Inflationmonger Joe trying another dip into the SPR, but it probably won't work

Yes, President Joe Biden announced Tuesday that he would release more crude from the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve to counter OPEC+ announcing cuts in production last week, and yes, oil markets and gas markets responded.

One big problem, though: diesel refineries are running out of stock. As this Bloomberg analysis piece notes, the diesel oil + fuel oil combined stock is at its lowest this time of year since a guy named Harry Truman was president. Oh, and we had half the population at the time, and much less semi traffic, and other things.

As Javier Blas noted, diesel has increased at the trucker's diesel pumps by 50 cents or more in the past two weeks. There's other things you need to read there, and that Team Blue would probably like to imagine away.

Let's start with this pull quote, then a few small specifics:

The American diesel market has been in crisis mode for most of 2022, and the warning lights have been flashing for months.

Oops.

One of those is that a fair amount of diesel stock had come from Russian crude. Oops.

Second is that Biden can either do nothing, thus boosting inflation, or he can take steps to help the US, which will boost energy insecurity elsewhere, and among Latin American neighbors that are NOT part of the NATO fight against Russia. Given that he's already gone Trump one worse earlier this month by expanding use of Title 42 to deport Venezuelan Ill Eagles, and kind of pissing off Mexico, which is a definite importer of US diesel right now, that won't be good.

Third is that the EU still relies on Russian diesel imports, but plans to cut that off in February. We'll see how well that goes. Remember the last time somebody in Europe got into war with Russia with crude oil being a key factor, oh, about 80 years ago? At the same time, did we cut off Russian oil during Afghanistan invasion years.

Fourth is that, under US law, he has to keep it above 250 million barrels. Wiki links to other information that says 90 days of imports, which would be far less, but here's the actual US law, and it says 250 million barrels. DOE website confirms. Oilmonger Joe says that his plan is to refill it when oil is at or below a $67-$72/bbl range. Problem with that? Except for the COVID plunge, which actually started pre-COVID, oil prices haven't much been below that range for half a dozen years. And, that was with loss-inducing fracking in the Permian Basin keeping them that low. Beyond THAT? Oilmonger Joe said back in May that he had a plan to replenish the SPR.

That was surely as much of a lie as the one he told Peter Doocy Wednesday that, on the latest SPR release, "It's not politically motivated at all."

Meanwhile, despite Biden's attempt to low-key this, voters have loudly said "It's the economy, stupid" to Inflationmonger Joe and Passive Pelosi.