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Immediately after taking office in 2009, Osama’s Secretary of Interior, Ken Salazar, canceled 77 leases for oil and gas drilling in Utah. The fact that this was one of his first regulatory decisions meant that American energy companies were immediately concerned about their ability to produce oil and gas in the future, injecting a level of uncertainty into the market that remains today. And has been compounded by daily stupidity coming from this administration. Stupidity that ranges from their response to the BP oil spill, to continued EPA regulatory rulings to foreign policy decisions.

Its all connected and it all stops with the imam in the big chair in the oral office.

Osama is anti-business, anti-oil, pro-green-energy... pro-deficit spending, not at all interested in fixing our economy... all of which ties into decisions made by energy companies that drive pricing.

Osama leads the charge to restrict American energy while sending our tax dollars to countries like Brazil for them to drill for oil.

In 2008 Senator Osama said on the campaign trail that he doesn’t object to high oil prices as long as they come about gradually, and Secretary of Energy Steven Chu once famously said he hoped the U.S. would “boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe,” where prices are currently about $7 per gallon.

Also in 2008, Osama told the San Francisco Chronicle that under his cap-and-trade plan, “electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.”

Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy, told this newspaper in the same year: “Somehow, we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” That would be, oh, $10 a gallon.

In March of last year, Osama reversed or scaled back nearly every major offshore oil opportunity that has come about since the price spike of 2008—effectively reimposing a moratorium on drilling off the coasts.

He has killed leases in developmentally crucial areas of Alaska. His EPA has refused to issue permits. He used the BP oil spill as an excuse to also shut down the deep-water Gulf.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has revoked oil-and-gas leases.

The EPA is suffocating the coal industry with regulation. One of the president’s only clear State of the Union proposals was to raise taxes on oil and gas.

The White House’s energy policy, says Dan Kish of the Institute for Energy Research, is “embargoing our own energy supplies to drive up their costs.”

Osama: ‘There’s going to be a day when we look back at $3.05 or $3.15 gasoline as the good old days’

"The fact that this [Salazar's esarly termination of 77 oil leases on Federal lands] was one of his first regulatory decisions meant that American energy companies were immediately concerned about their ability to produce oil and gas in the future, injecting a level of uncertainty into the market that remains today."

Uncertainty always existed with all untested leases. This is a question of future development, domestically, and future supply. Having those leases did not contribute to expectations about either current or future supply, because exploration had not yet converted any of them into production or determined if and when that would happen.

It was a stupid decision and it did affect the investment scenarios of U.S. domestic oil companies, IN DOMESTIC drilling, and POSSIBLE (but not quantifiable) future domestic production. But, it did not affect current or KNOWN future supply scenarios and therefore did not affect current prices or future's market prices; and would not affect future's market prices until (and if) the leases were converted to active producing wells with some quantifiable capacity. It was a bad decision for long range domestic oil production. It did not affect current supply, demand or prices.

And has been compounded by daily stupidity coming from this administration. Stupidity that ranges from their response to the BP oil spill, to continued EPA regulatory rulings to foreign policy decisions.

Yes, many of those rulings have been stupid and some have given artificial political boosts to other forms of energy, but those boosts have had little impact on current oil supply, demand and markets - yet, and may turn out to have less than expected impact on oil supply, demand and market factors down the road. Stupid as they were, and as little immediate impact as they are, traders have not seen facts by which to price their affects into current oil markets and prices.

"all of which ties into decisions made by energy companies that drive pricing."

You seem to subscribe to one popular myth and a myth that Obama also subscribes to. He considers himself (and his office) as the chief manager of the U.S. economy. He's not. And, contrary to popular belief the U.S. oil majors are not in control of the global energy markets and the prices set by them. They, collectively, control no more than 7% of the world's oil resources and the U.S. domestic market is not the cheapest oil exploration and drilling neighborhood in the world.

So, does some bad Obama decisions help sustain or increase how much oil we import, or will import (at least until he's gone)? Yes. But, do those facts change OIL PRICES NOW or in the immediate future? No.

You mention plenty of reasons to not like Obama and to not like his policies. Regardless, and regardless of any ill intentions on the part of his policy makers;

CURRENT OIL PRICES are, as I said, PRIMARILY a result of:

(1)world immediate supply and world demand driven by ever-increasing world automobile use; (2) the Bernanke cheap-dollar-driven world-commodity-price bubble; (3) institutional investors and hedge funds betting those two conditions continue and Middle East unrest continues.

Obama may be bad for the prospects for a bigger domestic oil industry and larger domestic production - down the road. That only means WHERE we might get more supply in the future. It does not mean that that additional supply alone, or any additional supply, will be larger than additional demand WHEN those supplies come on line (if they do) and therefore those prospects are NOT part of current oil prices or current oil futures pricing.