I can’t drive 55

It's deja vu all over again in Washington.

With gasoline prices soaring, members of both parties are eager to look like they're doing something about it. Problem is, they remain wedded to failed policies of the past, gambling voters have short memories.

Many Democrats, for instance, advocate a windfall profits tax on oil companies -- some even agitate for price controls. Apparently, they've forgotten that many Americans lived through the 1970s when such policies were revealed as abysmal failures.

On the other side of the aisle, Sen. John Warner, R-Va., last week hinted he might advocate reimposing a national speed limit on interstate highways. Sen. Warner argued the move could save 2 percent of the country's highway fuel consumption.

Again, been there, done that. Under the same "save gasoline" guise, Congress in 1974 imposed a 55 mph speed limit on interstates. It was perhaps the most scorned and ignored law in the nation's history -- particularly in the West -- accomplishing virtually nothing other than angering millions of drivers.

It was finally repealed in 1995, with states given the leeway to set highway speed limits within their boundaries. As it should be.

Let's hope neither of these hare-brained schemes -- long since sent to the grave -- can pull off a resurrection.