CHESSNOID

It’s hard to believe that gas is going back to the price it once was before Bush took office. OK, not quite that low but it is below $2 a gallon in some states.  In my local area, it is about $2.30 a gallon.  People overall are still driving less.  After the OPEC countries hammered us with the $147 for a barrel of oil, it backfired on them in the long term.  A barrel is now less than $60 today for the first time in a long while.

SINGAPORE (AP) –

Light, sweet crude for December delivery was down 31 cents to $59.02 a barrel, after falling as low as $58.55, in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange by midday in Singapore. The contract overnight fell $3.08 to settle at $59.33, the lowest closing price since March 2007.

Oil prices have fallen about 60 percent in four months, plunging from a record $147.27 in mid-July.

“We have a pretty good idea that global growth is going to be pretty awful next year and probably not much better in 2010,” said Mark Pervan, senior commodity strategist with ANZ Bank in Melbourne. “There was clearly a bubble scenario in all commodities and that bubble has burst.”

Investors are pricing in slowing crude demand growth from China, whose economy, the world’s fourth largest, was once thought to be a counterweight to weakening demand from the U.S. and Europe.

The recession is so severe now that oil consumption is continuing to decrease. OPEC taught us a lesson on how to get by with less oil when we were getting gouged by high prices, that now we are still trying to save every penny with our new found frugal habits. Serves them right. I only hope we can develop more renewable energy and get away from our dependence from these other countries. It would be better for the environment too.