Time You Enjoy Wasting Is Not Wasted Time

As gasoline hits the lowest price going into Christmas week in 5 years (link) my question is, is this a good thing or a bad thing? My thought is that it is good. Cheap gas means we can fill our cars without any mental anguish. Theoretically our heating bills will go down. But in the financial news the falling price of oil per barrel is always reported with a sense of gloom. Is there a good reason for this? It seems like the only people who would want oil to cost a lot are the oil companies and those who invest in oil. The everyday person seems to benefit the most when oil is cheap. Am I missing something and what?

The New York Times has an article (link) quoting Governor Paterson on his plans to possibly increase taxes on the wealthy. He claims that he consideres taxing the rich as a last resort because it “automatically kicks in less job creation and leads to people leaving the state” which I’d like to see him back up with statistics becuase that doesn’t seem to make sense to me. Whatever, as long as he follows through and doesn’t just do it in name only.