[Vision2020] Obama Sets Gas Prices? Just Another G.O.P. Myth

[Tom Hansen]

My wife drives an American-made 2010 Ford Fusion Hybrid (Consumer Reports' 2010 Car of the Year) totally electric at speeds below 45 mph, that gets approximately 43 mpg.

Here it is in San Francisco . . .

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"If not us, who?
If not now, when?"

- Unknown



On Mar 18, 2012, at 13:40, lfalen <lfalen at turbonet.com> wrote:

> They have been able to make cars that get 55 miles per gallon for a long time. My wife gets 50 on her GEO Metro, which is not made anymore.
> Roger
> -----Original message-----
> From: Art Deco art.deco.studios at gmail.com
> Date: Sun, 18 Mar 2012 08:45:26 -0700
> To: vision2020 at moscow.com
> Subject: [Vision2020] Obama Sets Gas Prices? Just Another G.O.P. Myth
> 
>> March 17, 2012*
>> Obama Sets Gas Prices? Just Another G.O.P. Myth*
>> By ROBERT B. SEMPLE Jr.
>> 
>> Jeff Bingaman, chairman of the Senate energy committee, complained the
>> other day of ?widespread misunderstanding? about rising oil prices. He was
>> being senatorially polite.
>> 
>> The issue of gas prices has not only been misunderstood but thoroughly
>> distorted by relentless ideological spin from industry and its political
>> allies, mainly Republican. Hardly a day goes by that some industry
>> cheerleader somewhere ? be it Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana or Senator
>> James Inhofe of Oklahoma ? does not flay President Obama for driving up oil
>> prices by denying the industry access to oil and gas deposits and imposing
>> ruinous environmental rules. Senator John Barrasso, a Wyoming Republican,
>> said last week that Mr. Obama should be held ?fully responsible for what
>> the American public is paying for gasoline.?
>> 
>> If only the president had the power to give us $2.50-a-gallon gasoline, as
>> Newt Gingrich promised to do if he got to the White House. It is ridiculous
>> to think that a president can.
>> 
>> One can sympathize with consumers feeling the pain of higher gas prices.
>> But the fundamental truth is that those prices are tied to the price of
>> oil, set by world markets. There are peaks and valleys, but their causes ?
>> a worldwide recession, an embargo or conflict in the Middle East ? are
>> beyond the control of any one country. As the chart below shows, gasoline
>> prices rise and fall in the same pattern throughout the world. Americans
>> historically pay much less at the pump because they pay lower taxes; when
>> the price of a gallon spikes at $3.70 in the United States, it is closer to
>> $8 in, say, Germany.
>> 
>> Because oil is a global commodity, increasing domestic production will do
>> very little to bring down retail prices, although it does help narrow the
>> trade defici