The final nail in the coffin of, "Drill, baby, drill". Aah MAGA, so guillible

MAGA really thought the US could drill its way to energy independence, isolating the country from international commodity prices. They thought this would be accomplished by multinational companies willingly selling their products at lower prices domestically. They talk about capitalism but don't understand it.

US oil exports hit record high. What does this mean for gas prices? |USA Today

"Why not keep the oil here?

Right now, it’s better for U.S. producers to export oil because overseas buyers are paying more for it than domestic ones would, said Greg Upton, the executive director of the Center for Energy Studies and a professor at Louisiana State University.

Since the start of the war, the United States has exported over 280 million barrels over nine weeks, drawing down the country's strategic petroleum reserves in the process. The Department of Energy released nearly 23 million barrels from the reserve since late March, part of the 172 million barrels the DOE is authorized to release by President Donald Trump. As of May 1, the reserves stood at about 392 million barrels.

Yet, oil and gas prices have remained elevated."

Who could have ever possibly predicted this outcome? Oh yeah, that was me, and any thinking person of average intelligence, which seemed to have eliminated most MAGA folks.

Trump did not lower prices on day 1, he did not end the Russian/Ukraine war in 48 hours, he did not end American involvement in foreign wars, and he did not make the USA energy independent with "drill, baby, drill". 

Has there ever been a President that has piled up so much failure in the first year of their administration?

 To answer your question - yes, a vegetable named Biden. ---- You seem to have an affliction posessed by ALL ignorant liberals - you have amazingly overlooked the disasterous 4 years of the brain dead Biden administration. The elevated oil and gas prices is a temporary condition, as any sane person realizes. 

ITZ AWL BIDENZ FAWLT! ITZ ALL BIDENZ FAWLT! TDS! TDS! TDS! AWWWWWWWWWWK!

Will somebody feed that damn parrot?

Oh, yeah, the parrot keeps telling us that if something bad is "temporary," it's just fine and we shouldn't worry about it or criticize it. But how does the parrot know that high oil prices are indeed temporary?

ITZ AWL BIDENZ FAWLT! ITZ ALL BIDENZ FAWLT! AWWWWWWWWWWWK! TDS! TDS! TDS!

   I am glad that you finally admit that it is/was brain dead Biden's fault. 

Max, you highlight one consideration that I strongly suspect was a driver of this whole stupid Turd war. Big Oil is selling its products for much higher prices than only a couple of months ago. Same quantities but at a 50% price increase. What's not to love??

You're quite right, in that the current situation illustrates the stupidity of the MAGA "energy independence" mantra. We have ALWAYS been able to meet our domestic energy needs with domestic production. We "drill, baby, drill" so that Big Oil can EXPORT our energy resources and make beaucoup bucks. The mumbled question, "Well, what happens if there's a war in the Middle East, HUH???" has been answered: Big Oil will take full advantage--and they have.

I'm sure that most Americans are wondering, "Well, if our oil doesn't come through the Strait of Hormuz, why does its closure affect us?" Short answer: it shouldn't.

What would a decent President do? He would place a restriction on oil exports. Keep it here. We shouldn't have to pay elevated prices. If petroleum is a strategic national asset, then the people own it and we shouldn't sell it on the world markets. We should use it for ourselves.

(Of course, a decent President also wouldn't have started the stupid fucking war in the first place. But Big Oil stuffed a couple billion in his pocket and Bibi gave him a big sloppy kiss, with tongue.)

I was quoting the parrot (you).

It is worth mentioning that though, on paper, we are a "net exporter" of oil, we don't really refine the oil we pump domestically. 

Our refineries are not setup to refine the type of oil we produce domestically. 

Most of the oil we produce we export and most of the oil we refine we import. 

Until we build new refineries we will still be dependent on imports. 

Even if we were to achieve "oil independence", that still doesn't isolate us from world supply chain issues. We live in a global economy whether we choose to participate or not. 

But we lack that capacity precisely because Big Oil has found it cheaper and easier to sell our oil than to increase our capacity to refine it.

Imagine any honest effort to achieve "energy independence." Wouldn't that include building refineries to process the oil that as you say, we have no choice but to export? Wouldn't that directly and immediately increase our domestic energy production, without drilling baby drilling?

Of course it would. So let's inquire why Big Oil and their Republipig cronies haven't lifted a finger to do that.

It's not only about refinery capacity it's about refinery type. Domestic oil that we produce is a different type of oil than what our current refineries use. 

Every time new refineries are proposed they get blocked. 

Well, yes, obviously, I was referring to the possibility of building new refineries OF THE TYPE NEEDED. If we truly have a shortage of finished product due to having the wrong type of refineries, then what I was referring to was building the type of refineries we lack.

But I was speaking hypothetically--as in, if we really really crave "energy independence," we could build more refineries of the requisite tyoe. So the reason we don't do that is that the existing refinery capacity meets our domestic needs. In any event, drillbabydrill is stupid in the extreme, because it would be far simpler to just add refinery capacity. Again, if we really needed it, which we don't.

And that is the reason new refineries are "blocked." They're not needed. And they do have a significant impact on the surrounding areas, so we don't want to build them unless they really are needed.

In addition, building new refineries is kind of like ramping up horse and buggy production in 1905. Fossil fuels (used as fuel) are obsolete.