Gas Pump via Pixabay images

The price of gas keeps rising.

“The reason for that is because of Putin’s war,” said President Joe Biden.

But that’s impossible. Most of the price rise came before Putin attacked Ukraine.

So some politicians simply blame “corporate greed.”

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse accuses the oil industry of collecting “excess profit.”

Sen. Elizabeth Warren even introduced a bill to ban “price gouging.”

This is just economic ignorance, as my new video explains.

“If big oil could raise prices anytime they wanted and get away with it, then why were they so cheap in 2020, 2019, 2018?” asks the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Ben Lieberman.

Lieberman points out that companies are always greedy. Greed didn’t just start now. They were just as greedy when gas prices fell in 2019 and early 2020.

“It all comes down to cutting back on supplies,” says Lieberman.

It’s not complicated. Prices change because of supply and demand.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, fewer people drove, and demand for gasoline dropped. So did its price. Oil drillers then did less drilling. Now demand is up because people are driving again.

But it takes time for producers to adjust.

“It takes months, not days, for a company to increase production,” says Biden.
I’m relieved that the president understands that, but he ignores how his own policies reduce production and raise the price of gas. He didn’t mention that when he canceled a long-planned sale of offshore oil rights this week.

Activists want Biden to also kill a pipeline that would bring oil from Canada to Wisconsin. They’ve already delayed it five years. They delayed the Keystone Pipeline for 16 years, until Biden killed it altogether.

This is so dumb. Stopping pipelines doesn’t even help the environment. Oil still gets shipped, but by truck, train and barge. That leads to more oil spills.

At least one congressman is as foolish as the activists.

Last fall, at a congressional hearing titled “Exposing Big Oil’s Disinformation Campaign to Prevent Climate Action,” grandstanding California Rep. Ro Khanna scolded oil executives for producing too much oil.

“Are you embarrassed as an American company that your production is going up?” Khanna said to Chevron CEO Michael Wirth.

“Demand for energy is going up in the world,” Wirth responded, reasonably.

“Would you commit to reducing the production of oil?” Khanna asked ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods.

“We’re committed to lowering our emissions,” Woods answered.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no,'” sneered Khanna.

Hilariously, now that gas prices are up, Khanna goes on TV to complain that oil companies don’t produce more oil. “They’re still not increasing the production!” he whines.

I tried to interview Khanna about his hypocrisy, but he won’t talk to me.

“It’s amazing what $4 a gallon gasoline in an election year will do to cause some people to change their minds!” says Lieberman.

Still, the environmental activists aren’t totally crazy.

“We have to protect the Earth,” I say to Lieberman. “Sometimes the market isn’t the best director.”

“There is pollution, and there is a reason to address it,” Lieberman responds, “But we have to be realistic … these threats are repeatedly exaggerated.”

They sure are.

“(But in) the public debate, you’re losing. They’re winning,” I point out.

“At $4 a gallon gasoline, I think we’re seeing a rethinking of the climate agenda,” Lieberman replies.

Biden, at his State of the Union address, did say his top priority would be “getting prices under control.”

But he can’t get gas prices under control without more use of those hated fossil fuels.

“The Biden administration either has to choose between affordable energy or the climate agenda,” says Lieberman. “It can’t do both.”

Subscribe
Notify of
3 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Captain America
1 year ago

The idiot and theif will continue to dessimate the economy until WE get off our asses and drag the bastards out

MJB
1 year ago

Why would he care? In his mind it makes it easier to raise the minimum wage to a ridiculous rate that has no chance of impacting things positively for those who receive the increase.

Government interference is the issue and the cause of all the inflation! With the TRILLIONS of $$’s and no restraint on spending, there is no way inflation won’t rage out of control!

The only way to get any of this under control is to begin cutting government projects and let the private sector take over! Government does not create a single job that is not more expensive to the taxpayers than it brings benefit.

Eliminate 90% of the government bureaucracy and we will start to get where we need to be! Incentivize the government to SAVE the taxpayers money rather than encouraging more spending with baseline budgeting schemes! The government is wholly unaccountable for all the hate and abuse of the taxpayers and it needs to stop!

We have been so ignored for far too long! The glimmers of hope we have seen over the past 100 years have been Kennedy, Reagan and Trump! All of which have sought to upend the deep state control of the government and its counterpart behind the scenes. (the unelected and unaccountable “shadow government”). And because of that, they were either eliminated, vilified or ignored by the deep state!

We need to return to true Constitutional government with its limitations on the Federal control… 1st order of business is to eliminate the Federal Reserve (a PRIVATE Corporation – nothing Federal about them) and return to SOUND money instead of the debt instruments called Federal Reserve Notes that are nothing but a promissory note owed to the international bankers. We need to eliminate them and their control over our monetary policy. It is wholly unconstitutional to continue allowing a PRIVATE central bank set policy. Article I, Section 8, Clause 5: [The Congress shall have Power . . . ] To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;

F J B - F B O
1 year ago

THE WHOLE DEMOCRATIC TERRORISTS NATIONWIDE DON’T CARE WHAT HAPPENS TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE! THEY MADE THEY’RE DEAL WITH CHINA AN RUSSIA! THAT THE TRUE REASON FOR A PUSH ON GUN CONTROL! F J B -F B O