Submitted by QTR's Fringe Finance
Yesterday, an apparently fake headline circulated on Twitter (or X, or whatever the fuck it’s called this week), alleging that President Biden was open to “depleting” the Strategic Petroleum Reserve due to rising oil prices.
Many quickly accepted the headline as genuine, perhaps because it sounded precisely like something President Biden might say. I spent some of the afternoon looking for the source and it was not The Wall Street Journal, as claimed on Twitter.
Though the headline was fabricated, it almost doesn’t even matter at this point. President Biden has made it clear that tapping into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is perpetually under consideration, undoubtedly because oil prices (and the prices of everything, i.e. inflation) have become a headline issue in the upcoming presidential election.
In essence, the lower oil’s price is, the easier it is for President Biden to claim success in fighting inflation. Reduced oil prices also enable leftists to argue that limiting drilling domestically does not adversely affect consumers and therefore, we should all do whatever the fuck they want at any and all times, including cheering them on while they deface priceless historic works of art, all in the name of sacred “climate change.”
However, by perpetuating this oil price “solution” charade with a series of short-term fixes, the administration sacrifices our country’s long-term goals, ultimately causing more harm than good.
As Jim Bianco correctly noted on Twitter yesterday, the SPR was created to prevent supply shocks (i.e. shortages of actual oil) that the U.S. saw in the 1970s — not to manage prices of ample supply.
And then there’s that pesky term “strategic” that keeps popping up.
Has “The Big Guy” ever asked himself what that word means in the context of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve? After all, it’s not just the petroleum reserve, it’s the strategic petroleum reserve.
Oxford defines the word as “relating to the identification of long-term or overall aims and interests and the means of achieving them”.
The word implies long-term planning, something evidently lacking in the administration’s approach. Their decisions instead seek short term political currency by depleting our national reserve, meant for emergencies, not market fluctuations. Price serves as a rationing mechanism and government interference distorts this natural function.
I am once again reminded of the chief reminding Marcus and Mike in Bad Boys 2 of the meaning of the word “tactical”.
“What’s your job description? What is your job description,” the public asks Biden as the SPR lays bone dry.
“Tactical narcotics team! Key word: tactical! Displaying finesse and subtlety in achieving the goal! Tell me gentlemen, what was subtle about your work today? 42 cars - and a boat!”
“Strategic petroleum reserve. Key word: strategic! Definition: relating to the identification of long-term or overall aims and interests and the means of achieving them. Tell me President Biden, what was long-term about defiling the corpse of the strategic petroleum reserve to get gas prices down $0.10 for 10 minutes?”
Not only is the move not “strategic”, it makes us look vulnerable on the world stage.
Ironically, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman tried to warn us back in late 2022 that emptying our Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) was a stupid idea to try and “temporarily” fix oil market prices.
"People are depleting their emergency stocks, had depleted it, used it as a mechanism to manipulate markets while its profound purpose was to mitigate shortage of supply. However, it is my profound duty to make it clear to the world that losing emergency stock may become painful in the months to come," he said back in October.
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After all, everyone knows there’s only one organization that’s allowed to manipulate oil supply, and that’s OPEC. Oh, and now maybe BRICS, which is soon to have 6 of the top 10 largest oil producers in the world, making up about 40% of the world’s total oil supply
Not only did the Biden Administration not heed this warning, but they also seem to have little to no understanding about geopolitics or free market economics. If they did, they would see they are putting the country into a precarious position when it’s totally unnecessary. They continue to use the SPR as a...(READ THIS FULL ARTICLE, FREE, HERE).
