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hatrack

(64,755 posts)
Thu Mar 12, 2026, 08:45 AM Thursday

Huh. Trump's "Energy Dominance/Tiger Team" Doesn't Know Shit About What To Do Next Re. Energy Prices

President Donald Trump once pledged his incoming “energy dominance” team would bring about a golden age of American prosperity and global peace. Now, 15 months later, the Trump administration’s self-described “Tiger Team” led by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Energy Secretary Chris Wright appears flummoxed by the surge in global oil prices in the wake of the U.S. attack on Iran and is scrambling to head off a bout of energy-driven inflation.

Burgum has hewed to the White House line that the energy pain would be temporary, even as White House aides say he’s caused eye-rolling among staff amid his media appearances and trips to events like Rupert Murdoch’s birthday party. Wright’s efforts to reassure markets that oil supplies remain ample have fallen flat, and the Energy Department quickly deleted a market-churning social media post that erroneously claimed U.S. warships had escorted an oil tanker through the Persian Gulf’s Strait of Hormuz.

Energy experts say the administration underestimated the oil impacts from launching the war, which, despite near-record U.S. crude production, has sent gasoline prices at the pump up 60 cents a gallon in less than two weeks. The early messaging that global energy markets would cool in time as Iran’s threat to Strait of Hormuz shipping waned has been replaced Wednesday by its agreement that dozens of countries should release up to 400 million barrels of oil from their strategic stockpiles.

Wright announced Wednesday that the Energy Department would release 172 million barrels of oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve over 120 days as part of the IEA’s move. The U.S. oil markets largely shrugged off the news and extended their gains from earlier in the day in Wednesday evening trading. “We’ll do that and then we’ll fill it up,” Trump told Cincinnati news station Local 12 about the planned crude oil releases. “But right now, we’ll reduce it a little bit and that brings the prices down.” Adding to the sense of confusion was the Tuesday post to Wright’s X.com account that the U.S. Navy had successfully escorted an oil tanker through the narrow Strait of Hormuz. The post, which the Energy Department attributed to a mistake by a staffer, was quickly deleted, but not before it sent oil markets whipsawing.

Ed. - Emphases added.

EDIT

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/03/11/trump-energy-iran-cabinet-crisis-00823045

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Huh. Trump's "Energy Dominance/Tiger Team" Doesn't Know Shit About What To Do Next Re. Energy Prices (Original Post) hatrack Thursday OP
There is, of course, an upside, albeit painful, to high energy prices. NNadir Thursday #1

NNadir

(37,880 posts)
1. There is, of course, an upside, albeit painful, to high energy prices.
Thu Mar 12, 2026, 09:25 AM
Thursday

It is that they create an impetus for both conservation and the funding of alternatives, the only "alternative" that I personally support being nuclear energy.

The German case demonstrates both in economic and environmental terms that it is possible to be exceedingly stupid in choosing "alternatives," however.

Rising electricity prices are driving interest and investment in nuclear energy and, increasingly a long overdue bout of public acceptance despite much antinuclear propaganda that has served fossil fuel interests for half a century.

Regrettably, however, in our less than ethical world, the most pain falls on those who can least afford it.

The orange pedophile is a vile idiot to be sure, but there is for the long term some silver lining on his impetuous violence. We all share in grief for those killed and wounded by his violence, but again, the risk of fossil fuel dependence is obviate by this outcome.

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