From The MANHATTAN CONTRARIAN
July 10, 2021 / Francis Menton
The great thing about our freedom-based economic system is that there isn’t much government to do to make people thrive and the economy grow. Just sit back and watch people do business, get each other to work, and meet every human need imaginable.
But we now have government in the hands of people who hate America and hate its freedom-based system. The current administration is actively working to undermine the American economy and advance the interests of our geopolitical opponents. In no area is this more true than in the energy area. In this area, the Biden administration stepped in with the express aim of undermining American energy production. If a government wanted to undermine America’s energy prosperity as much as possible and bring comparable benefit to our adversaries, it is hard to imagine that it would do anything other than what the Biden government is doing.
For most of my adult life, “energy independence” has been a cross-party goal for the entire federal government. That goal was actually achieved under President Trump. Within a few months, Biden reversed this effort. The government has made no secret of its goals to reduce US energy production from working things (e.g. fossil fuels) and to drive up their prices. Let’s just make a small list of key actions to achieve these goals:
These are just examples of a general hostility towards fossil fuel development, specifically aimed at making energy projects more difficult and expensive to develop. And so far, the government’s actions are quickly achieving their intended goals:
OPEC members and Russia are the obvious candidates to take advantage of the price hikes, but it seems these parties are currently having some sort of dichotomy over who gets how much of a quota when production goes up. From the Wall Street Journal, July 6:
[A] Quota dispute between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates blocks an agreement [to lift production].
Do you think a competent American government would like to see American production increase at such a time? Not correct:
A White House spokesman said Monday he was pushing OPEC and its allies [including Russia] to quickly find a compromise “that enables planned production increases to be driven forward”. The government is concerned that higher gas prices could undermine Mr Biden’s climate agenda and spending plans.
Instead of energy independence, we are now seeing that imports from Russia are reaching highs like they have not for ten years. From S&P Global, April 16:
Imports of Russian oil, which consists mainly of heating oil raw materials and some crude oil, recently hit a 10-year high as U.S. refineries continue to ramp up as the economy recovers from COVID-19. The share of Russian oil imports in total US oil imports reached a record high of 8% in January 2021, up from 4% in 2018, according to the US Energy Information Administration.
It is difficult to imagine a more counterproductive policy than the one that the Biden administration is implementing under the rubric allegedly “combating climate change”.
Read the full article here.
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