During this whole Oh noes! Iran will hurt our oil supply! Orange Man Stupid! panic, I just can't get my knickers in a knot like so many people seem determined to do. There is one solid, indisputable fact that the United States has in our favor. This fact is thanks to President Donald Trump's global strategizing, foresight, and dedication to insulating American security from globalism and the risks associated with it.
The fact is this: The United States is the world's #1 producer of oil and gas.
"But, Athena, oil is a global market, duh," a leftoid might argue. Yes and no.
My colleague Rick Moran covered the Iranian regime's desperate oil-based strategy for trying to keep the U.S. from completely annihilating it in his article today entitled "Iran Wants to Turn the Tables on U.S. and Force Us to Keep Fighting."
Iran may not be able to inflict the kind of damage that the U.S. and Israel are delivering on an hourly basis, but the board has been flipped as the Western world panics over attacks by the regime on ships in the Strait of Hormuz.
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Indeed, their ace in the hole is soaring oil prices, and Iran plans to turn the screws on the oil markets until the U.S. and Western Europe howl.
"While the damage they can inflict is minimal, they can count on the Western media to trumpet any successful strikes as 'proof' that the war is a failure," Rick notes.
But then, where would terrorists be without fear? Inspiring terror to control people is kind of their whole schtick. And like clockwork, the lamestream media is right there to hype it up and amplify that power for them.
Conversely, when cooler heads prevail and people refuse to panic, terrorism loses its influence over our behavior and our politics. In the case of access to oil, Americans may be at ease.
Kimberly Strassel blows up the oil-panic dynamic in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal:
The Democratic-media complex seems determined to get everything wrong about Iran, though few efforts compare with this week’s work to tag the Trump administration with a global energy crisis. Not only is this uninformed and overdone, the sudden concern over energy security comes about three years late.
The undermine-America crowd describes Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz as an "oil shock" that is "spiraling," "chaotic" and the "worst in history." It seems to have evaded this crew that Iran’s bombardment of peaceful trading vessels is yet more justification of U.S. strikes. Iran’s been using energy threats to manipulate geopolitics for decades and won’t stop until it is fully defanged.
They are blaming the administration, in particular Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, whom Politico described as the "vaunted" team "in danger of fumbling the biggest energy crisis" of Donald Trump’s second term. The go-to quote comes from Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy, who ranted that "on the Strait of Hormuz, they had NO PLAN. . . . Which is unforgiveable, because this part of the disaster was 100% foreseeable."
That's an incredibly stupid assertion to make, even for someone who habitually says stupid things as much as Murphy. In fact, Trump's foresight and competence have placed us beyond Iran's ability to hurt us in this way:
Let’s talk about plans. That the U.S. was finally in a position to disarm Iran is largely thanks to a plan Mr. Trump initiated in his first term—to gain energy independence, which his team is now turning into energy dominance. Trump policies turbocharged a shale revolution that made the U.S. a net exporter of petroleum products and the world’s largest exporter of natural gas. Alongside was Mr. Trump’s plan to foster economic and security ties in the region against shared threats like Iran via deals like the Abraham Accords.
We are no longer hostage to Middle East fossil-fuel threats, which gives us room to weather temporary Hormuz disruptions.
Trump's motive for moving crucial operations back into the United States when possible, or at least into the Western Hemisphere (which he is aggressively sanitizing of crime, corruption, and communism in his second term), is the security of his beloved homeland. His resolve was further cemented by the supply chain failures of the COVID-19 overreaction and idiocy. And being a businessman, not a career politician, he is simply getting it done.
The haters also pivot to anti-war hysteria in general, screaming that Trump started a war for no good reason. But as the saying goes, confronting Iran about its policies of evil and anti-Americanism didn't create a problem; it exposed one. "Iran has been attacking the Saudi oil industry with drones, rockets, and ballistic missiles for years," Middle East analyst J.T. Alexander (likely a pseudonym) posted on X Thursday. And yet, "They've barely made a dent." He continues:
Iran has been committing piracy against oil vessels in the Gulf, Strait, and Red Sea for years. There were similar surges in 2020, 2023, and 2024.
The recent slow in OPEC production is because storage capacity is filling up. It's filling up because the ships won't move. The ships won't move because they are scared.
None of this is actually because of damage Iran can or has caused. The fear of the thing is worse than the thing itself.
From the Greek side of the family, I have a wee bit of familiarity with shipping oil around the globe. I know that, for my entire life, Iran has been a right pain in the a**. Way back in the Jimmy Carter era, they were closing down the Gulf and destabilizing our energy supply. Remember those famous 1970s gas lines? And, hey, notice how we've never had them since?
Trump is nothing if he's not committed to America First. Alongside that, he has proved his alacrity at thinking outside the box and simply leapfrogging the old order and doing things differently, in ways that will ultimately benefit and protect the United States. His extraordinary vision and historic effectiveness as a leader are not only Making America Great Again, but they are also shoring up America's national security to keep her safe for the next generation. God bless the man and his team. We may never see their like again in our lifetimes.
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