u235

Conspiracy theory? Lots of people have been mentioning it recently. While it wouldn't take much effort to get me to believe Bush could convince a bunch of oil execs to get together and collude to help the GOP keep control, I would generally think they'd wait for 2008 to do something drastic like this. I mean, these are men who've had record profits since he's been in office. Plus the price would have to be slowly raised back up to avoid the obvious impropriety.

Besides, I've seen a number of GOP strategies discussed that indicate a 2006 loss would aid them in the 2008 elections because the dems don't have a fucking clue, and Bush would manage to keep Congress in check for 2 years with vetoes and signing statements (dems unlikely to get majority to overrule). Then, they can blame everything on dems unwillingness to work together (uniter, not divider).

ALL politicians play the game. It does seem very convinient that the gas prices have come down only a mere couple of months before the election.

This is one point where you hope you are wrong and that there are other more long-lasting effects at play, but you get this gut feeling you aren't wrong and just got to wait.