Ocean shipping rates have been soaring. The cost to get oil to our refineries has gone up for months. So, frankly this little charade has very little chance of keeping a lid on oil prices. It’s probably going higher, unless of course they play the “lets shut the country down game” again.
Hey I’m a simple guy. I grew up in a middle class family, with a great mom and dad. I did stupid boy things growing up, spent a lot of quality time fishing the bays and rivers, married a wonderful gal, and had a couple kids. Fat, dumb and happy comes to mind.
I don’t have a Harvard diploma. Neither one from Yale. I seem to have survived without both by using simple bayman’s logic and common sense. However, it appears like you have to come from an Ivy league college, or at minimum… spend decades in politics to understand some things. Let’s consider the cardboard cutout we call President Biden for a moment.
He’s been a political hack for decades on end. I truly have no idea what he’s ever done for the good of the nation, but he, or his electronic ventriloquist, tells us weekly that he’s all about helping families and building our nation better.
It is with that idea, that my obviously lesser developed brain has been misfiring over lately. From the standpoint of this 64 year old clamdigger from the Jersey coast, some of the twaddle this guy (or the guy who writes on his notepads) spews, is simply beyond basic baymen logic. I just can’t understand it, it’s over my head.
I point to his action a couple days back. He has called on OPEC and their minions, to produce more oil, because for some strange reason, he’s concerned about the price of energy and gasoline. Somehow that just doesn’t quite square up. Isn’t this the same guy that wants us to be “carbon free” by 2050? Check. Isn’t this the guy that says the Green new deal, is the way forward? Check. Isn’t this the guy that halted pipelines, shut down new drilling areas, stifled already in progress oil drilling projects? Check.
Now I don’t profess to have the mental acuity of a life long politician, or a college professor, so maybe someone could help me out here. Do we have oil in the US? Check. Did Biden cut the production of said oil? Check. Weren’t we nearly oil independent just a year and change back? Check. Then wouldn’t it make basic logic/common sense, that we simply reopen what we had?
I tend to think that would be a very good idea. A year and a half ago, even 9 months ago, I was filling up for $1.99 a gallon. Today I paid $3.00. That extra dollar, even using back of the napkin, redneck math, comes out to $24 more dollars in my 24 gallon tank. I could use that 24 bucks. But Joey thinks asking the foreigners for more oil is the right play. You know, the same folks that can shut the valves off if they want to.
Is it possible that Biden believes his own twaddle? While he is a lifelong politician, he is not a pinnacle of neuronal radiance, having finished low in his class in a mediocre law school, while being caught cheating. So maybe he’s got the shorter end of a politician’s seemingly inbred wisdom?
Yeah I’m being a bit snarky here, but like…”really??” You know I’m in strange waters when even a leftist mainstream outfit like Reuters is having an issue with it. Check this:
CLASHING PRIORITIES
The Biden administration's push for lower fuel prices grates with its efforts to secure global leadership in the fight against climate change, an agenda anchored by efforts to transition the economy away from fossil fuels toward cleaner energy sources and electric vehicles.
Biden has set a goal to decarbonize the U.S. economy by 2050 and has paused new drilling lease auctions on federal lands pending a review of its environmental and climate impacts.
A Republican lawmaker criticized Biden for the clashing priorities.
“It’s pretty simple: if the President is suddenly worried about rising gas prices, he needs to stop killing our own energy production here on American soil," said Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the top U.S. oil producing state.
The administration also said on Wednesday that it had not called upon U.S. producers to ramp up output. U.S. oil production has been stagnant at about 11 million barrels per day (bpd) since the fallout of the pandemic pulled it from a record high of 12.3 million bpd in 2019.
Robert Yawger, director of energy futures at Japanese bank Mizuho, also critiqued the administration, saying: "I don't know why they aren't trying to get U.S. producers to increase production," he said.
I don’t like being on the same page as a main stream media outlet much, but in this case, it’s justified. So the question is, what happens to oil now?
Trust me, I want lower oil and energy prices. But with the central banks printing as they are, and commodities ever-creeping higher, will an increase in production really bring about a meaningful price decrease? Probably not. Why? Well you can produce all the goo you want, but if there’s little way to get it here, and/or it costs too much to do it, guess what? Prices at the pump don’t change.
Ocean shipping rates have been soaring. The cost to get oil to our refineries has gone up for months. So, frankly this little charade has very little chance of keeping a lid on oil prices. It’s probably going higher, unless of course they play the “lets shut the country down game” again.
Now on the other hand, if we could get back the million+ barrels of oil Biden shut down here in the first place, THEN we could easily see a marked pull down in the price of gasoline and diesel. But for some reason the guy that just wants to help America, simply can’t seem to figure that one out. I wonder why….