Gas prices reaching nominal record highs in the United States are fueling fights -- both domestic and political.

"I keep the price from my husband cause I'm afraid he'll make me get a cheaper car," said one woman as she filled up.

In Los Angeles, the epicentre of the car-centred lifestyle, the top price is $2.39 US per gallon.

The average U.S. price is about $1.72 per gallon.

During the first oil shock of the 1970s, then-U.S. president Richard Nixon said Americans would "never" pay more than a dollar per gallon for gas.

The campaign team of U.S. President George Bush are making it an election issue, with Bush saying in one ad: "Gas taxes would hurt the economy."

On the Bush website, there is a claim Kerry supports a 50-cent-per-gallon increase in the price of gas.

For his part, John Kerry, who is Bush's unofficial challenger for the Democrats, is also trying to tap into Americans' anger over pump prices.

He is claiming to have blocked a 1986 effort by Dick Cheney, now the vice-president, to get an oil import tax that would have cost consumers $1.2 trillion US.

Kerry is promising a plan that will make the U.S. independent from Mideast oil in 10 years and to create hundreds of thousands of jobs in renewal energy.

The reason for the kerfuffle is that gas prices are 20 cents US per gallon higher than they were a year ago.

This has caught the attention of Americans even more than the war in Iraq.

"Public attention to news about rising gas prices, already quite high, increased markedly in early April – fully 58% paid very close attention to reports on the high price of gasoline, compared with 36% who followed the recent attacks on Americans in Iraq very closely," said a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. "Only about three-in-ten (29%) approve of Bush's handling of energy policy."

That survey questioned 790 people between April 1 and 4. It is considered accurate to within four percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

"In terms of economic issues, it could be big in the fall," said the Pew Center's Carroll Doherty.

This hasn't affected the American love affair with gas guzzlers: there are now 20 million SUV owners in the U.S. Sales are up 14 per cent over last year.

But at $50 to fill up, they're starting to make the connection.

"This thing was a mistake. I got talked into this by the dealer and I should have never bought this car," said one man.

Adjusted for inflation, however, gas is cheaper than it was in the late 1970s and early 1980s, where it was up to $2.42 US per gallon in California -- about 15 per cent higher than the current state average.

"In some longer historical perspective I'd tell them to stop whining," said the Cato Institute's Peter Van Doren. "Things aren't really that bad."

Sympathy for the Americans' plight is limited in Great Britain.

"They should come and fill up with petrol here," said one man.

"You can only fill up so much at one time. Especially with a low income," added another.

U.S. prices are also cheaper than Canada.

Drivers in the Northwest Territories are paying $1.01 per litre. In Newfoundland, it's 89.3 cents.

The NWT price would represent about $3.04 US per gallon.

Alberta, Canada's most oil-rich province, also has the cheapest prices at 51.9 cents per litre.

With a report from CTV's Kathy Tomlinson