Okay. Where is it? The governor of Arizona said that there is plenty of gasoline in the valley (the Phoenix metropolitan area) and that no one should panic. As she said this 3 of the stations closest to my house were closed down because they didn't have gas and one was selling gas for $2.54 a gallon and had cars backed up into the street waiting to buy it. Government officials are measured by how they handle crisises. Governor Napolitano is doing a great job handling this crisis here in Arizona. The main gasoline pipeline between here and Tucson/El Paso broke a couple of weeks ago and things have gone down hill from there.

The blame gamers are at it big time. The owner of the pipeline, Kinder-Morgan, comes under fire naturally. Next, America's liberal punching bag, President Bush, is blamed by some misguided souls with troubled minds that have nothing to do while they sit in gas lines. Even the governor, who is doing all she can, catches flak. One complainer writes: "Anyway, just who is responsible for this mess? It's probably the current Bush administration trying to return the AZ Gubernatorial seat to a republican. Which I'm sure is part of the bigger conspiracy that started in CA.". Another chimes in with this (this person posted 10-15 similar posts throughout the gasoline shortage forum where I found this particular one.): "Price Gouging by the Oil Companies is EXACTLY what can be expected when our federal government is run by rich, greedy good ol' boys from the Oil Industry." Even Kerry's campaign worker blamed Kerry's total ignorance concerning how to order and eat a philly cheesesteak sandwich on President Bush so laying blame on the president is nothing new. Desperation Time for Democrats is just around the corner. You can feel it in the air.

It is not a good time to have a big SUV or monster pickup truck. 30-40 gallons in one of those big gas hogs will cost $75-$100 for a fill up if the gas can be found. I hope they enjoy the ride as old Betsy takes big swigs from the trough each mile she goes down the road. Our local Valley Metro Park and Ride facility has more and more cars in it each day as drivers cannot afford to pay $5-$20 to drive back and forth to downtown Phoenix from the suburbs each day and are hopping the express busses. Maybe things will be back to normal in a couple of weeks. Meanwhile we are going to have to miss going to play bunko tonight in order to save gas.

Given the choice between a one day electrical black out and no gas or gas lines at the pumps I would take the black out.