White House says crude oil price too high

By Chris Baltimore

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration on Friday voiced its dismay at record-high crude oil prices over $90 a barrel, but said it has no plans to suspend oil shipments to the nation's strategic stockpile despite lawmakers' warnings that the action is cutting into supplies.

"It's far too high," U.S. Energy Secretary Sam Bodman said when asked about oil prices, which hit an all-time high of $90.07 a barrel.

U.S. oil has rallied more than 15 percent since October 8, driven by fears about tight winter supply and a weakening U.S. dollar, which has propped up prices for oil and other commodities like gold.

The Energy Department will continue its ongoing program to fill the nation's emergency oil stockpile, Bodman said.

"We have no plans to make any changes," he told reporters after speaking at a solar energy competition on the Smithsonian Mall.

Oil prices are marching ever closer to their inflation-adjusted high of $101.70 a barrel hit in April 1980, a year after the Iranian revolution.

Earlier on Friday, a White House spokesman said U.S. President George W. Bush would like to see oil prices lower than their current levels.

"There's no magic to any particular number like $90 a barrel. Obviously we prefer oil prices lower," White House spokesman Tony Fratto told reporters.