btw, countries have nuclear submarines, so a full first strike without retaliation isn't possible.

POLITICS

More Questions About Russiagate

PETER VAN BUREN FEBRUARY 28, 2022

San Francisco becomes first city to see $5 per gallon at the pump

Oil prices hit $115 a barrel on Friday, raising gas prices across the country yet again as the Russia-Ukraine conflict continues to affect Americans filling up at the pump.

The latest increase saw San Francisco, California, become the first U.S. state to record gas prices higher than $5 a gallon, according to Fox Business. While San Francisco is seeing more than $5 a gallon, the state average for a gallon of regular gasoline in California is $4.94, a marked increase over the national average of $3.728.

“It’s been quite ugly as gas prices rise nationally, but nowhere has the pain been more significant than California, where prices have breached the $5 gallon mark,” Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis for GasBuddy, told the outlet late last week.

De Haan went on to warn that San Francisco’s gas prices would hit $5.35 per gallon by the end of the month.

Fox Business also reported that “the United States and other major governments agreed to release 60 million barrels of crude from stockpiles to stabilize supplies, but it failed to calm anxiety over Russia’s attack on Ukraine as oil prices still rose.”

De Haan, however, was not convinced the release of barrels would do much to help stabilize gas prices, saying the loss of 10 million barrels a day of oil production “can’t be offset by meager releases of oil.”

“It would likely need to be more like 100-200 million barrels to have much effect,” he told Fox Business.

The Biden administration has struggled with inflation and rising gas prices, choosing not to use Republican solutions to fix the problems and instead doubling down on Democratic platitudes. The Daily Wire reported last week that corporate media pundits, Democratic politicians, and even Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg have suggested or been open to buying oil from Iran, a country that sponsors terrorists and refers to America as “the great Satan.” From The Daily Wire:

“Could the president possibly consider authorizing the Keystone XL pipeline, working something out with Iran?” MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle asked Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Wednesday night’s episode of “The 11^thHour.”

“Look, the president has said that all options are on the table,” replied Buttigieg, a former mayor of South Bend, Indiana. “But we also need to make sure we’re not galloping after permanent solutions to immediate short-term problems,” he said, possibly out of concern that reviving the U.S. energy sector may retard the Biden administration’s attempt to force Americans into relying on renewable energy sources.

Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) responded to Buttigieg’s response by calling it “a word salad of bureaucratic BS,” adding that the “left wing in Washington is doubling down on energy illiteracy instead of learning more about real energy security solutions.”

The idea of buying oil from Iran – rather than producing more oil at home like America did under the Trump administration – was also suggested by MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, who said “this is one possible solution” for those who wanted to cut off Russia’s oil revenues and are “worried about inflation and spiking oil prices,” in response to a tweet from The American Prospect’s Ryan Cooper, who tweeted: “Iran has 103 million barrels of oil loaded up on tankers and ready to go.”

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ENERGY / NATE JACKSON

‘Putin’s Price Hike’ Brought to You by Joe Biden

The president bans Russian oil after blaming higher prices on Vladimir Putin’s Ukraine invasion.

ENERGY / NATE JACKSON

Gas Pains Caused by Biden’s Bloating

Every Democrat wants high gas prices. They just don’t want you to know they want high prices.

Worthless memes because you can’t give cogent ideas in written form using information and actual context and explanation.

Just a few years ago, a congressional investigation into Russian interference in U.S. politics revealed evidence that Russia has had a role going back more than a decade now to get the United States and other western countries to shift away from fossil fuels — a goal much like the one Biden's Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm stated last week.

A 2017 letter sent to Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin by former Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) and Rep. Randy Weber R-TX) as part of an investigation undertaken by the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology shines a light on how the Kremlin plotted to fund radical environmental groups inside the United States to shift public opinion and policy away from fossil fuels and energy independence:

The Committee on Science, Space, and Technology is conducting oversight of what appears to be a concerted effort by foreign entities to funnel millions of dollars through various non-profit entities to influence the U.S. energy market. According to the former Secretary General of NATO, "Russia, as part of their sophisticated information and disinformation operations, engaged actively with so-called nongovernmental organizations – environmental organizations working against shale gas – to maintain dependence on imported Russian gas." Other officials have indicated the same scheme is unfolding in the U.S. These statements and related reports provide evidence that Russia is also behind the radical statements and vitriol directed at the U.S. fossil fuel sector.

Among these propaganda efforts outlined by the Committee was "a covert anti-fracking campaign to suppress the widespread adoption of fracking in Europe and the U.S.–all in an effort to safeguard the influence of the Russian oil and gas sector" that was funded by "Russia and its government corporations."

Even former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lamented in a private speech the "phony environmental groups... funded by the Russians to stand against any effort — 'Oh that pipeline, that fracking, that whatever, will be a problem for you' — and a lot of the money supporting that message was coming from Russia" during her time as President Obama's Secretary of State.

The U.S. intelligence community has also been aware of the anti-fossil fuel propaganda coming from Russia, including an admission in a report about Russia's actions surrounding the 2020 election that found "clear evidence that the Kremlin is financing and choreographing anti-fracking propaganda in the United States."

The Majority Staff Report released by the Science, Space, and Technology Committee in 2018 revealed even more of Russia's nefarious efforts that are often echoed or similar to those used by Democrats pursuing Green New Deal-style policies. These included "an estimated 9,097 Russian posts or tweets regarding U.S. energy policy or a current energy event on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram." Ironically, while Democrats were ranting about Russian social media posts being used to "steal" the 2016 election, it was apparently Democrats who were getting helped along by Russian propaganda campaigns that "exploited American social media as part of its concerted effort to disrupt U.S. energy markets and influence domestic energy policy."

A selection of Russian social media posts included in the Committee's report are more or less indistinguishable from leftist politicians and radical environmental activists. On Facebook, the Kremlin propaganda was posted to pages titled "Born Liberal," "Blacktivist," and "Native Americans United." On Twitter, Russians tweeted links to MoveOn.org petitions and posts on The Root that include anti-fossil fuel posts from Democrat lawmakers. One Russian post included in the report was a simple retweet of Senator Bernie Sanders' (I-VT) condemnation of American pipeline projects.

As the information contained in the 2017 Republican letter to Secretary Mnuchin and 2018 Majority Staff Report show, Democrats, radical climate activists, and proponents of Green New Deal policies had natural allies in the Kremlin's propaganda office. And despite more ink and man-hours spent breathlessly covering alleged Russian collusion with the Trump campaign in 2016 than can be counted, there was little to no interest in the reports that Russia was meddling in American energy policy to force the United States into a weak and vulnerable position. In fact, those like Reps. Weber and Smith who sounded the alarm about Russia's propaganda war against fossil fuels in the U.S. were conveniently castigated as conspiracy theorists. After all, the Russians were on the Democrats' side then, and still are today when it comes to wanting America to move away from fossil fuels.

What's more, for Biden and his party to admit now that Russia was pushing for the United States to reduce its own oil and gas production and funding left-leaning climate organizations would be to admit that Biden, The Squad, and proponents of the Green New Deal have spent years acting in a way that's all but indistinguishable from a Russian propagandist. It would also mean admitting that — after killing the Keystone XL Pipeline, canceling land leases, and demonizing the fossil fuel industry while seeing the national gas average pass $4.17/gallon — they got played by Putin.