#111 Show Me The Incentives, I'll Show You The Outcome

Good Morning Everyone,

The US continues its decent into the depths of clown world™️, dragging most other developed nations with it. At a time when any sane human would think the rhetoric would have reached peak absurdity, things seemingly continue to become more insane.

Old mate sleepy Joe has been asking gas companies to reduce their prices as the pain from decades of irresponsible monetary policy and naive interventionism hits a critical point seeing record high fuel prices across the country leading to an increase in political pressure on the administration.

A week or so ago we saw this stunning clip from the energy secretary basically begging for more supply, while in the same sentence saying we’re committed to shutting down your industry over the next 5-10 years. You really could not make this up. Take a listen below.

This is the same energy secretary that basically made light of the situation a month earlier highlighting that if everyone just purchased new electric vehicles the rising prices wouldn’t be an issue.

It’s painfully obvious these people are completely incompetent and have absolutely no place having any control over, frankly anything really, and certainly not something as vital to sustaining life, as energy, The recent dialogue from the president directed at the oil and gas industry got the attention of Chevron CEO Mike Worth. He wrote an open letter addressed to Sleepy Joe highlighting the need to depoliticise the problem, and seek thoughtful discussion.

“As industry leaders, academic experts and numerous policy makers have pointed out, there are no easy fixes nor any short-term answers to the global supply and demand imbalances aggravated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Addressing this situation requires thoughtful action and a willingness to work together, not political rhetoric.”

“Chevron and its 37,000 employees work every day to help provide the world with the energy it demands and to lift up the lives of billions of people who rely on these supplies. Notwithstanding these efforts, your Administration has largely sought to criticize, and at times vilify, our industry. These actions are not beneficial to meeting the challenges we face and are not what the American people deserve.”

In response to this catastrophe sleepy gnome has decided to reduce their tax on fuel for 90 days. Which is odd given that Obama called this out as being nothing more than a gimmick back in 2008.

While there is no question reducing the level of theft by government via taxation is a good thing in essence, responding to this issue by focussing on the demand is completely misguided and fails to meaningfully address the problem. The problem is not demand. The problem is supply as Dan Pickering aptly points out:

Reducing the level of tax on gas will increase demand, and an increase of demand without meeting that with a supply increase will equal - you guessed it - price increases. This action is purely a political stunt by an army of knuckle heads who are completely out of their depth.

To bring more supply online costs billions of dollars and takes years. No company will invest the resources needed when a government are directly and intentionally incentivising the opposite and essentially working as a competitor against them, while also being the referee.

The need to defund these idiots has never been more urgent, unless everyone is happy being cold and hungry. Transitioning away from broken political money and to a bitcoin standard has never been more mission critical. Vote with your time and energy. Bitcoin is that vote.

Hope you all have a great day. I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.

AK

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