Instead of just complaining about high gas prices John Edwards would like to do something about them.

Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards says a wave of mergers in the oil industry should be investigated by the Justice Department to see what impact they have had on soaring gasoline prices.

During a planned campaign stop Thursday in Silicon Valley, Edwards planned to berate the oil industry for "anticompetitive actions" and outline an energy plan he says would reduce oil imports "and get us on a path to be virtually petroleum-free within a generation."

"Vertically integrated companies like Exxon Mobil own every step of the production process - from extraction to refining to sale at the pump, enabling them to foreclose competition," says an outline of Edward's energy plan provided to The Associated Press by his campaign.

Now we are talking! I would love to see some of these Presidential candidates talking tough about dealing with the obviously criminal activity of the oil companies.

We certainly will not get to the bottom of this with Bush and Cheney, two well known oil whores, in office.

Edwards goes on to lay out a fairly comprehensive plan for moving away from petroleum products and into alternate sources of fuel.