I’m resurrecting this thread to simply address the oft-debated theory that the Bush Administration could manipulate gasoline prices to improve the Republicans’ election-year prospects (and the complimentary “the oil industry is too complex for that to work” counter-argument) to say: They did it before.
In a Times of India article on Bob Woodward’s State of Denial:
Can’t wait to see John Mace, El_Kabong, et al handwave this one…
rjung, as I previously posted, according to Dept. of Energy figures, the high price for gas in the U.S. in 2004 was $2.03 in May. In November the price was $2.00. You would think that if Bush was really manipulating prices he’d drop it much more than that.
Theories of price manipulation are patently absurd.
Based on what. Your super ability to know what manipulation is and wat hat level it occurs. Premise gas under 2 .Proven. Election time a delicious coincidence. To you.
You just dont get it. It’s simply supply and demand:
It’s simply ludicrous to imagine the administration has a hand in it:
No, the premise of this piece was that manipulation would bring gas to under $2.00. That is certainly not proven. Since gas prices did not fall this much in previous elections during the Bush term, it seems unlikely this year would be different.
Sounds like Woodward just reworded his last book. Thanks for resurrecting this thread based upon the strength of two year-old news. 
2 years ago was an election cycle. This of course is not true. Renob can explainiTime warp. maybe.
Renob can still type no. Hopefully he will learn to type as I see it. The evidence leads me here. I disagree.
You state 200 gas is not low enough to help the election. How,when,what do you mean. Would 180 work. Apparently you know. I thought dropping gas 1.30 wouls be substantial. It bis not part of the political discourse,so obviosly it is enough.
Yes, and if you read renob’s post correctly, you’ll notice that two years ago the price of gas plummeted from $2.03 when the meeting occured to $2.00 when the election occured, a whopping 1.5% price reduction!
Crude oil and gas prices also declined in the fall of 2005 when there was no election.
Gas is now $1.97 by me, down from $3.09 three months ago. :eek:
I heard a report on NPR (I think it was Morning Edition, but it could have been a program on the local affiliate) on the drive in today suggesting that the oil companies could be manipulating prices to bolster the potential for the republicans to remain in control because if the democrats take over some sort of tax could be imposed on the the oil companies they’re trying to avoid.
Anyone else know/heard anything about this? I can’t locate the story on the main NPR site.
Today’s close
Exxon/Mobil $65.41 down $1.59
Haliburton $26.57 down $1.29 and almost at a 52 week low
So, the oil companies will screw their shareholders for the sake of making sure that a Republican congress will be reelected?
The price of gas was $23/barrel during the 1996 elections. Was that an attempt to help Clinton get re-elected? It was $12/barrel during the 1998 midterms - was that an attempt to bolster Democratic chances during the midterms?
The above directed at Onomatopoeia, if there was any confusion.
Oh, and Cite
Went to 3.35 .did you miss that period.
The point that I made in this thread long ago was that in both 2002 and 2004 there was no reduction in prices before the elections, which, if the conspiracy theories were correct, we should have experienced so that the GOP would stay in power.
So you agree that the Bush Administration has no qualms about gettings its friends to manipulate pump prices for political gain, n’est pas?
It will be interesting to revisit this thread in January 2007. My bet is gas prices will be at $3 again, or well on their way there. Which will be explained as a natural coincidence. Again.
It’s pretty odd. I mean, I can see prices dropping for elections, yet I don’t know how much of an impact that the lowering of the prices would actually have on voters. Are we really THAT hung up on the price of gas to vote that way instead of the war, domestic policy, or international policy?
I’ll take a stab and bet gas prices will begin to increase within 30 days after the election, no matter who ends up with control of the house or senate. I wonder if Las Vegas is taking any action on this 
So, factual arguments you happen to disagree with are ‘handwaving’, eh? I don’t have any personal stake in this, except that I feel a bit bad about people making economic judgements based on unsupported superstitions. You want to believe that gasoline prices are being manipulated for the election, feel free to do so. I suppose the adminsitration is depressing the housing market for the same reason, right?