The One Campaign Promise Obama Has Kept

That is, his promise to increase the price of gasoline. Sarah Palin explains:

Through a process of what candidate Obama once called “gradual adjustment,” American consumers have seen prices at the pump rise 67 percent since he took office. Let’s not forget that in September 2008, candidate Obama’s Energy Secretary in-waiting said: “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” That’s one campaign promise they’re working hard to fulfill! Last week, the British Telegraph reported that the price of petrol in the UK hit £6 a gallon – which comes to about $9.70. If you think $4 a gallon is bad now, just wait till the next crisis causes oil prices to “necessarily” skyrocket. Meanwhile, the vast undeveloped reserves that could help to keep prices at the pump affordable remain locked up because of President Obama’s deliberate unwillingness to drill here and drill now.
Hitting the American people with higher gas prices like this is essentially a hidden tax and a transfer of wealth to foreign regimes who are providing us the energy we refuse to provide for ourselves. Like inflation, higher energy prices are a hidden tax on Americans who are struggling to make ends meet. And these high gas prices will be felt in the form of higher food prices due to higher transportation costs. Energy is connected to everything in our economy. Access to affordable and secure energy is key to economic growth, which in turn is key to job growth. Energy is the building block of our economy. The President is purposely weakening that building block and weakening our country.
2012 can’t come soon enough.

Every word of that is true. This chart, from the Heritage Foundation link above, is also instructive:
special_gas_prices_obama_FEB_2011.jpg
Barack Obama took office as a naive leftist with essentially no knowledge of how our economy works or how wealth is created. He subscribed to the leftist view that America is too rich and too powerful. He therefore took office intending to make America poorer and weaker. The single easiest way to accomplish this goal is by making energy more expensive. Obama said that he would increase gasoline prices gradually and cause the cost of electricity to “skyrocket.” I’m not sure he has fulfilled any other campaign promise, but he has certainly made good on that one. And every American is paying the price, every day. Just as Obama intended.

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