"Jittery about a political backlash over gasoline costs as prices set yet another record Tuesday, Congress voted to halt deliveries to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in defiance of President Bush." --LA Times

When the Senate votes 97-1 on something, it's pretty much guaranteed that they're doing so because voting Nay puts them at risk of being voted out in the next election. (Note that the one Nay vote was by a senator who's retiring. Also note that on that page there is a poll, and as of 5/15/08 the highest votegetter is No, meaning a lot of people are opposed to the Senate's vote.)
I think I see Bush's point about energy security, but the key thing here is that people would only save 2 to 5 cents per gallon. Even for the lower class, 75 cents is not enough to make a difference in people's ability to pay their bills. Yes it could make a difference for somebody who drives a large truck for a living, but considering how we're already seeing positive effects from the [relatively] high gas prices, I'll have to disagree with the Senate on this one.