President Obama said yesterday that he has “urged world oil producers to lift crude output.”
“They need to increase supplies,” Obama told CBS affiliate WTKR in Hampton Roads, Virginia. “We are in a lot of conversations with major oil producers like Saudi Arabia.”
So Obama understands that increased production of crude oil will bring down the price of gasoline. But does he not understand that the United States is the third-leading crude oil producer in the world? Not only that, we could be the number one producer of energy, if only our government would stop blocking exploration and development of our petroleum resources.
Dan Kish of the Institute for Energy Research points out the absurdity of Obama’s importuning the Saudis to increase production:
The President now says his administration is pushing major oil producers to increase oil output in an effort to lower prices. What he really needs is to have someone tell the government of the world’s 3rd largest oil producer to boost output. In case he is unaware, that producer is the United States.
He could do that at his next cabinet meeting by telling EPA to stop holding up Shell’s drilling in Alaska and by telling Secretary Salazar to stop closing access to our nation’s energy supplies, which the Congressional Research Service says are larger than any country on earth.
The President is beginning to look like the Ugly American in his attempts to point the finger of blame anywhere but his record, which includes seeking higher taxes on energy and stopping energy production wherever possible. It requires a suspension of disbelief to accept his protests about higher energy prices when that is his policy. His chickens are coming home to roost.
President Obama named Steven Chu his Secretary of Energy just three months after Chu told the Wall Street Journal in a high-profile interview that “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” Presumably Obama put Chu in charge of energy policy because he shared Chu’s goal of driving American gas prices far above their then-current level. The policies that Obama, Chu and Obama’s EPA have subsequently followed confirm that higher energy prices was their objective. Now, confronted with the political fallout from his policies and facing rejection at the polls in 2012, Obama is flailing helplessly to re-cast himself as an advocate for American consumers. But he still is not willing to do the one thing that is within his power and that will bring down energy costs: turn loose America’s vast energy resources for development.
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