Thank you for letting us know that we should be thankful for $4.00 a gallon gas prices. Since the economy is in its current wreck due to high fuel costs (or as you say people's false perception of high fuel costs) then your article telling us that we are mistaken should cause the economy to come back 100% overnight. All of our problems have been solved!

Here is the reality. It took gasoline more than 100 years to reach $1.00 a gallon. Now in only about 5 years it has gone up to $4.00 a gallon. 100 years to reach $1 and 5 years to up to $4. The "world demand" ruse is pathetic. The economy in other counties has been a steady and gradual growth. Instead of our fuel prices seeing a steady and gradual growth, they quite literally exploded overnight. Are we to believe that China was a wasteland of cavemen on Monday and on Thursaday even resident in China was magically behind the wheel of a gas guzzer? Drival, pure fantasy.

As for gasoline not being a significant cost of car ownership or of the average American's budget, what planet are you living on? Maybe you are a multi-millionaire? For the rest of us, gasoline cost is a very real cost of car ownership and a very real concern in our budgets. Gasoline is up from a dollar a gallon less than 10 years ago to four dollars a gallon now. Just how many jobs that paid $50,000 a year ten years ago are now paying $200,000 a year? My guess is exactly none. Salarys for middle-class jobs not only have not risen in the past ten years, in many cases they've actually gone down.

You are out of touch with the reality of the average American