If you must, at least buy your overinflated oil at CITGO

Citgo is a fully-owned distribution arm of the Venezuelan state oil company. When you buy at Citgo, you make a consumer decision that actually makes a difference (unlike most boycott recommendations). Oppose imperialism and the war agenda, support the people of Venezuela.

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0516-25.htm

I'm moving to New England and Citgo is everywhere there. Yay!!

:bounce:

I've seen 2 new ones in just the past month here in Mass.

got one 3 miles from my front door and they know me well

Citgo is notoriously cheaper here than most other gas stations, but I will make a point to only get gas there.

Citgo runs from 5 to 25 cents more than the cheapest gas (QuikTrip & RaceTrac).

I recently started following his advice and buying my gas at a couple of Citgo stations close to where I live. I have stopped buying gas at the Chevron station where I used to buy gas.

I am in San Diego, and there are Citgo stations here.

Boycott other stations!!!

It states that venezuela is the "Of the top oil producing countries in the world, only one is a democracy with a president who was elected on a platform of using his nation's oil revenue to benefit the poor. The country is Venezuela. "

Norway is the world 3rd largest oil-producer and has currentl set aside $170 billion in an oil-fund to benefit it's citizens in the long run. It's also light years ahead of venezuela when it comes to beeing democratic.

You're right, Norway is also democratic.

In the last six years Venezuela has made progress like no other country on earth. I dispute whether any place is "more" democratic.

Venezuela is under attack by an imperialist power -- the court-appointed, spook-infested junta occupying the federal government in Washington. The CIA already attempted and -miraculously!- failed to overthrow this fragile experiment in people's democracy. The military dictatorship the CIA and the reactionary elements of Venezuelan society attempted to impose on April 11, 2002 would very likely have gone the way of all such regimes, complete with death squads and a massive rollback of living standards for the poor and working people.

Given these hostile conditions, the Venezuelan achievement of remaining a democracy since then is much more impressive than Norway's happy luck of being rich and democratic to begin with.

Now I stay away from Mobile too. I usually get Citgo or Sunoco.

Since we have to buy gas anyway at least it will go to somewhere that NEEDS it.

NOW I KNOW MORE PEOPLE HERE SUPPORT THIS OF ALL THINGS THAN HAVE COME OUT - PLEASE KEEP THIS KICKED NOW!!!

Great photo of Chavez being returned to power after the failed coup

Thanks for the info!

This should be inspiring more posts and kicks than runaway brides, "greatest Americans" and MJ trials, no?

Ahem...

Factually, Snopes agrees with what I wrote above, and with what the original article at Common Dreams says.

Snopes:
"CITGO is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the national oil company of Venezuela, so naturally most of its crude oil comes from there."

Correct.

Common Dreams:
"Money you pay to Citgo goes primarily to Venezuela -- not Saudi Arabia or the Middle East... So get your gas at Citgo. And help fuel a democratic revolution in Venezuela." (Key word: "primarily.")

Also correct: Buying from CITGO supports Venezuela.

The Snopes article is not about the CITGO "BUYcott," which is meant to support Venezuela.

The Snopes article instead is criticizing the idea that one can completely avoid purchases of gas that comes from Middle Eastern oil. This may be impossible, but avoiding Middle Eastern oil is unrelated to the "CITGO BUYcott" (or this thread).

Furthermore, Snopes's use of statistics in this case is misleading. It may be true that no company is entirely untainted by Middle Eastern oil, but certainly the consumer can purchase gas in a way that minimizes their consumption of Middle Eastern oil.

Snopes notes that CITGO Iraqi and Kuwaiti oil amounting to about 1.8 million barrels in Feb. 2002, which was less than 10 percent of CITGO's shipments that month. (I looked up the statistics on the DOE site, just like they did.) We could argue if it was wrong to buy Iraqi oil in Feb. 2002, when this would have been under the UN oil-for-food program, but never mind.

This non-Venezuelan oil was presumably bought and shipped by CITGO so as to bridge shortfalls. (Other than that, the state oil company of Venezuela has little reason to provide anything other than Venzuelan oil.)

Buying at CITGO supports Venezuela. This is not an "urban legend" and your bringing up that phrase suggests the whole idea of buying at CITGO is a lie; which it is not. Shame on you.

And shame on Snopes for spreading the urban legend that we are individually and collectively helpless to effect change, as in statements like these:

"This notion is like claiming that we could put the big grocery chains out of business if we all bought our food only from small mom & pop stores, but ignoring the fact that these small shops couldn't possibly come close to supplying all our grocery needs."

Oh really? Who's defining needs? Who says I can't get all of mine from the corner grocery story? Who says that if enough people switch, the market will not adapt accordingly? (More small stores would open, some
chains would go out of business.)

Their point in no way applies to corner grocery stores (or to anything on the retail end, if you think about it), although they are correct in the following conclusion about oil supplies:

"To meet the sudden demand... the good guys would have to buy gasoline wholesale from the bad guys, who are suddenly stuck with unwanted gasoline."

To which I say: let it come to that. Let Chevron and Shell and BP go out of business, even if it means the oil is still mostly coming from the Middle East. Like that won't send a message?

Like it won't send a message if CITGO doubles its earnings next year while Exxon's drop precipitously?

I certainly agree with their most valid single point:

"Simply shifting where we buy gasoline isn't nearly as good a solution as the much tougher choice of sharply curtailing the amount of gasoline we buy."

...

(Grumbling PS: Geez, Snopes set themselves up as the arbiters of discrimination and skepticism, and now everyone is supposed to believe whatever they want to spin. rassa fracka bucka coocka...)