"Gasoline was about $1.80 a gal when the great pretender took office 4 years ago."

Supply and demand. Did you forget about the Great Recession and carmaggedon already?

To add to zooms point. If it were so easily manipulated by oil and gas companies, why would it not be heading WAY UP near elections, as the oil and gas companies are largely HUGE GOP backers?
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Come post elections, LOAD UP my friends on oil future calls, as it will be flying back up in price when the budget-financial cliff crisis hits congress, and is in complete dead lock. The solution will be the same as it has been for years now, PRINT MORE $$$. When that finally is announced as the solution markets will fly, and as the $ will weaken, and commodities will all once again sky rocket up.

If the president has control over gas prices, then why would Bush have allowed them to get well over $4 a gallon in 2008?

Gasoline was about $1.80 a gal when the great pretender took office 4 years ago. Is the Messiah now manipulating prices downward just before the election? How very convenient.

Diesel has not gone down, actually went up!Remember everything is transported and the equipment for construction and Agriculture mainly uses diesel.

If gas prices could be manipulated so easily by a President, they wouldn't have gotten to $4+/gallon in the first place, just months before an election. Use your brain people. Oil is a WORLD commodity, and world events can and do have an effect on prices in the U.S.

First of all, Nemesis, Obama has not limited the number of refineries being built. No new refineries have come online in the U.S. since 1976. The EPA only received 1 permit application for a new refinery between 1975 and 2000. The decline in refineries started long before Obama.

In 2009 (that would be under Obama's administration) Hyperion Energy Center in Union County, South Dakota was granted permits to build a new refinery. HEC has been engaged in legal battle with 3 environmental groups since the issuance of the permits. The case is currently being heard by the South Dakota Supreme Court. If the permits are upheld, construction of the first refinery since the 1970's would begin next spring.

The bottom line is that yes, the EPA is restrictive and makes the process of building any new petroleum infrastructure difficult and costly, but even when companies interested in undertaking the feat jump through all of the government hoops to get permits to do so they end up battling in court against environmental groups until their permits expire. Then they have to start the process all over again.

(By the way, if you're going to straight up copy and paste someone else's writing, you should at least put it in quotes.)

I am in absolute agreement that the regulatory agencies have stepped far past the point of protecting the environment for the good of the people. Yes, a lot of these regulations come straight from the EPA and those costs come through at the pump, but that is not new under Obama. By the way, the EPA was formed by Nixon, who was a REPUBLICAN president. What we all need to keep an eye on is the regulation imposed by the state. By law the state cannot have laws more lax than federal laws. So, regulation imposed by the state is MORE restrictive than whatever is required by the federal government. Regulation by either the feds or the state certainly does not help the price at the pump. Every penny that companies have to spend on modifications to the petroleum infrastructure from pumping it out of the ground to inserting the nozzle in your car gets passed along to the consumer. Next time instead of copying and pasting someone else's thoughts (unless you're the one that actually wrote that article last spring?) get your facts straight so I don't have to defend an administration I'm not a fan of to begin with.

Perhaps It's a vast left wing conspiracy?

nemesis - I don't know were you get you're information but I think you better check a couple things again. First of all the oil companies have not needed to build new refineries to meet their needs as they have modernized the old ones and have enough refining capacity. The Keystone pipeline as originally proposed was also opposed by the Republican legislature and Governor of Nebraska. It is now being relocated and will be built. Oil is an international commodity and therefor the price is controlled by international companies not the United States. If we were to try to control prices in this country, they would just sell elsewhere. The reason prices were lower at the end of the bush administration was that we were in a worldwide recession that caused less demand on oil.

Hardly a political ploy. It all comes down to the $$$, and the global economy. Lot of fears in the world economy now. Europe is heading into recession. China is not growing like it has, and consequently capital pours into the the sucker 'safe' haven, in the US $$$. The dollar strengthens, and commodities all go down as a result. It's all a giant game people. A few months from now, we will have a budget debate in congress. It will be TOTAL GRID LOCK as each side debates meaningless cuts, or tax increases none of which will balance the impossible deficit.. Since we have no way to balance a budget, we will just print more $$$. The dollar will the again weaken as a result, and commodities will all head back up.

It's all a game people, you just have to realize that it is, and how to play it accordingly.

I filled up last week, the day BEFORE the prices plummeted. Timing is everything. Mine was bad.
I think I'll take a road trip during Wednesday's nice weather...just so I can fill up again with cheaper gas (ironic sarcasm).
For those of you who think a political party can control crude oil prices...you may want to read up on world economics.

Yes, I am one of those conservatives who consider this nothing but a well-timed political ploy.

Whether you want to believe it or not, President Obama can indeed control the price of gas. Now he can't personally tell the oil companies to lower or raise their prices but his actions do just that. One factor driving up the price is the impending closure of large Northeast refineries due to oppressive Environmental Protection Agency regulations unilaterally imposed by Obama-appointee Lisa Jackson. Who do you think tells Lisa Jackson what sanctions to impose? If you said President Obama, you get a gold star. President Obama also demanded that the Democrats in the Senate vote against the Keystone pipeline, which also is a factor in driving up prices. Obama keeps saying "drill, drill, drill is not the answer" but the problem is the Republicans have been saying "drill, drill, drill" for 30 years. If Democrats and tree-huggers hadn't fought so hard against more drilling 30 years ago and continued that fight right up to this day, we could be in much better shape and not be so dependent on foreign oil. Obama has limited the number of refineries that are built. So although oil imports are up, refining production of fuels are stifled by that bottleneck. The EPA has regulations in place governing refineries which can strangle building new ones. The president can cut much of that red tape if he wanted to. To say that the president has no control at all over gas prices is both naive and short-sighted.

Price of gas is $3.47 in Janesville. Was in Milwaukee over the weekend and paid $3.26. Also saw $3.29 in Beloit. Why are our prices $.20 more? We are getting ripped here.

I think that people tend to overlook how much the value of the dollar affects the price of commodities, gasoline of course being one of them. A strong dollar would make fuel very inexpensive. Quantitative easing doesn't help either. It's nice to see some lower prices, but a two dollar price per gallon is going to be a part of the past as long as the fed keeps printing money.

The most likely way to get gas prices below $2/gallon again is to create an economy in free-fall like we had in 2008 when we were losing 750,000 jobs per month, credit was frozen because banks large and small were failing across the country, people were seeing their life's saving evaporate overnight as the markets plunged to well below 7,000 (over 13,000 now) and I could go on and on. Basically it is the target economy that Romney and Ryan want to not only duplicate with their policies (less regulation and incentives for the wealthy to exploit the poor as the 2008 crisis created such a large crop of poor to be harvested), but expand upon.

The president has absolutely no control over gas prices. Greg had it right in the first paragraph when he said "Inventories are rising. Demand is slowing." Also, there is a difference between summer gasoline blends and winter gasoline blends. Oil companies want the summer blend out of their inventory to make room for winter blend. That contributes to the price decrease. Summer blend gasoline is also more expensive than winter blend to produce because of the additives required by the EPA to reduce pollution and smog during summer ozone season. None of it has anything to do with the president (of whichever party) or elections.

Gas needs to go down to two dollars a gallon.