Gasoline and crude oil are traded 24 hours a day on the world markets. A great part of the world's supply lies in the Middle East. It is unfortunate that our economy has become so dependent on that oil. There is very little that anyone can do about these prices.
Today I watched the oil go over $100 a barrel; this price was last seen in 2008. We are in for at least $4 a gallon for gas. If the unrest in the Arab world spreads to Saudi Arabia, all bets are off. Anyone who has been in that part of the world knows it is unstable.
We have all kinds of groups in this country who have blocked all kinds of things that could help us to produce much more of our own oil. At present they are trying to halt a large pipe line because it goes through "wet lands."
We haven't been able to build any new oil refineries for over 30 years; they fight against atomic plants and against permits for drilling anywhere.
Alternative energy sounds great, but we will be dependent on Mideast oil for decades. The four to five hundred billion dollars spent on that oil per year will always be a drag on our economy. Many analysts think this rise in world oil prices will sand bag the recovery in the United States and also the world.
We should have adopted some type of an energy policy 50 years ago. Specialists say 95 percent of our energy comes from fossil fuels, and getting off of oil and coal in the foreseeable future is very slim. I cannot see how anybody can "do anything" about gas prices.
Let's hope some sort of stability occurs in the Middle East fast! I suspect these radical Islamic groups are behind some of it.
