Explain these gas prices again...

Explain why gas prices have shot up in the last week from $3.67 a gallon to $4.35 a gallon when this was released today:

Oil refiners in Texas and Louisiana prepared to restart plants. Ike caused minimal damage to facilities in an area that supplies about half of the fuel and crude used in the eastern half of the U.S. Crude oil fell to a seven-month low and gasoline futures fell.

We'd better see gas prices falling soon - this is ridiculous. I'm so tired of prices rising because of speculation and supposed short supply being forecast. These aren't actual conditions they are made-up "market" type conditions and don't reflect the current conditions the oil companies are facing it's only what they "might" face in the coming weeks. Since when does a supply and demand commodity like oil have prices rise on speculation that conditions may change? The current price should be what it cost the oil company to purchase the crude oil and the actual cost of refining it into gasoline plus their markup and of course the city and state tax added on top of that.

Crude prices are around $100 a gallon as opposed to over $200 a gallon only a month or two ago and yet gasoline prices have really not fallen.



While I'm on my rant I'll complain about the airline industry as well. Not only are ticket prices going up, but they're (some are) increasing the prices for bags you check. I don't care if gasoline prices remain around $4.50 a gallon it will still be cheaper to drive somewhere (assuming you can actually drive there) than to fly. I completely understand that the airline industry has seen a downturn in their profits and probably overall ridership as well, but increasing your overall ticket prices as well as adding these crazy extra fees is just going to push ridership down more.

Just my two cents. Thanks for listening...