If you want to blame one person more than any other for those $2-plus petrol prices, it is not Vladimir Putin and it is certainly not Scott Morrison, but Joe Biden.
And it is not because of the decisions taken, the sanctions imposed, by the US and the rest of the civilised world to hold Russia to account for its invasion of Ukraine; and indeed, more importantly for both the Ukrainians and for world peace, to try to force Putin to back off.
It is because of all the decisions taken by the US President and taken by him very specifically and personally, before Russia invaded a month ago, going all the way back to his very first day in the Oval Office in January last year.
In very broadbrush terms, those decisions by Biden to either slash or to discourage US oil and gas production – and the all-critical Day One move to stop the Keystone pipeline bringing Canadian oil south into the US – combined to directly drive our petrol prices up through 2021 and into 2022 to the $1.80-$1.90 level. Then the Russian invasion could be said to have added the last 20c to 30c or so on top of that.
But, also critically, the invasion – and all the things that have flowed from it – would not have had the impact, but for all the things Biden had done through 2021 that left the oil (and gas) market so vulnerable to a shock.
It is vitally important to understand this, because it means that even if the war in Ukraine ended quickly and/or Putin backed off completely, we would not necessarily see the crude oil price and so petrol prices plunge dramatically and then stay down.
Not unless OPEC did what it has so far refused to do – pump more oil.
All this is emphatically laid out by The New York Post in a simply undeniable timeline of the Biden administration’s disastrous moves, starting with the Keystone ban on Day One.
Back then, in January 2021, the average price of petrol at the pump in the US – they call it gasoline – was $US2.38 ($3.22) a gallon.
That was the equivalent of 82c a litre.
Now, remember that while the US has state sales taxes on petrol, they mostly don’t come anywhere near our 44c-a-litre excise plus the 16c-a-litre (at a $1.80 pump price) or 20c (at a $2.20 pump price) GST.
The Post forensically charted all the anti-oil (and gas) moves made by the Biden administration tracking through 2021; at each step along the way the price of petrol at the US pump marched inexorably higher.
By the end of the year – well before there was even talk of a Russian invasion far less the actual one – the price was up to $US3.34 a gallon ($1.23 a litre).
And in the week of the invasion the US average price hit $US3.53 a gallon ($1.28 a litre).
Now to get a fully equivalent price down under, you need to add the 60c or so per litre excise plus GST, less the much lower US taxes.
Right now (actually, a week ago), according to the Biden administration’s own figures, the average pump price is up to around $US4.32 a gallon ($1.57 a litre).
After setting out to slash US domestic production of oil (and gas) Biden has taken to begging other countries from Saudi Arabia, to Iran and Venezuela to increase their production.
Humiliatingly, the Saudis – supposedly the US’s closest ally in the Middle East with Israel – wouldn’t even take his call.
All this has poured billions into Russia, effectively funding the invasion.
Utterly devastating own goal doesn’t even begin to describe it.
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