I’ve been wondering about this. How could the prices drop so in the last few weeks when the crude prices haven’t dropped that much?

Q. Did George W. Bush’s buddies in the oil industry contrive to lower gasoline prices to help him (and themselves) in the fall elections?

I looked for guidance from three people knowledgeable about oil markets and put this more-neutral question to each: Is there possibly a link between the drop in gas prices in this country and the coming election?

One said flatly no, it’s just due to lower demand now than during the driving season.

Another said he was puzzled by the drop because people he trusts tell him it is not due to, or cannot be explained by, a comparable drop in crude oil prices.

The third had a similar reaction, noting that, in the past, when the price of crude oil dropped, the price of gasoline took much longer to come down. He said the price of gas customarily declines with the end of the driving season, “but not as sharply as it has in the last few weeks and certainly never went down faster than the price of crude, as it has.”

The latter two respondents, independently, referred me to Peter K. Ashton, a long-time consultant on petroleum issues who has testified on gasoline pricing before the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Ashton’s response to the same question:

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