Many years in my history classes when I taught about the early days of WWII, I explained that the US, in order to punish Japan for its brutal invasion and occupation of China, in 1941 cut off shipments of oil and iron to Japan. In other words, at that time, almost no Americans wanted to send their boys off to war, since “The Great War” was a recent memory. However, there was a strong sense that the US should do something, and thus the government of FDR sanctioned Japan.
I would then tell my students, “It’s hard to believe, but imagine a time when the US actually exported more oil than we import!”
For most of recent memory, the US has been a net oil importer. However, the trend lines changed when President Trump was in office. Loath to admit much good from his administration, most corporate media downplays this, but the US actually became “energy independent” in the last few years, with domestic energy production outpacing demand, so we could export the rest.
However, along with all the other horrific damage he has done in only 13 months so far, it did not take President Biden and his administration long to wreck that. As reported in a column on February 21, on Biden’s Day One, in an avalanche of executive orders, he stopped construction of the much-maligned Keystone Pipeline. That project was designed to carry oil from Central Canada into the US, and from there deliver the goods into the US grid where we could use the energy or else export it to others.
(President Obama tried to stop the Keystone Pipeline too, and both our US senators, Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, voted to kill the project. Remember those names each time you see the dollar signs spinning on the pump as you fill your tank.)
So on Day One Biden ordered the project stopped, killing the pipeline and all the well-paying jobs it has created. The explanation was “we needed to stop the pipeline to save the planet.”
However, not only did Biden kill the US pipeline, he RESUMED the Nord Stream 2 project, a pipeline carrying RUSSIAN natural gas to Germany.
So go figure: Americans using North American fuel will “destroy the earth,” but Europeans using RUSSIAN fuel is just hunky-dory. To be consistent, Biden would want to stop ALL energy pipelines, but he did not, so clearly this is about something other than “saving the earth.”
(In fact, many suspect the whole push for solar and batteries is a plot to make us not only energy-dependent, but actually depend on Communist China, where many of the world’s solar panels and batteries just happen to be produced. But that is a different issue for a different column.)
Moreover, when President Trump let us use more of our own energy resources–off-shore, on federal lands, Alaska, etc.–we enjoyed LOWER energy prices. This helped us at the pump and since so much is carried by trucks, it kept prices and inflation lower on lots of items.
So, when Biden shut off those spigots upon entering office, that triggered the higher prices on gas and almost everything else we see today.
(CBS this week dishonestly tried to blame inflation on “the Ukraine crisis,” but most people see through the deception. Inflation has been spiraling for about a year, but the Ukraine crisis is recent.)
But wait, there’s more!
By cutting oil production in the US and losing those related jobs, we have recently been buying MORE oil from overseas. And guess who a big supplier is?
Russia, led by dictator Vladimir Putin.
Moreover, pipelines tend to be cleaner and safer, because they keep the oil or natural gas in a pipe. However, when we buy fuel from overseas, it has to be brought here by oil tanker ships then moved around the US by truck or train. That is more open to dangerous accidents or leaks.
Plus, by buying oil from Russia, we are sending our US dollars to Putin, thus bankrolling him so he can invade Ukraine!
Yesterday President Biden announced sanctions against Russia to punish them for their aggression. However, we are to keep buying Russian oil in exchange for our dollars.
Why?
Because Biden claims he wants to spare us Americans from the “hurt” of sanctions by paying more for gas. But we HAVE BEEN paying more for gas for a year, as a direct result of his actions and decisions.
Plus, if burning American oil “destroys the earth,” why does Biden not mind us burning RUSSIAN (or Saudi or etc.) oil? It is inconsistent and makes no sense.
When you think about it, it is really insane.
Do you think this is why there has been a years-long push to bamboozle and disorient us all to keep us from thinking rationally and being able to spot inconsistencies? In other words, the more confused we are, the easier we are to lead and manipulate?
So this week Russia invades Ukraine, world oil prices skyrocket, but we keep buying Russian oil so they can fund this and their (God-forbid) next wars?
How would this be for a common sense alternative? STOP buying oil from Russia while they attack and occupy their neighbors, thus cut off Russia’s “pipeline” of US dollars, and instead OPEN THE SPIGOTS on our own energy industry. Resume the Keystone Pipeline, and resume drilling to use the resources we already have: on federal lands and off-shore. This would revive many energy-sector jobs, push prices lower at the pumps, strengthen the dollar, and begin the rollback of our outrageous inflation.
After thirteen months of cutting our country off at the knees and MRGA (Make Russia Great Again), the Biden Administration can do the right thing and take the crucial step back to energy independence.
Open the spigots!
–Scott Dreyer
