By Harold Hutchison
President Joe Biden boasted during a Tuesday speech about ordering releases from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to address inflated gas prices.
“Across the country, the common price at the pump is $2.99 a gallon. It’s much higher here. And the prices continue to go down. This isn’t accidental,” Biden said during a speech in Bay City, Michigan. “We’ve been on this for months. Remember, I got criticized in the face of Putin using energy as a weapon. It took some decisive action. I ordered the largest ever release from the petroleum reserve, 180 million barrels of oil. And I rallied our international partners to come up with their fair share as well. That helped put pressure, downward pressure on price, because we’re producing more gasoline that helps stabilize crude oil markets and reduce prices at the pump.”
WATCH:
Biden authorized the sale of up to 180 million barrels of oil from the reserves in March, following Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine. Biden and the White House have often called increased gas prices the “Putin price hike,” while also blaming oil companies for high energy prices, but some experts have said Biden’s hostility to fossil fuel production has fueled higher gas prices.
The Biden administration released 10 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in October, putting it at its lowest level since the 1980s, according to Forbes.
The average price of gas soared to as high as $5.016 a gallon on June 14, according to AAA, while the average price for a gallon of diesel remains above $5.
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How shameful of him to boast about this record-setting release. Did he exercise any great virtue in authorising it? Did he have to work to persuade a lot of folks to go along with it? I doubt it. Even if it were a prudent act, it being easy for any adult makes it unremarkable.
But, except in it’s short term benefit of immediately reducing the price of oil temporarily, it’s not a good act. As I see it, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is a rainy day fund, meant to reduce immediately the geopolitical leverage of oil-producing foreign powers in the short term. So choosing to use it when there are better means is a foolish decision that likely will have negative geo-political consequences. Having decreased this reserve, the U.S. now has less leverage should it unexpectedly have a sudden oil shortage and need to increase its imports
Foreign producers, such as OPEC, can demand more in exchange for their oil, or simply deny it.
Biden is exhibiting one of Obama’s most infuriating characteristics, which is to refrain from bestowing on one’s opponent the dignity of existence. Doing this, he avoids even having to debate them, since he doesn’t even acknowlege their validity. Have you heard any White House debate on whether America should rely on her untapped oil to reduce gas prices? I haven’t. Instead, he doesn’t even acknowledge his restrictions on and animus towards domestic oil production, regarding which a prominent oil association president recently said that they constitute the most hostile regulatory environment ever seen in in his associations one hundred year history. And if he does speak of it, he communicates such an apathy towards it as to imply that his restrictions and animus have no appreciable effect on domestic production. How detestable of him.
So his only recourse is to tap into our Strategic Petroleum Reserve, since he doesn’t consider boosting Domestic production even worth considering. Perhaps it’s to appease his irrational climate alarmist constituents and the people of questionable intentions who capitalise on their sentiment.
That’s how I see his action when I assume he’s not acting on behalf of foreigners. I’m not convinced, however, that he isn’t. It’s worth examining whether he is weakening America at the behest of some foreign power, and perhaps doing so under threat of blackmail. He does seem to have a strong family loyalty. I see no objection to exploring that line of thought, especially given the willingness seen recently to explore our 45th president’s foreign connections.
Regardless of the nature of his energy policy failures as our current president, whether incompetence, treason or something else, I urge any Christians reading this to pray for him, that God break through to him and that he accept God’s mercy. And may God have mercy on all of us in our failings.