No predictions on gas prices from Obama

President Obama won’t promise any relief in high gas prices when he talks energy Friday in Indiana, White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters Friday in a gaggle aboard Air Force One.
 
Obama's poll numbers have been dogged by a spike in the cost of gas, even with a popularity boom in the aftermath of the killing this week of Osama bin Laden. But Carney said the president won't make any populist pitches during his visit to the traditionally red state that he carried in 2008.
 
"We don’t predict markets here, obviously," Carney said when reporters pointed out that Obama told voters they should vote for "change" when gas was $3.60 just before the 2008 Indiana primary.
 
"And we have seen a drop," Carney continued. “We have — but they go up and down.”

Carney noted that Attorney General Eric Holder has created a task force to look into the possibility of price gauging in the oil industry. But Carney said Obama will continue to stress there are no short-term solutions to the pain at the pump.
 
"The president, as you know, has said many times that there are no silver bullet solutions here, no short-term solutions … while we are doing the things in the short term that we hope can provide some relief, the big challenge is the long-term solution that weans us off our dependence on foreign oil, that diversifies our energy supply, that allows us to build clean energy industries in the United States that both enhance our national security and provide quality jobs in this country," he said. 
 
While in Indiana, Obama will tour a transmission company. He will travel from there to Fort Campbell, Ky. where he will speak to troops at an Army airfield. The president will reportedly meet with the special forces involved in the successful raid on bin Laden's compound in Pakistan last weekend.