January 13, 2011 - 4:55 pm
Washington insiders are wondering if the next real economic crisis facing President Obama is when gasoline prices spike to $4 or $5 per gallon. At today’s press briefing, a White House press spokesman rebuffed queries about the possibility saying ” there are many people that would get upset at me if I started to opine on oil and gas prices, so I won’t.”
Translation: Look at that bird! The drilling ban is going
to iso/i blow up in his face.
The openly stated aim of this administration is to drive Gas prices up to $6-$7 per gallon. Why are you suprised that $4-$5 per gallon may be on the horizon?
The openly stated aim of this administration is to drive
Gas prices up to $6-$7 per gallon. Why are you surprised that $4-$5
per gallon may be on the horizon? – - – - – On the Deepwater
horizon, you mean? Im guessing Obama anticipated achieving the
$6-$7 target prices without having to be so publicly watched as he
shut down the entire permitting process. The rig fire threw his
game a bit. He shut down drilling as a result of that fire, which
landed him in court with a half-ash defense of that shutdown, which
resulted in the judge countermanding the shutdown, and so his
subsequent continuation of the shutdown (through simply losing the
keys to the permit room) has a very public aura of venality that
wasnt part of his original plan. He wanted to quietly shut it all
down through obscure and arcane regulation, and instead he ended up
having to do it with a very visible Up Yours! to a federal court
judge. So, Im guessing this will give us a top-price limiter in
the $4-$5 range for now – he cant be seen achieving his beloved
$8/gal by so explicitly blowing off a fed-court Order. His
aspirations of which you speak are going to be stuck on hold until
the American public forgets that entire chapter. Meaning we have
two or maybe three weeks.
High gas prices bring on political instability, and the
usual outcome is a change of parties at the levers of power in DC.
How could anyone in this Administration think it would be to their
advantage to see gas prices increase to heretofore unseen levels,
on top of the chronic unemployment that we are witnessing?
How does the Administration reconcile the electoral
consequences of $6/gallon gas with the desire to be re-elected?
Its not like very many of them are qualified for private-sector
jobs…
Buy an FFV (Flex-Fueled Vehicle) and use methanol (not
ethanol). Methanol is already available cheaper than gasoline per
BTU and its not subsidized.
But if gas is too expensive well have no choice but to
ride solar powered unicorns to our jobs mandated within a five
block radius of where we live. Hooray!