Diesel is at record highs. That is not a mystery, and it is not “the government owns the fuel.”
The federal government does not own diesel. Private refiners do. They sell it on a global market.
Two wars knocked a huge amount of refined diesel off that market:
• The fight around the Strait of Hormuz cut Middle East crude and product flows.
• Ukraine’s strikes on Russian refineries, plus Russia’s diesel export ban, took another major supplier offline.
The United States still imports crude oil. We do not depend on imported diesel. We make more diesel than we use and export a lot of it. When the world is short, buyers overseas bid our barrels away, inventories here tighten, and the pump price follows.
That is supply and demand—not a presidential price tag on the pump.
If Democrats want to campaign on diesel, they should say the whole sentence: global shortage, private refiners, record export demand, and two wars. Leaving half of that out is politics, not economics.
Americans feel this in groceries, freight, and on the farm. Voters deserve the real cause, not a campaign strategy before the midterms. For all the naysayers who want to blame our President for the war with Iran: kiss my behind. If that’s what it takes for me to sleep without worrying about Iran bombing American soil, then so be it.
Rant over,
Love, Grammy