First, increasing efficieny of oil consumption means a reduced demand for oil. On a standard P-Q chart, that is a shift to the left of the demand curve. It is NOT a move along the demand curve. Supply and demand intersect at a a lower price and quantity.

Secondly, the shape of the demand curve matters. This is the price elasticity of demand. In the case of oil, it's fairly vertical, or inelastic, meaning you have similar demand at a wide range of prices. This is b/c oil is a necessity with few substitutes that is part of our daily habit of living and can't be easily changed in the short run. So shifting the demand curve even a bit to the left results in a bigger decrease in price and quantity from suppliers -- not a smaller one.

Third, the shape of the supply curve matters. This is the price elasticity of supply. In the case of oil, it's fairly vertical, b/c supply is managed by cartels and limited by production factors. This means a shift left of demand curve will drop price more than quantity.

Put it all together, and what you see is that reducing demand for oil will not effect the amount used very much -- but could lower the price. This means Prius drivers can feel good about reducing their own oil consumption, and making oil cheaper for everyone else. That's good for the economy, but not for the WSJ's cronies who run the big oil firms, and are currently enjoing record profits.

May the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be ever at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields.

And may your dog be ever continent by your side.

I am confident that this issue will not go away. Republicans will be forced to authorize investigations which lead to articles of impeachment. The same way they had to authorize Fitpatrick to look into the Plame leaks.

This raises the possibility of a double whammy -- both the President AND the Vice President being impeached at the same time for different crimes.

Gee, it must all be part of Karl Rove's brilliant strategy to have an incumbent Republican ticket in place for '08 ;-)

No matter what. The woman can walk away with your kid and most of your money. You will not see it coming. Judges will most often believe her story. And if you don't have $10K lying around the house, you can't do much about it.

So, protect your assets and your children and DON'T GET MARRIED!! Shack up, like she's doing now. All the benefits, none of the risk. Call her your wife, just don't sign on the dotted line.

All's fair in love and war, men should stop being suckered by a system that is warped toward women.

P.S. Pre-nups are mostly worthless, don't fall for that.

They are like people who think they are funny. If someone tells you how funny they are the one thing you know *for sure* is that they are not funny.

Same for people who think they are smart. I remember in high school we had two asian women valedictorians. They both planned to go to Harvard or Yale. They both let everyone know this for four years. But who actually went to Harvard and Yale? Two weird guys you never heard about and a girl on the swim team. Seems the really smart people never got around to bragging about their SAT scores.

So what's the real reason these "smart women" don't get dates? They are not that smart -- and they are obnoxious. Witness Maureen Dowd.

Attractive women always had better access to society through marriage. Feminism enabled less attractive women to gain power through non-sexual means.

Salon would be less of a paradoy of a knee-jerk feminista bitch-rag if it acknowledged some basic truths about the world -- and stopped posting inflammatory, men-are-all-worthless-pigs material.

Joe Francis didn't get a city-full of college girls drunk and topless all by himself. These girls go to New Orleans every year and get drunk all by themselves. They WANT to take their shirts off and get a little famous. They are the same girls who post semi-nude pics on myspace.com and brag about their sexual exploits. This is the behavior you get when you raise an entire generation on MTV and "Sex in the City."

Reading this post after the one that lamented that "smart women" can't get dates reveals the problem with feminist thinking. Namely, women cannot do whatever they please and still demand that men take them seriously. This applies not only to lewd behavior but to vindictive man-baiting journalism, from Maureen Down right down to Salon.

They just shifted from a radical hippie view to a radical conservative view. What they like is being angry radicals. The content is less critical to them than the stance. It's a personality characteristic not a policy decision.

And I thought it was just the male half they had problems with.

Binge-drinking exhibitionist 20-something sluts are all over the place in the U.S. Ironically, they think they are "liberated". More like addicted. And exploited to no end by alcohol, tobacco, and other male-dominated corporate entities, as well as men looking for easy ass.

Ironically, these women believe their very exploiters to be their liberators, and scorn the critics of their behavior, not realizing that such critics are the only ones truly on their side.

In any case, I wonder whether such voyeuristic journalism will serve any warning, or simply convince folks that "everybody does it."

Sad story any way you cut it. What happened to nice girls who don't drink like frat boys?