With a gallon of gas approaching $5 last June, President Joe Biden visited Saudi Arabia asking the kingdom for an increase in oil production.
The crown prince responded by cutting production a month before the midterm elections. In April, a second cut was announced, and then again this weekend, a third cut of 1 million fewer barrels starting in July.
The message from the Saudis is clear: We set oil prices, just like we did in the past, and thanks to the weakness of Biden and his energy policy (or lack thereof), we are now in charge — again.
It does not have to be this way, as even Biden has acknowledged. During this year’s State of the Union, he proclaimed, “We’re going to need oil for at least another decade and beyond,” a statement leading to outright laughter from the Republican side of the aisle.
Biden’s comments were laughably ignorant for two reasons. For starters, oil will be necessary in perpetuity. Even $1.3 trillion in taxpayer subsidies for electric vehicles won’t replace oil when EVs and wind and solar are all made from oil (and natural gas and coal).
We are not using less oil by “going green”; we are using oil differently. Innumerable products in everyday life come from oil: plastic, rubber, fiberglass, to name a few.
When New York Rep. Jamaal Bowman recently demanded we “stop drilling for fossil fuels completely,” one wonders if he realized his eyeglasses — frames and lenses — started as oil.
Second, if fossil fuels are required to make those wind turbines and solar panels and EVs, then why not create conditions for a fossil-fuel economy so robust that we can all benefit immediately?
Biden has engaged in amenable oil negotiations with Saudi Arabia and the entire OPEC cartel, yet continues to liken American oil and gas companies to war profiteers.
Just last week, Biden’s Department of Interior placed another enormous parcel of land in New Mexico on a 20-year ban from resource development.
He ignored the pleas and the protests of the Navajo community dependent on that development for its livelihood.
On one hand, we have a president admitting we need oil, but on the other, an administrative state making it near impossible to bring it to market.
These contradictory actions signal to the world the United States has no clear energy plan other than climate hysteria. When America shows weakness, nations like Saudi Arabia will pounce.
There is a better way.
Biden could beat the Saudis at their own game by expanding domestic production.
Just as oil prices are up at the mere announcement of production cuts (which don’t start for another month), markets would respond with lower prices if Biden announced favorable conditions for domestic production.
Expanding domestic production would translate to significant job growth, as one new oil worker creates nearly three additional jobs.
Increased production would slowly bring down prices on all goods, services and food, which would lower inflation, bills and utilities.
Remember gas under $2 a gallon? Or eggs costing less than $5 a dozen? Expensive energy leads to high prices, and it is all reversible.
It would also weaken Russia: The fast way to end Vladimir Putin’s invasion is to cut off his cash cow, and the only way to do that is lower oil prices by outproducing him.
Yet for all this to happen, these incredible, positive developments for American families and our domestic economy, geopolitics and world peace, Biden would have to admit American fossil fuels are both good and necessary.
And that he cannot do. Fossil fuels cannot be the hero of the story because it contradicts the green cult running amok.
Oil runs the world, like it or not.
America could be in the driver’s seat if we let our producers do what they do best: produce oil.
Under Biden, America has surrendered the oil economy. The Saudi king is now the world’s oil king again, and we are all worse for it.
Daniel Turner is the founder and executive director of Power The Future, a national nonprofit organization that advocates for American energy jobs. Twitter: @DanielTurnerPTF
This story originally appeared on NYPost
