Disclaimer: I have no more or less information than any of you.

I think that it was not a plant but if it was, what was it? A type of "smart politics" or a "dirty trick", and why is it that?

On average, Americans consume about 386 million gallons of gasoline each day.

If we were able to reduce our fuel consumption by just 5% we would save 7.05 billion gallons of gas each year. Just think of how this would affect the supply, and therefore, the price of gasoline and of course Big Oil and OPEC

There would also be a significant reduction in the amount of damage we do to the environment.

Each gallon of gasoline that we burn releases roughly 20 pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide, as I’m sure you’re well aware, is believed to be one of the main contributors to global warming and the "greenhouse effect."