Gas Hits $4 a Gallon; Bush "Hadn't Heard That"
Just a little over three months ago, President Bush declared he "hadn't heard" that gasoline would soon reach $4 a gallon. Today, the milestone anticipated by all save the President of the United States came to pass:
"Drivers are paying an average of $4 for a gallon of gasoline for the first time. AAA and the Oil Price Information Service say the national average price for a gallon of regular gas rose to $4.005 overnight from $3.988. But consumers in many parts of the country have already been paying well above that price for some time."
Given the stratospheric - and uninterrupted - rise in oil and gas prices, Bush's February 28 display of ignorance is all the more jaw-dropping. Asked by a reporter about the looming arrival of $4 gas, Bush the former oil man did what comes naturally and played dumb:
Q What's your advice to the average American who is hurting now, facing the prospect of $4 a gallon gasoline, a lot of people facing --
THE PRESIDENT: Wait, what did you just say? You're predicting $4 a gallon gasoline?
Q A number of analysts are predicting --
THE PRESIDENT: Oh, yeah?
Q -- $4 a gallon gasoline this spring when they reformulate.
THE PRESIDENT: That's interesting. I hadn't heard that.
To put Bush's mind-numbing mindlessness into context, it is worth noting that even White House press secretary Dana Perino had gotten the memo. Six months before Bush gave his deer-in-the-headlights response, the woman who earlier proclaimed her ignorance of the Cuban Missile Crisis discussed the $4 barrier with reporters at an October 16, 2007 press briefing:
Q Dana, analysts say that gasoline prices could go as high as $4 a gallon because of the current run-up in the price of a barrel of oil. Does the White House have any plan to -- for relief for the American consumer should gasoline get --
MS. PERINO: Well, I'd refer you to the Department of Energy. Obviously they track that very closely. Last spring everyone in here said gasoline was going to go to four gallons -- $4 a gallon, as well. Look, there's no doubt that energy prices are too high. They disproportionately hurt low-income families that have to spend so much of their money on energy, and when those prices go up, it eats into the family budget on the other things that they want to be able to buy.
And the situation for American families is only about to get worse. Some analysts are predicting oil will reach $150 a barrel by the Fourth of July, a jump which could quickly produce $5 a gallon fuel at the pump this summer.
Hopefully, President Bush has heard that. Of course, given his dismal history of broken promises to "jawbone" his Saudi and Kuwaiti friends into opening the spigots, Americans shouldn't expect relief at the pump any time soon.
UPDATE: The New York Times offers an analysis of the regional impact of rising gasoline prices. Unsurprisingly, that impact (measured as gas expenses as a percentage of income) is generally most severe in those states that voted for George W. Bush.
No... no relief any time soon, because Bush simply doesn't care. No more than he or Cheney mind Haliburton and other private contractors that contributed to their campaign are getting rich off the Iraq war. And while he criticizes Obama for "appeasing" countries that harbor terrorists, he's doing exactly that when he goes to Saudi Arabia - probably THE most oppressive Muslim country in the world - to beg them to increase oil production. Clearly nothing but another photo op. The neo-cons aren't at all interested in trying to break our dependence on oil, which was clearly demonstrated in the bill they just shot down to reduce global warming that would help us do just that.
I'm not even a doom-predicter yet predicted $4/gal more than a year ago. Without something like a hurricane, I'm skeptical about $5 except in a few locales. I'm with George Soros on that one: a speculative oil bubble's being grown now and if it becomes clear that Obama's likely to be the next prez, that means troop withdrawals and speculation will reverse.
When gas gets to $4.90, (and I look for that by Labor Day weekend) that's when it'll be time to look for a substantive dumpoff in oil prices, imo. Though my target and timing may be slightly off, I think we'll see prices at 35%- 40% of the peak within 5 years of that peak, because that's what bubbles do.
Bush, the FAILED oil man, didn't know that gas prices hit $4/gal? He should win an Oscar. But, then again, instead of getting a job when he leaves office, he should be locked up in a supermax prison with all his oil buddies, KBR, Cheney, Rice, etc.
Bush, the FAILED oil man, didn't know that gas prices hit $4/gal? He should win an Oscar. But, then again, instead of getting a job when he leaves office, he should be locked up in a supermax prison with all his oil buddies, KBR, Cheney, Rice, etc.
this is all because they (in the White House) are all physcotic pathological liars. they REALLY need to be in one of CCA's supermax prisons.
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