So, gas.

(Insert sophomoric joke here.) (Not to insult freshmanic jokes or anything — which, however, seem to be more manic than fresh.)

Hey, it’s better than pink slime. (Luckily, I don’t eat hamburgers. But then, who knows what, exactly, is in tofu? — Don’t interrupt me, New Pi, you old soy & soy.)

Yeah, I know — the food of the day seems to be broccoli. Even the Supreme Court got into Broccoli Nation recently, though only God or Plato knows why. (Not to compare God to Plato.)

Well, I man enough to admit I like broccoli. It’s not asparagus or Brussels sprouts (which are the lobster and monkfish of the vegetable kingdom, as fishy as that sounds), but broccoli is fine. I’m not sure why the first President Bush tried to ban broccoli, or whatever he tried to do, but then, I’m not sure why the first President Bush tried to do anything he tried to do.

(Does anyone remember anything the first President Bush tried to do? I didn’t think so. Outside of promising no new taxes, then reneging on the deal. If only he had said no new Texas — he would have won a second term.)

Speaking of tofu, Mitt Romney, who is so determined to become president that he apparently doesn’t care how many principles he has to change — or how quickly he changes them — claims that President Obama is responsible for high gas prices.

(Speaking of Romney, why is it that very rich guys seem to think that America owes them something? It wasn’t that long ago that the Kennedys, given whatever faults you might ascribe to them, believed that because they were rich, they owed something to the country.)

It wasn’t that long ago — 2006, actually — that the Mitt was governor of Massachusetts and pushing for higher gas prices and alternative forms of energy in order to combat global-climate change. At least according to NPR.

"Then was then, now is now," to quote Jerry Brown (back in the days of no Internet, no cell phones, and dinosaurs roaming the land, such as the land was, given the inland ocean) the California governor running for the Democratic presidential nomination. (And now once again the California governor, belying the belief that dinosaurs are extinct.)

Brown, obviously, never became president. Time-shifting doesn’t, apparently, work quite so well with American voters as it does with American movie-goers. (Some political scientist should research the beliefs of American movie goers who do not vote vis-à-vis American movie-goers who do. I bet, though I’m not a betting man, there’s something interesting there. Or maybe it’s just a matter of time-shifting. So much is. Great universe, huh? Too bad it’s the only one we have. Or maybe not. Huh?)

Meanwhile, back at gas prices, not that we left them, necessarily, Romney’s charge that Obama has raised those prices couldn’t be more wrong if he accused Obama of causing the Sun to rise in the west. (For those of you who don’t necessarily follow current events: The Sun still rises in the east.)

Not to be too paratactical.

For one thing, the president, no matter who he is (we haven’t had a she yet, but we will, soon), has little to nothing to do with the price of gasoline. International oil markets do, the edginess of those markets about Iran do, and the facility of American pipelines do.

For instance, according to the Energy Department, the United States is a net gasoline exporter, mostly to Central and South America. Yes, net exporter.

Why? Because, according to NPR, the U.S. pipeline system from the refineries in Texas and Louisiana is too small to get all that gasoline from there to the East Coast. So, the gas goes south, because that’s where the American companies can make money. I mean, capitalism means making money, right, Mitt?

You certainly made some.

And, in 2010 and 2011, the U.S. became an oil-exporting nation for the first time since the 1960s.

So, Mitt, about your energy policy; it sounds as if you want to install elevators in trains.

And I’m not sure you believe in trains.

A least, not anymore.