Gary is right on a few things, but the govt could easily cap the oil companys profit. They are making record profits,billions of dollars, so the price of crude being $112.00 a barrel isnt dropping their profits at selling us 87 octane crap gas at $3.50 a gallon. The Govt gets 45 cents a gallon here on each gallon of gas sold, however, the gas station only collects 2 cents a gallon, they rely on you buying the candy,pop,etc when you go in to pay for the liquid gold.
All that simply needs to happen is the govt set in place a profit margin tax, it would simply double thier taxes on the oil companys after a set profit, they would have to reduce the price of gas this way. Will it happen, most likely not in my lifetime because as a "nation of the free" we dont exercise the right anymore. We just simply take it. This never would have stood back in the 60-70's, people would be picketing the companys and boycotting gas stations, trucks would stop moving, etc. We all have become a passive nation and we just take it because we dont exercise our own given rights. Isnt going to matter who you elect president, mc Cain, Hillary(good god help us), or Obama, high gas prices are here to stay because "WE" all let them (our own oil companys)take advantage of us! The stocks on commoditys have doubled, so we are showing them we need the oil and we will drive out own prices up, the stock markets down so people are investing in oil, why not record billion dollar profits, but we are all paying for it every day.
