our tables.

Like rats in a maze we have been trained to look to the government for solutions to this sort of crisis. We sit and wait hoping for the best and all we get is more of the worst. If we are going to save ourselves we have to break our revolting dependency on the government. We are addicted to government. But this is America. We, The People, rule! When we forget that our destiny is in our own hands we surrender our self-determination. It’s a bad bargain. But you already know that don’t you? I haven’t said anything so far that a thousand other bloggers haven’t said. What’s different here is that I can show you how to break the government’s grip on our seemingly expendable lives.

Imagine that six months from now nuclear bombs are set off in New York, Washington, Chicago and L.A. What’s your $4.00 worth now? If you’re lucky some fool might give you 1 cent on the dollar. And what’s that gas certificate worth? Well, if you can still trade it in its value will be “what the market will bear”. What the market will bear in the devastating circumstances of post nuclear destruction will be the difference between starvation and survival. The market will not be accepting dollars any more but it would kill for gas certificates – literally. What We need to do as quickly as humanly possible is set up a People’s oil reserve and make certificates of ownership available for purchase by The People.

But if you happen to be living in the imaginary Utopia where government makes the sun shine and saves the polar bears you aren’t worried about oil reserves. The government oil reserves are filled to capacity. No worries. Right. Have you been to New Orleans during hurricane season? You are never going to see a drop of that oil! Never!

I have not seen them but I’m certain that the government has set priorities on how that oil should be distributed in the event of a national crisis. I’m thinking it goes like this:
1. Politicians
2. Military
3. Agriculture
4. Industry
5. The People

I would bet every last dime I own that in a crisis distribution of federal oil reserves would never get beyond #2. You want to live and feed your family through national disaster? You’d better begin now by facing the reality that The People will be on their own.

Setting up a “Citizen’s Oil Reserve Co-operative” (C.O.R.C.) is not a terribly difficult proposal. Existing infrastructures for storage and distribution could be purchased as they stand without interrupting on-going operations. A charter could be written in a matter of a few weeks or months. An executive board could be selected in a few months as well. Memberships could be put up for sale before the year is out. Operating capital could be found without a problem in the present atmosphere of economic distress and government disillusionment. All that’s required to get going is that one young human dynamo that can set it all in motion. Volunteers?

I first suggested this concept some two years ago in posts at Blogster.Com. If you are unclear about the concept three posts on the subject will go a long way toward clarification. The first was titled, “How To Make A Buck”.

Since I wrote those posts at least one intrepid businessman has conceived and put into operation a similar fuel reserve concept. In his system a person may buy gallons on reserve. But from what I’ve been able to gather only the price is reserved. There is not actually a physical reserve of fuel in storage somewhere. So while the concept may prove excellent as an investment strategy it is subject to supply availability and ownership is not easily exchangeable as with cash and certificates. In any case the man has demonstrated that a system of this sort can be put into operation in under 2 years.