Op-Ed: Daniel Turner: Energy independence is as critical to American Independence as ever
We cannot celebrate 249 years of American independence without celebrating and protecting the very vehicle which today fuels our freedom: American energy.
Thomas Jefferson made the deliberate decision to expand on John Locke’s “Life, Liberty, and Property” to “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” deeming that third inalienable right as greater than a physical possession.
This new land, Jefferson believed, would honor a right much more deeply personal, to pursue happiness, and fossil fuels are the tools to do so.
We are stronger, healthier, cleaner, safer, and more prosperous, because of fossil fuels. We are also freer to pursue our happiness. There is no freedom when one suffers the cruel elements of nature.
One is not free if his food is rancid, his health subject to disease and ailments, infection, and unsanitary conditions. One cannot pursue happiness if he cannot protect and store his goods, travel freely and quickly, transport goods, or communicate freely.
Fossil fuels are the essential building blocks so that a free people can pursue happiness.
For four years under President Joe Biden and his radically anti-American energy agenda, all Americans felt decline. Food and consumer goods were at record high prices. Gas and electricity prices hit record highs. Expensive energy made for expensive life, and we were in essence less free. If you cannot afford to buy food, you are less free. If you are struggling to pay for gas, you are less free.
Americans saw this, and reelected Donald Trump decisively. They did not just want cheaper goods. They wanted their freedom back.
Look at the independence America exhibited during what President Trump calls the “Twelve Days War.” Here we have a region of the world, the Middle East, that historically when someone sneezes, gas prices shoot through the roof. By the time the American bombing campaign on Iranian nuclear sites ended, oil prices were down nearly $10.
That is unthinkable under previous, conventional oil market models. In fact, headed into the trading week after the American bombing raid, top Wall Street speculators were warning of $130 barrel oil. The difference? Freedom.
President Trump has the humblest and most deferential energy policy in modern history: he trusts in free people and free markets to get the job done.
“Drill, baby, drill” is a rally cry, but he is not directing the drilling. He is not regulating the rig counts or micromanaging the financing. He is getting government bureaucracy to stay clear of the process because Donald Trump believes in freedom.
Look at the results. We hit record high production and oil is nearly $20 cheaper per barrel than it was under Biden. Gone are the days of Sen. Elizabeth Warren screeching about greedy oil companies. Sen. Bernie Sanders is not yelling about big oil and stock buybacks. After four years of Biden administration apologists explaining away high gas prices, we have a president whose freedom agenda got them lowered.
Either oil CEOs no longer care about profits, or they were not profiteering at all. Which one, Democrats? Were you deceiving us then or are you denying the truth now?
I love the fossil fuel industry and the hundreds of energy workers I have met across the country who labor in oil, gas, coal, pipelines, servicing, fracking, trucking, etc. I love the innovation and the genius behind it, the technology, the sacrifice, the small mom and pop shops who mortgaged their homes to buy a well and the enormous companies who employ thousands. But the only reason I love this industry so much and fight for it as my life’s mission with Power The Future, is because of what this industry does for humanity.
Not even the greenest, most anti-fossil fuel lunatic would forgo the comforts and the products this industry affords them. Joe Biden just forced a first class passenger to give him his seat on a plane.
John Kerry will no doubt be using fossil fuels this 4th of July even as he recalls throwing his war medals into the river. Heck, the only photo I saw of Greta Thunberg on her “death to Israel” boat tour, the sails were down and the diesel engines were running. They can all yammer about the climate, but they all love fossil fuels as much as we do. Fossil fuels give them the freedom to do evil, and I will always call them out.
Fossil fuels give us the freedom to do good. And 249 years later, thanks to this noble, moral, and thoroughly American industry, we are all better off, safer, healthier, more prosperous, and able to pursue our happiness as Jefferson foresaw. God Bless energy workers. God Bless our Founders. God Bless President Trump. And God Bless America.
Daniel Turner is the founder and executive director of Power The Future, a national nonprofit organization that advocates for American energy jobs. Contact him at daniel@powerthefuture.com and follow him on Twitter @DanielTurnerPTF.