Sweetcheeks wrote:

“In midweek events in Washington and Oregon, Kerry will emphasize how high gas prices are straining the economy and squeezing the budgets of families and communities.”

Wasn’t Gore in favor of a gas tax to persuade people to conserve? Now that the market’s invisible hand is raising gas prices, all the democrats are running around like chicken little. If the price of gas is high, it’s high and it doesn’t matter how it got there, right?

Pay me wrote:

That hand is hardly invisible, or as economist Joe Stiglitz of Columbia wrote last year, the reason it’s called an “invisible hand” is because it truly doesn’t exist…

…especially when it comes to oil pricing, which is wraught with moral hazards and manipulation. Oil prices are rising due to the dollar’s drop and to wild speculation at the NY mercatile exchange, not just the increased demand from China or issues over
domestic refineries. There is a precarious currency issue at the core that is reflective over overseas restlessness with our budget deficit, general federal indebtedness and foreign policy shenanigans.

The Drique writes:

I still believe that OPEC is just coming to terms with the fact that there fuel is still fairly inelastic at today’s pricing. I agree more with James. The U.S. the wealthiest, most powerful nation in the history of mankind could have the most advanced public transportation system in the world, in all of its cities.

Market demand has not pushed it in this direction, in my opinion, because gas prices are still within the American budget. Asseninely ginormouse SUV’s don’t just spawn, they are driven my market demand.