Did We Finally “Drill Baby Drill” to Lower Gas Prices?
Gas prices here in Milwaukee are now down to the “low” price of $2.90/gallon. I could have sworn that my right wing friends on the radio were saying the only way to ever lower gas prices was to “DRILL BABY DRILL!#@” as recently as last month. What happened?
Did we finally take their advice, drill in the Alaska Wildlife Refuge and off the coast of Miami, and now we’re magically swimming in “cheap” gasoline? If not, it would seem to re-enforce the argument I’ve been making that drilling in places like the Alaska Wildlife Refuge has no impact on the price we pay at the pump in the short or long term.
Despite the Right’s calls to open up the last remaining wilderness in America to their pals in big oil, which would somehow, someday, maybe lower gas prices, those prices seem to have come down without any massive increase in offshore drilling or drilling in the Alaska Wildlife Refuge.
October 13, 2008 7:54 am 
I live in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Milwaukee, WI with my wife Jen, our daughter Emerson, and son Carter.
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By Smitty, October 13, 2008 @ 8:43 pm
Gasolne prices have fallen because of: 1)decreased demand and, 2)increased inventories. In the past year Americans have driven 53.2 billion fewer miles, a 4.7% decrease. Meanwhile, 14 Gulf refineries knocked out by hurricanes Gustav and Ike are now back on line.
Seems like simple supply and demand to me. So why wouldn’t increasing domestic production (i.e. more drilling) drive down the price of oil even more?
By Dan Cody, October 13, 2008 @ 10:22 pm
Smitty, even before those refineries were offline, gas was $3.50/gallon, so I don’t see how saying they’re now back online is a reason gas prices have come down.
I agree with your first two points though. My point was that as recently as early October, many Republicans, including the GOP Presidential candidates, were saying that drilling for more oil in ANWR was the way to lower gas prices.
That didn’t happen, and yet the price of a gallon is down.
By non quixote, October 14, 2008 @ 9:24 am
Could any portion of the oil price equation as it relates to gasoline price be related to a desire by the oil companies to produce a pre-election minor euphoric consumer release from worries about their real financial predicaments to spur slightly better odds for Sen “deregulation,” McCain, who big oil sees as the candidate who would best continue to serve the status quo and thusly, their interests?
By Smitty, October 14, 2008 @ 2:44 pm
non,
Sorry, but “big oil” does not determine the price of a barrel of oil, the international market does.
American oil companies’ portion of world-wide oil production is too small to determine prices.
Dan,
Drilling in ANWR and offshore is not the only way to lower oil prices it is one way to lower oil prices. As I noted, there are other forces at work in determining the price of oil, but increased production is a certain way of accomplishing it.
By capper, October 14, 2008 @ 9:25 pm
The international markets are controlled by speculators. Does anyone care to speculate for whom the speculators work?
(Here’s a hint: Big Oil)
By Dan Cody, October 14, 2008 @ 10:26 pm
Again, I’d just make the point I did in the last two sentences of my previous comment.
My point was that as recently as early October, many Republicans, including the GOP Presidential candidates, were saying that drilling for more oil in ANWR was the way to lower gas prices.
That didn’t happen, and yet the price of a gallon is down.
By Smitty, October 17, 2008 @ 4:09 pm
The BBC reports on a large new oil field in the Gulf of Mexico and a potential national windfall.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7675234.stm