It is still disappointing for me to watch FOX News spill half-truths to outright misstatements onto the screen about Mexico. This week-end, Harris Faulkner, whose father is a highly decorated Army Officer, had to read about how stupid people are going over to Mexico to buy cheap gasoline. People were doing that in spite of the fact that everybody is always killing everybody and chopping their heads off all the time.
Then, an authoritative white boy comes along and responds to Harris's lead in with something to the effect that even if you survive the trip over to buy the gasoline, the gasoline is no good and it will void any warranty that might be in force with your automobile. On talk radio overnight, Teamster-type truck drivers called in with the same pre-fab story about how some stations in Mexico that are owned by the cartels lower prices on their gasoline standards so as to lure innocent Americans over, at which time the people are beheaded and their vehicles are stolen. For one, Cartel people do not own PEMEX Stations. For Two, PEMEX Stations do not have price standards. The price of gasoline and diesel is fixed, nationwide. There are no other gasoline dispensers save for PEMEX, and it is a government chartred monopoly.
So it's hopeless. But just to set it straight, the Mexican gasoline is not, as the white boy said, all the same grade. There are three different mixtures based on climate, elevation, and urban density. Three. The "enlightened" USA has 39 at the present time, all established by edict by imbeciles in the EPA who believe in simultaneous global warming and global cooling, and who scoffed at the notion that acid rain in Canada might have been caused by effusions from the forests in Appalachia. (It was, no matter how hard they laughed at Ronald Reagan for making the observation)
As far as the "boutique" mixtures, there are 39 in force now in the USA, but another 50 or 60 have already been approved, and we can rest assured that the new O'bamaham administration to come will have refineries making gasoline by the pint before it is all over. And blaming it on the oil companies. And most Americans are woefully and willingly ignorant about the nature of the oil and natural gas business, and will probably buy the bilge.
The white boy said that the government owned PEMEX company forces the stations to all charge the same, so the station operators fill their underground tanks with water, and there is no control or recourse. They all do it, and that's why the vehicles do not run. The fact is that PEMEX auditors do more frequent test-tubing and meter-register exams than any place in Texas or the United States that I know of....perhaps California might have ,more snoops, because the State of California is trying to take $1.50 on the sale of every gallon and really needs the money. They need to feed the miracle babies and children and do the day-to-day funding of pensions and programs that are financially insane. PEMEX is a Government-owned operation that is run like a private business finally....and especially in the last ten to twelve years has been doing a really good job in complying with their compact. Some say it is prelude to ultimate privatisation....good, and the sooner the better. Also, the Mexican gasoline is quite good, and it has been many years since I could get an engine knock even out of the lower of the two octane grades. The old 1992 Dynasty has fairly high compression and 400,000 miles on the same engine, so El Gringo Viejo uses an ABABAB approach, filling with the 87 octane Green Pump this time and the 93 octane Red Pump the next time. The Red Pump fuel is either EXXON Supreme or the PEMEX equivalent made with the same formulation. The full filter has been checked occasionally and has never had junk or anything. So scratch up another one for the blowhard no-nothings.
The most recent time anyone had a problem with being beheaded at a PEMEX station anywhere in Mexico is when Occupy-types threw molotov cocktails at a pump in Chilpancingo, Guerrero during one of the perpetual communist manipulated "student" protests about global warming and profits and being required to take examiniations and make an 80 so as to pass on to the next level. An heroic station manager died of his burns incurred during his efforts to put out the fire before the station blew. Also, every now and then the convenience stores are held up at the PEMEX Stations and, of course, that is very bad. We should be grateful that it never happens in Texas.
Folks, before you roll your eyes again....who are you going to believe....? Someone who lives it and has studied it and done business in it and who comes from ancestors who have been in the middle of it from Flintstonian times....or reporters? I have never been in attendence at any event, then seen the press report of that event, and been able to say that the report was reliably accurate. Once again, the issues we have now are not cured, but they continue to improve. And people really do go and come across the the Rio Grande and do so without extraneous issue 99.9999999% of the time.
El Gringo Viejo
