Comrades! Let us cast our gaze upon the latest proclamations regarding the price of petrol—that essential fluid upon which the movement of our modern industry depends. A certain Mistress Bunina, a functionary of the fuel trade, suggests that the motoring public need not tremble before a sudden leap in prices. Why, she asks, should we fear? Because the state, in its infinite benevolence, holds the reins of the majority of filling stations.

Observe the cunning of the bourgeoisie! Bunina admits that the great federal networks operate under a 'clear agreement' with the government, ensuring a stability that serves only to mask the underlying exploitation. These vertically-integrated monoliths—these titans of capital—arrange their supplies to suit their own ends, while the common man remains a mere pawn in their calculations.

Furthermore, we are told of a divide: the federal giants versus the independent traders. The latter are cast out to the mercy of the St. Petersburg Commodity and Raw Materials Exchange, where they suffer prices far more exorbitant than those enjoyed by the monopolies. Is this not a textbook example of how the great capital crushes the smaller competitor to further solidify its hegemony? The worker pays the price for this systemic cruelty!

And what of the 'remedies' proposed by the learned gentlemen of the Institute of Energy and Finance? Mr. Belogoryev suggests that the void shall be filled by import from the likes of Belarus, India, China, and Turkey. He speaks of 'dampers' paid by the government to the oil companies—a fancy term for the redistribution of public wealth into the pockets of the rapacious usurers of the oil trade!

They promise us additional volumes of fuel, comparable to the output of a great refinery, yet they do so while the yoke of the capitalist machinery grows heavier upon the shoulders of the proletariat. Do not be deceived by the promise of 'stable prices' when the very machinery of the state is entwined with the greed of the monopolies!