OK, let’s see if we have this right:

1. Exxon Mobil breaks all known records and records a profit of $11.68 billion for a single quarter, the largest profit ever made by any company in the history of mankind on planet Earth.
2. Other oil companies also record huge quarterly profits, ranging from Conoco Phillips at the low end with $5.43 billion to Royal Dutch Shell, just less than Exxon Mobil with $11.55 billion.
3. Totaled, the top six Big Oil companies posted quarterly profits of $51.47 billion.
4. Gasoline is selling for more than $4 per gallon in most places.
5. Confronted about the huge profits by reporters demanding an explanation, the company’s Vice President of Public Affairs Kenneth Cohen says this: “Our Congress needs to give us access to areas currently off limits to the industry. The best way to bring downward pressure on prices is by bringing on new supply while doing everything we can to use energy efficiently.”
6. The industry currently has access to thousands of acres of offshore drilling sites which it is not using.
7. It is well-known that, even if permission to drill anywhere the industry wants to drill was granted today, the supply would not reach the market for years.
8. Despite that, however, Republicans in Congress — including our own U.S. Rep. Jon Porter and U.S. Sen. John Ensign — have jumped to do precisely what the industry says it wants done, which is to allow drilling in places where it’s currently prohibited, for damn good reason.

Do we have all of that right? Because it seems to us that there is the makings of a pretty good anti-incumbent election-year ad in that list. Oh, say, something about doing the bidding of the most profitable companies in the world while the constituents who actually vote for members of Congress are getting totally screwed while oil companies use record profits, not to explore for new sources of oil, but to buy back stock and ensure future profits.

That might be a pretty good ad. If only a certain challenger hadn’t already endorsed the idea of drilling, too.