The biggest Price Gougers in America

I have recently signed up to go back to college for the first time in more than a decade. Holy cow!!! I hear people complaining about the price of oil, but what about the American college system? The cost of schooling goes up by double digits every year, and there is no investigation about price gouging or profiteering? If anything else, food, clothing, anything other than taxes would go up like tuition has year after year, the federal government would hold televised hearings, to show that they are "doing something." How come these terms that apply to the public, such as usury, price gouging, profiteering, racketeering, etc. do not apply to the federal or state government? Just wondering.

Big-BAD-Oil?

So, congress was "drilling" big oil today. I have a slight problem with the notion that is widely accepted that big oil is to blame for all of the high energy prices that we have to pay. The EIA (Energy Information Association) says that oil companies make approximately $.10 per gallon of gas purchased. The federal tax per gallon is $.184 per gallon with state taxes from $.20 to $.60 per gallon. Who really makes out in the gasoline racket?
I think congress should be grilled on why they will not let the oil companies build refineries and drill for the oil we have here. We have not built a new refinery in over thirty years. The demand for gas keeps rising, but our production capabilities remain stagnate. In a free market, this causes prices to go up. We have more than enough oil here in the United States to pacify our needs, but the oil companies are not allowed to go and get it because of the environmentalists that stifle any progress we have towards energy independence.
When the prices of the goods we need go up because of the added cost of getting it to the market, the government and environmentalists are to blame, not big oil.