Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) blamed President Obama for the spike in oil prices, saying the administration had pushed for consumers to pay higher prices at the pump.
"Let's give the president credit for one domestic policy that works. He wanted higher gas prices and he got them," said Daniels on Fox News Sunday.
"Secretary Chu said $8 are about what they pay in Europe. It would be great. Secretary Salazar said $10 and it still wouldn't be for drilling in the places where we know there's an awful lot of domestic production. And so, they have gotten the doubling of gas prices and perhaps worse, it's a conscious policy of this administration. Maybe the one thing they set out to do and actually accomplished." he said.
The GOP is blaming the White House for the recent rise in gas prices. Obama on Thursday however accused Republicans of "licking their chops" over high gas prices. He said that while there is no quick fix, his administration has done all it can to reduce reliance on foreign oil, expanding domestic production and investing in renewable energy sources.
Republicans have leaped on comments from Energy Secretary Steven Chu to the Wall Street Journal in September 2008 saying that government needed to "figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe."
Drivers in Europe pay far more than American consumers to fill up.
The 2008 Journal story noted that Chu, who then was head of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, “called for gradually ramping up gasoline taxes over 15 years to coax consumers into buying more-efficient cars and living in neighborhoods closer to work.”
But Chu had backed off from supporting higher taxes on gasoline during his confirmation process to be Energy secretary in 2009.
"When you have environmental regulations that are going to raise the price of refining gas, possibly put some of our scarce refineries out of business, guess what? You are going to get higher gas prices," said Daniels on Sunday.
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This is the problem with buying the more "fuel efficient" cars.
ReplyDeleteThe ones that are affordable for most people only get 30-35 mpg and that's open highway.
If they're already driving a vehicle that gets something like 26mpg highway, then what's the point of moving up to the other vehicle and having a new payment, or higher payment, along with higher insurance?
For 4 more mpg, you can buy a whole lot of gas.
Sure, there are some vehicles that get 50mpg but just look at them.
The Toyota Prius is the ONLY one I would even consider being caught in!
ALL of the energy efficient products have been either priced so high the average person can't afford to make the switch or it'll never pay you to switch in the end.
Cars, windmills, geothermal heating/air, solar panels and the list goes on.
Greed is what's keeping America from being energy smart. Greed by the companies who sell the alternative products, which in turn, IMO, make all of them pretty darn worthless!