if you talk america only, you are being selfish blinded by your pride of being number one in the world. think about the other countries who live below poverty line and these countries are more educated than any of you but they are still trying to save their lives over education and means to survive daily. if you argue about how you deal with gas prices in your own concerns, well its difficult to comprehend on why are you so fortunate and other countries are not. try to understand the very state of individuals in the third world countries.they have education but they dont have the resources, so your help is great internationally than domestic.

Ride a motorcycle (a fuel efficient one - however) instead of driving an Expedition.  Suzuki GS500E gets 60 mpg average and close to 80 if you ride easy.  Harleys are actually very fuel efficient and fun - over 50 mpg.  Most commuting can be done on one without looking like a weenie on a scooter.

By the way - much better fuel efficiency has already been here.  Not sure why it went away.  Look up a Honda Cub.  225 mpg in 1963.

Geo Metro in the 50's several years ago and now you have to get a hybrid to do that. There's not a pickup on the road that will get 30 now, but there were in the 80's - I had one.

We need multiple solutions.  More alternative energy sources.    AND since when do we NEED gas guzzling SUV's, keeping our heat at 78 and our air conditioning at 72?  These aren't needs.    But we've been conditioned to think they are.  I grew up without air conditioning and still keep my heat at 60(I live in Michigan).    Changing our (I know I have a lot of work to do on mine)habits by being more conscious of what we consume would go a long way towards conserving energy AND money.   There isn't just one answer to these problems.  There are many little things that go a long way towards fixing the big issues.  Maybe it will take a bone numbing halt in our economy and way of life to make the right changes.  AND to the naysayers about America's potential?  WE can do this!!!!  There's no doubt that we have the power!  We just may need a kick in the butt!!! :)

Eliminate catalytic converters, eliminate all of that pollution control junk we have in our cars ( I mean what do those things do besides make your check engine light go on) and bring back leaded gas. Watch the fuel milage soar as it did in the 1960's. Currently I pay $3.85 for a gallon of regular fuel, and I feel that is fair. Compare that to what a gallon of "Red Bull" drink or a gallon of Starbucks would cost, and I say gas is a steal. If you want to know why everthing under the sun has skyrocketed look to all the wastefull government spending. My friends in New Jersey know exactly what I am referring to.

We want cheap imports from China and India at our Wal Mart.  We buy these products and the money we spend goes to said countries.  Now the previously poor people can afford cars which they buy and start using gas.  Suddenly we wonder why prices are up.  Perhaps if we paid a little more money and bought American made products our money would stay here and the chinese couldn't afford to buy cars and gas anymore.   BUY AMERICAN.

I guess I have much more research to do, but the statement made saying that oil is not a finite supply baffels me. Sorry I know spelling is off here, but I was under the assumtion that it takes millions of years to create oil.

I am afraid that just changing habits is not the total answer. I changed mine, and given how much higher gas prices have gone, I still spend more than I did. Other than not working at all, and walking everwhere else, there is no way to decrease my consumption any more.

There are better answers out there. They will cost money to implament, but I know in my heart that most of those answers are kept under lock and key by the major oil companies. Lets face it, if you owned a well, how would you feel it it went from Black Gold to just toxic waste due to alternatives out there. Would you not fight to keep it on the market and to increase the demand.

I do not complian about  the cost of gas, and I dont look to our goverment, with a president whos family has made their fortune in oil, to fix the problem. I do what I have to do, spend what I have to spend and move on. And this is what most americans will do. Ten years from now, I think we will be talking about what great gas milage we got in 2008 and how cheap gas was compared to 2018. It is a cycle that never ends and one we just need to learn to deal with.

We are not a falling nation.  We simply need to get up and do something.  As far as the energy crisis is concerned, the solution is NOT in "conserving (using less) energy" because that, noble as it may sound, does not work.  For example, in 1979, JEA (Jacksonville Electric Authority) was doing an already lousy job in providing the energy needs of Jacksonville, FL.  Then JEA's pet gerbil died, resulting in even more brown outs and black outs.  So, to keep its angry "customers" at bay, JEA, with the local TV stations, proposed to display a "no lights" sign (like the popular "no smoking" sign except that a light bulb was used in place of the cigarette). As a result, there were no more power outtages.  Everybody was happy until JEA  announced that because energy consumption was down 55%, its revenue was down 55%.  So guess how they recouped the losses!  Yeah, the price was raised so we were paying more for less.  We need to get "sundown" laws passed so bureaucratic monsters like the Department of Energy would be forced to either do something useful for the first time in its history, or lose funding and sink away into the sunset, forcing bureaucrats to work for the first time in their lives!

I remember life in the 1970s.  Cars in the 1960s got better milage than cars in the 1970s because we let the government force the manufacturers to produce garbage (the Clean Air Act and the Safety Act which went into effect on January 1, 1968) and then we bought their garbage!  Lee Iacocca, where are you?  My 1967 VW Beetle got about 34 miles to the gallon. On a road trip,  I drove it fast (65-70 MPH), not only did the MPG take a hit, it acted like an oil guzzler!  I thought it blew a seal or something.  So on the return trip, I brought some extra quarts of oil and drove slower (50-55 MPH), hoping the car would limp back.  Not only did it make it back, it's oil consumption was practicallly zip!  My MPG was also very good.  I also learned through trial and error that my VW Beetle, with a proper tune-up, got up to 38 MPG, which was better than EPA estimates.  And I didn't strip the car down to a bare chassis or replace the seats with a bench, either.  I drove the car at an average of 48 MPH!  Unfortunately, if telling a high performance driver to slow down to "55 saves lives" is hazardous enough to one's health, telling him to slow down to 48 would be even more insane.  So I won't.  I just say "try it and see!"  

I am frustrated by the apparent Democrat position on energy, particularly oil policy.

I too want to see us develop America born solutions and for us to stop purchasing oil from the Middle East, Nigeria and Venezuela.

We have watched the Congress do precious little in the 35 years since the first oil crisis in 1973.

When we insist on not drilling in Alaska in the Refuge, or off the Coast we are not being environmentally friendly even a little bit. We are merely exporting our pollution from drilling to a distant place with far poorer stewardship of the environment. Does anyone honestly think it's cleaner to buy oil from Nigeria (or even Mexico) than to use our technology here?

We are sending our money abroad exacerbating the balance of payments so we don't have to drill in our backyard far more cleanly. This is ultimate NIMBY at a very high cost to our planet and our wallet.

I want to see us use no oil at all, but it won't happen for years and I have no choice except to drive a gasoline vehicle.

It is extremely upsetting to hear the "let's develop clean technologies" speech when I need to buy gas this week and next.

Drilling for more oil and building refineries might or might not drop prices immediately, but 10 years ago we had the same speech given to us. It seems disingenuous, but I suspect the arbitrageurs will get nervous if we finally establish a direction and get to work -- and stop merely using it as a wedge issue.

Maybe there's a way they can reach across the aisle (for once) and craft a plan that expands our directions and investment in new technology while permitting drilling in new areas.

This could double the speed to market for getting off foreign oil and show a Congress finally doing something about this.

The Congressional hearings with oil executives looks like window dressing and fixing blame more than anything else.

This is squarely the job of Congress.

The options are always in front of people. Smaller vehicles, less driving, slower speeds, public transportation, etc. The more the moaning grows, the more we know we have gas that has been too cheap, too long. It reminds me of the story of the 1950s small towners who had a Ford Thunderbird before they had indoor plumbing. They would often drive the car about sixty yards to the outhouse.