FLASHBACK TIME:
In 2000, the Republicans used the spike to $1.64 as a campaign issue to bash the Clinton administration and Democratic candidates in the election that year, especially Al Gore:
In June 2000, Republican politicians urged President Bill Clinton to fire his energy secretary, Bill Richardson. Richardson, Michigan Sen. Rod Grams explained, was presiding over an “energy disgrace.”
Mr. Bush was critical of Al Gore in the 2000 campaign for being part of “the administration that’s been in charge” while the “price of gasoline has gone steadily upward.” In December 1999, in the first Republican primary debate, Mr. Bush said President Clinton “must jawbone OPEC members to lower prices.”
As gas topped a record level of $50 a barrel this week [Sept. 28, 2004], Mr. Bush has shown no propensity to personally pressure, or “jawbone,” Mideast oil producers to increase output.