Will $5/Gal Gas Be The Death Knell For Biden’s ‘I Did That’ Presidency?
It’s a given that the Democrats are in trouble in the 2022 midterms. But President Joe Biden might also be on his way out. Desperate Democrats are sending signals they’d be happy if he didn’t run again in 2024, and might be even happier if he left before that, and took Vice President Kamala Harris with him. Why? A look at his disastrous bumbling on energy tells you all you need to know.
For those around during the 1970s, the gold standard for political ineptitude has always been President Jimmy Carter. Forty-three years ago this month, Carter gave his now-infamous “Address To The Nation” on energy policy.
It was a disaster, and wrong on all counts when it came to both basic economics and energy.
Some of his most memorable quotes, courtesy of the Foundation for Economic Education:
- “The oil and natural gas we rely on for 75% of our energy are running out.”
- “We can’t substantially increase our domestic production …”
- “Within 10 years we would not be able to import enough oil — from any country, at any acceptable price.”
These were just a few of the many defeatist fatuities in that infamous speech, not one of them true. But no one thought Carter was intentionally lying. He was just wrong. And it led to soaring prices, gas rationing with lines that lasted for hours, and economic misery.
Biden’s energy policies are likewise having a devastating impact on the U.S. and global economies. But there’s no excuse. He was in Congress during the Carter years. Did he not learn any lessons, especially about energy? Is he senile? Or merely a figurehead for the far-left, woke puppetmasters that run his “green” administration?
How else can you explain a president who blames “gas stations” for soaring gasoline prices? The same stations, by the way, where customers now put up stickers of Biden pointing at rising gas prices and saying, “I did that!”
Biden’s energy catastrophe is a major reason why, in a recent Rasmussen poll, just 29% said they wanted him and Harris to run again in 2024. Not even a majority of Democrats want them on the ticket, that’s how bad it is.
Meanwhile, 57% in a Monmouth University Polling Institute poll cite federal government policies since the start of this year as having hurt their families. Among those taking the poll, 33% cited “inflation” and 15% named gasoline prices as their No. 1 concern; it was “the first time that gas prices (were) mentioned by more than a handful of Americans as their predominant issue.”
Gasoline prices have soared 108% since Biden became president, promising to wage war against the oil industry as part of his 10-year, $1.7 trillion “climate action” plan.
He kept his word. Upon entering office, Biden immediately blocked the Keystone XL pipeline project and halted federal oil leases. Since then, he has rejected drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, blocked exploratory drilling in Alaska, and has even nixed plans to expand and improve a U.S. Virgin Islands-based oil refinery.
To punish Russia for invading Ukraine, Biden also convinced U.S. allies to stop buying Russian oil and gas, adding to regional shortages, higher prices and, ironically, more coal use. And now, Biden’s green agenda is even threatening our national power grid.
So, no, the sudden “shortage” of oil and soaring energy prices weren’t bad luck. Or someone else’s fault. They were made in Washington, by Biden and the Democrats. And they’re hitting Americans hard at a time when wages aren’t keeping up with inflation, which now costs the average family an extra $460 monthly, according to recent estimates by Moody’s.
But don’t tell that to the Bidenistas, who in one week showed how they’re severely damaging their party’s prospects in 2022 and 2024 with a series of blame-deflecting comments on energy that made them look out of touch and inept.
As Biden tweeted Saturday: “My message to the companies running gas stations and setting prices at the pump is simple: this is a time of war and global peril. Bring down the price you are charging at the pump to reflect the cost you’re paying for the product. And do it now.”
Really? Amazon gazillionaire Jeff Bezos, not exactly a right-winger, tweeted this response: “Ouch. Inflation is far too important a problem for the White House to keep making statements like this. It’s either straight ahead misdirection or a deep misunderstanding of basic market dynamics.”
The U.S. Oil & Gas Association was even more pointed: “Working on it Mr. President. In the meantime – have a Happy 4th and please make sure the WH intern who posted this tweet registers for Econ 101 for the fall semester …”
Not to be outdone by his boss, Biden’s National Economic Council Director Brian Deese claimed that high gas prices are “about the future of the liberal world order” and Americans would just have to get used to them.
Finally, comes the revelation that Biden sucked 5 million barrels of oil out of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is supposedly for emergency use, and sold it overseas, in particular to China and Europe.
This is tone-deaf and major league ineptitude, far worse than anything Carter did. Carter lost handily in 1980 to a man the media and their Democratic allies desperately tried to portray as a right-wing extremist: Ronald Reagan.
Reagan aggressively deregulated energy, cut taxes, and left the Fed alone to fight inflation. Lower energy prices and the 1980s boom was the result.
Biden has shown himself incapable of such insight. He’s a creature of Washington, out of touch with the American people and the pain he’s causing. The anger over gasoline prices is growing political. It could cost Biden his job.
So if you want to know what’s going to happen in the midterm elections and in 2024, here’s a tip: Watch gasoline prices, not polls.
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