Why you are paying more at the pump: My reasoning

Over $4 a gallon for regular unleaded gas. Pretty scaring, considering that, at $2, we freaked out. Now it is doubled in 5 years.

But there is something the media doesn't talk about and it makes me somewhat angry (I try not to get too irate or I get heartburn). It's the last Bush screwing.

I read the news every day. I see how much a barrel of oil costs, watch what we pay at the pump and how much gas we are consuming. The news states that we are driving less and consuming less and buying better fuel-mileage vehicles. Should be driving down prices, right?

The opposite happens and it drives us crazy because we want to be able to travel at ease, not be consumed by the cost of just getting away.

My theory is based on what I have learned and my logic and reason center. I think that we are getting screwed because of both the price of non-innovation that our car companies spent the last century doing. With the commercials selling us cars and trucks based on how many cups we can hold, where we can store things and how many DVD players we can have, they never talked about how much more efficient the engines were getting or even showing me the concept car with the newest engine that gets 100 miles to the gallon. Why? It can't be because we wouldn't eat them up like potato chips. It's because, like our society, everything is disposable and you and I would stop buying more if things lasted.

We are also being hoodwinked by, in our fear of paying too much for gas, the Bush administration wants to give his buddies in the oil industry carte blanche to go find more inventory at the expense of our environment and our pocketbooks.

Did you know that the oil in the Artic National Wildlife Reserve (ANWAR) would never be used in the U.S.? The oil would actually be sold to foreign entities because of the cost to ship it down to us. It would not help us directly.

The fact of the matter is that the holiday for oil companies is coming to an end. When the president leaves office, all of those favors will disappear. Hopefully we will all learn how to live with high gas prices but we will also be able to afford it once he's gone because, well, I feel a sea change coming. I think we will no longer live in the same constant state of fear.

That or I am moving to the moon.