Diesel Reserves Running Out

President Joe Biden is proposing a plan that would require fuel suppliers to maintain a minimum amount of diesel in their inventories this winter to stave off severe shortages and prevent extreme price hikes. However, it could create a demand surge and drive up already high prices, according to Bloomberg.

The plan would force diesel vendors to take supplies off the market which could cause short-term diesel demand to soar and drive up prices in the Northeast, where fuel shortages are most severe, according to Bloomberg. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has exacerbated the East Coast’s fuel shortages as the region has become dependent on Russian imports due to the region’s constrained pipeline capacity.

“We also want to make sure there’s enough fuel in the United States,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said when asked about U.S. fuel exports to energy-starved Europe during an interview at the COP27 climate conference in Egypt. “It may not be a business choice that they make, but we’re asking, as the companies that are operating in America, to do what they are doing in other countries.”

The national average price of diesel is $5.31 per gallon and is $1.58 higher than it was in November 2021, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA). The Midwest region’s wholesale diesel prices skyrocketed in July after pipeline operator Magellan Midstream Partners increased the minimum inventory levels for fuel held throughout its pipeline, according to Bloomberg.

The European Union (EU) required its member-states to fill natural gas storages to 80% of full capacity in order to prepare for potential winter shortages, according to the European Council press release. Europe is currently heavily reliant on U.S. oil and gas imports as Russia has continuously disrupted natural gas deliveries through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline in retaliation to EU sanctions.

Americans who use heating oil (a form of diesel) will spend an average of $2,354 to heat their homes this winter which represents a 27% increase from winter 2021 and the highest price point in more than 25 years, according to the EIA.

The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

False & Misleading Information

Washington  --  CNN  --

President Joe Biden has been back on the campaign trail, traveling in October and early November to deliver his pitch for electing Democrats in the midterm elections on Tuesday.

Biden’s pitch has included claims that are false, misleading or lacking important context. (As always, we take no position on the accuracy of his subjective arguments.) Here is a fact-check look at nine of his recent statements.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment for this article.  READ MORE...

Inflation Wipes Out Retirement Savings

Inflation has taken an average of 25 percent - at least $2.1trillion - off the 401Ks of American workers, despite President Joe Biden's insistence Sunday that the 'economy is strong as hell.'

The analysis was done by conservative economists Stephen Moore and EJ Antoni, who said that the balance of Americans' 401ks will 'ruin your whole day, week and month.'

Moore and Antoni note that inflation has been going at 8 percent for the past seven months, despite the White House claiming things were temporary.  READ MORE...

WOKE and the Military

Army Gen. Mark Milley is getting kudos from the media for telling Congress that the military hasn’t become “woke,” even as its leadership urges soldiers and sailors to absorb woke ideas. The brass is trying to have it both ways on this issue, and that may ultimately undermine its core mission.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs told the House Armed Services Committee Wednesday that he “personally” found it “offensive” that Republicans have accused general officers of being “woke.” A pair of Florida Congressmen had been criticizing Gen. Milley over seminars at West Point about “white rage.” 

The Chief of Naval Operations has recommended “How to Be an Antiracist,” a book that proposes “future discrimination,” ostensibly against white people, on his professional reading list for sailors.

Gen. Milley has to be sensitive to the political realities in the White House, but he was clearly exercised about the criticism, saying it’s “important actually for those of us in uniform to be open-minded and be widely read.” 

He later added: “I’ve read Mao Zedong. I’ve read Karl Marx. I’ve read Lenin. That doesn’t make me a communist.” So, he asked, “what is wrong” with “having some situational understanding about the country for which we are here to defend?”

Of course sailors and Marines should read widely. Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Michael Gilday said similarly last week that he was merely exposing sailors to new ideas. 

But one can still wonder why “How to Be an Antiracist,” a book promoting sectarian racism, is on the reading list as “foundational” material on par with Jim Hornfischer’s classic naval histories.   READ MORE