Senator Inhofe using the "they're hurting our fee-fees" argument

Waaaahhhhh

"A lot of people are saying that the gas prices that are going up are a result, partially, of what's happening over there," said Senator James Inhofe, his party's senior member on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and a vocal climate change skeptic. "That isn't the real problem."
Inhofe said that "the real problem" was Obama's efforts to enact a cap-and-trade plan to curb emissions of greenhouse gases blamed by scientists for global warming.
"My message today simply is the higher gas prices are simply a product of this administration's goal," said the lawmaker.

Via Washington Monthly.

In a way, we're all guilty of increasing the price of oil. Any one of us who reduce our nation's demand by simply driving a little less is pissing off oil industry executives, and because their feelings get hurt by that sort of behavior they punish us by raising the price.

The White House did respond:

"In fact, oil production last year rose to its highest level since 2003," Obama's deputy assistant for energy and climate change, Heather Zichal, said in the post.

Notice the big spike in oil production since Obama took office in my post below. It's hard to know what else to do in the face of such utter absurdity besides repeating over and over again: offshore drilling is not halted, oil production in the US is running on all cylinders, the price of crude is probably correct right now (it was too low in the past given how unstable the apparently stable Middle East regimes actually were: externalities are priced correctly now), and this price of oil is actually a sweet spot that will lead to more production and greater efficiencies, both of which lead to more, not less, jobs!