Loved One or Friend Killed In Iraq?

(AP:HOUSTON) As giant oil companies like Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips get set to report what will probably be another round of eye-popping quarterly profits, just where is all that money going?

The companies insist they're trying to find new oil that might help bring down gas prices, but the money they spend on exploration is nothing compared with what they spend on stock buybacks and dividends. The percentage they spend to find new deposits of fossil fuels has remained flat for years, in the mid-single digits.

If your loved one or dear friend died in Iraq, it was so my brother and his pals at Big Oil could get a yearend bonus that's 21.7 times larger than the combined average income of a married couple filing taxes on $65,500. You do the math. It makes me gag.

Bobby Miller
Florence, Alabama