To paraphrase the catchphrase Biden’s former boss made famous: Yes It Can.
Many thought that famous picture of US President George W. Bush holding hands with Saudi Arabian King Abdullah showed the polite gesture of a young president aiding an old king. In fact, it betrayed the geopolitical reality of an old king aiding a young president whose country was dependent on the oil his kingdom produces.
Of course, that was over 15 years ago. And, even though much has changed, America’s dependence on Saudi oil remains much the same.
Only that picture today would feature an old US president shaking the bloodstained hand of a young Saudi Crown Prince. This, because Biden is planning to eat these famous words:
Biden, who as a candidate vowed to make Saudi Arabia a ‘pariah’ in response to the assassination of a prominent dissident, has decided to travel to Riyadh this month to rebuild relations with the oil-rich kingdom at a time when he is seeking to lower gas prices at home and isolate Russia abroad.
While President Donald J. Trump remained close with the Saudis, Mr. Biden promised to take a different tack if elected to the White House. He said that he would make the Saudis ‘pay the price, and make them in fact the pariah that they are,’ while saying that there was ‘very little social redeeming value in the present government in Saudi Arabia.’
(The New York Times, June 2, 2022)
Oops.
To make matters worse, the Saudis have spent the past few years signaling to America’s geopolitical foes, most notably Russia and China, that there is increasingly no love lost between the United States and Saudi Arabia.
In fact, their oil has them sitting in a catbird seat so big, the Saudis could greet the most powerful man in the world by saying: I’ll see your beef about the assassination of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, and raise you our beef about the removal of American missile batteries from our kingdom. After all, you know we are being bombarded by missiles from the Houthi terrorists in Yemen who you have now designated freedom fighters – a designation we, as your most important Arab ally, consider a betrayal.
And, trust me, there’s no end to their list of grievances against the United States. But, most notably, they include Biden’s efforts to revive the Iran nuclear deal and limit the use of fossil fuels, which are the source not only of Saudi Arabia’s wealth but of the need that is bringing Biden hat in hand to their kingdom.
Frankly, if this trip were not replete with so much irony, the hypocrisy would probably compel the Saudis to do to Biden what they allegedly did to Khashoggi…
But the Saudis are smart enough to avoid becoming a bit player in the Axis alliance Russia and China are forming to counter the US-led NATO alliance. This, especially now that Russia’s genocidal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 seems every bit as ill-fated as Germany’s invasion of Poland in September 1939.
This is why, even though the Saudis will want to make Biden grovel, they will want to make nice with him … and eventually produce more of the oil that fuels America’s ongoing dependence…
That’s right. Despite jingoistic boasts, America has never been energy independent. But it’s one thing to import oil to refine because it makes business sense to do so. It’s quite another to beg foreign producers to produce more oil because Americans are finding high gas prices “too much to stomach,” and will make politicians like Biden pay.
Which is why Biden should use this Independence Day to declare a bold new initiative to make America truly energy independent. It should include three points:
- Invoking the Defense Production Act (DPA) to order Ford and other electric car manufactures to ramp up production to deal with this latest energy crisis. Recall that, in recent years, Trump and Biden invoked this decades-old executive power to order GM to produce ventilators and 3M to produce N95 masks to deal with the Covid crisis. And, more on point, that Bush invoked it to supply natural gas to California during the 2000-2001 energy crisis.
- Invoking the DPA to order every gas station owner in the country to convert at least half of their gas pump islands to electric charging ones by Independence Day 2023.
- Announcing a targeted stimulus package to subsidize EV purchases, so that it becomes as American and commonplace to own an EV as it is to love baseball and apple pie. (E.g., The government could issue vouchers for EV purchases that are means tested so that each household pays no more than 6 months of rent or mortgage payments.)
Better than the proverbial killing two birds with one stone, executing this Independence Day initiative will
- end America’s recurring high anxieties about high gas prices,
- end the nightmare of families suffering storm-related power outages (because the F-150 is a mobile generator), and
- render useless the license the rogue Supreme Court just gave oil companies to burn fossil fuels to their heart’s content.
But, if nothing else, this Independence Day and Biden’s looming trip should reinforce the need to reduce America’s reliance not just on oil Saudi Arabia produces but also on everything China manufactures.
So here’s to buying in America – to reduce dependence of imported goods and services; manufacturing in America – to eliminate supply chain and security issues, especially in the tech sector; and building in America – to create an energy and transportation infrastructure that is truly worthy of the richest country in the world.
Related commentaries:
Iran nuclear deal… Saudi Crown Prince… Bush-Saudi king…
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