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The recent drop in gasoline prices has stirred the antennae of the tinfoil-hat brigade. You know the type: They think 9/11 was a false-flag operation by the CIA, and Area 51 outside Roswell, New Mexico, is just a decoy to keep people from finding the real alien specimens at Area 52.

According to conspiracists, oil companies are in cahoots with the Chimpy McHalliburton White House—and are lowering gasoline prices only to help the GOP. After Election Day, they say, gasoline prices will shoot back up again.

Well, Donald Boudreaux, chairman of the economics department at George Mason University—he also produces the Cafe Hayek blog—has a proposal. In a letter to The Washington Post, he writes:

Alleging that today’s falling gasoline prices result from a fiendish plot to keep the GOP in power, Kenneth Jones is certain that “gasoline prices will go right back up to $2.75-plus after the [November] election” (Letters, October 2).

If Mr. Jones is correct, he - along with others who share his belief - can make a financial killing.  All he need do is to invest all of his assets going long in gasoline futures (which are today about 30 percent lower than they were in late July).  Indeed, he ought even to cash out all the equity in his house, max out on his credit cards, and borrow heavily from his brother-in-law so that he can invest as much as possible in these futures.

He can then contribute his post-election financial bounty to the Democratic National Committee.

Boudreaux has a point. Or at least that’s what the signals from the fillings in my teeth keep telling me.

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