According to Barack Obama, high gas prices don’t really constitute a problem for Americans. He stated yesterday that the reason for our anger is the rapid increase in prices, not the prices themselves. Obama claimed that Americans would have accepted a “gradual adjustment” to the current cost:

Obama wants higher gas prices? Do the rest of the Democrats feel the same way? It certainly would explain why they continue to block domestic energy production in oil. It would also explain the bloated Lieberman-Warner bill, which would have imposed a heavy regulatory bureaucracy on the energy industry, along with rationing that would have both driven up prices and held down supply.

Mitch McConnell decided to attack this on the floor of the Senate today:

I think we need some clarification from the Democrats on this issue. Barbara Boxer claimed last week that the Democrats wanted to “address” high gasoline prices. Did they want to make sure they rose even further?