This just in, courtesy of the Guardian:
Oil moved within a whisker of the $100 a barrel mark this morning as fears over the state of the US economy weakened the dollar again.
The price of a barrel of New York light sweet crude hit cleared $99 for the first time, peaking at $99.29 in Asian trading. London Brent Crude also hit a new high of $95.99 a barrel.
This latest surge in the oil price was triggered by falls in the value of the US dollar, which hit a new low of $1.479 against the euro this morning.
Yesterday the US Federal Reserve cut its growth targets for 2008, weakening the dollar and sending share prices lower on Wall Street.
Opec, the group of oil producing nations, has repeatedly insisted that supply problems are not responsible for the soaring oil price, blaming speculators.
Petrol prices have been pushed steadily higher in recent weeks. The AA said this morning that the cost of a litre of petrol is rising by 0.1p per day, and is expected to hit an average of £1.02 today.
Hope you all enjoyed the Golden Age of America, because the ride’s over.
TheZoo 
Just top-of-the-head figuring, considering that if at one time the Dollar and the Euro were equal, fully one-third of the cost of gasoline at the pump is due to the bushco effect on the economy. At $3.30 per gallon the oil companies, Darth, and Daddy Bush are raping the American citizens by $1.10 for every gallon of gas we buy. The price of a barrel of oil has not increased proportionately in terms of the Euro. It is no wonder the bushco is ready to bomb Iran and Venezuela to keep the dollar as the trading medium for oil.
Ahh, but Clyde, … they’re evil.. didn’t you know?
Muse,
I don’t mind the evil part, it is the “holier than thou” lying part that scorches my shorts!
Every Monday, I head over to Clusterfuck Nation for a polemic on the Long Emergency. http://jameshowardkunstler.typepad.com/clusterfuck_nation/
But if you want to read about smart thinkers in this area, the Oil Drum is the best site IMHO.
http://www.theoildrum.com/
The funniest thing I heard to do to get through to the 21% Bushevik Rapture-readies with their car magnets on this topic is to take their ‘Support the Troops’ magnets and move them to stick over their gas caps. If they think about it for just one second while they pump $100 into their Lexus SUV…..
And you don’t want to move to the US TtT! Where’s your sense of adventure? Obviously we’re all living on the edge thanks to our most glorious leader.
Shayne, I’m already here….. I came for two years….. that was 1989.
Taking a longer perspective, I’m not sure that everything can be blamed on the Crawford Sock Puppet. Same as there’s really not much difference between Hilary and Rudy, successive administrations since Carter have just jumped in their pickups and taken another lap around the freeway, stopping off for another burger and fries, rather than confront a national energy policy that assumed it could all go on forever. Americans need a ‘Pearl Harbor’ before they pay attention – trouble is, the national ‘debate’ that should/could happen after each event simply doesn’t, or is framed by controlling interests.
And crucially, when the two ‘Pearl Harbor’ moments of the late 20th Century occurred, 9-11 of course and the Kuwait invasion, when it came to asking why Americans should be asked to die for oil, there was an oilman called Bush in the White House.
Maybe a bit melodramatic here, but if you read “Guns, Germs and Steel” one of the random events that shape history is supposedly that the Chinese emporer of the time around when the Chinese were sailing across the Indian and Pacific Oceans and had a chance to explore and dominate the world, this emporer he just said “Yeah so what, not interested, burn the fleet”.
Perhaps the American Experiment will be similarly chronicled. When the time came to ask questions, to change the way America related to the world, the emporer said “They hate us for our freedoms, why don’t you go to Disneyland”.
Emporer, emperor….
TnT I thought you were in England. Well while you still can, RUN. I do believe Bill Clinton would have made a difference if the Republicans in congress weren’t persecuting him. But Hillary is no Bill. And while I think he got in because of charisma and brains I think she’s getting in because of connections and because the American people are too lazy to find out what the candidates are about.
And whoever the people get the government they deserve was so right. Americans have been too lazy to pay attention since Viet Nam ended. It’s like they think they fought one battle and now they’re too tired to argue with the government anymore. I suspect there’s been a concerted effort by Bush Sr. and his cohorts to create the apathy we’re witnessing now. But still, if the people were paying attention they would have gotten pissed at Iran Contra and stayed pissed. They would have gotten pissed at congress standing in the way of the real advancements Clinton was trying to make and stayed pissed. And they would have taken to the streets when Bush stole the first election and not even let him get close enough to steal the second. I’m not mad at Bush as much as I am the citizens of this country.