Ni5: Perspectives

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Gas Righting

Date: 2026-May-15 Author: Barry Shatzman

I was a PTA president once. If you were one too, then you know the one saying that says it all is, "No good deed goes unpunished."

No matter what i did, there'd be some parent telling me how i really ought to be doing it. I told them in return that i'd gladly step down if they'd rather be the president. Unfortunately, not one of them ever took me up on it.

And this is what i wanna talk to you about.

The price of gas 4 years ago

Remember when COVID-19 was running around but you weren't? Yeah... you weren't driving anywhere because there wasn't anywhere open to drive to.

So what'd gas companies do? Duh... they stopped making the gas that nobody was gonna buy.

Then Joe Biden came to town. Before long, lots of us were getting vaccines and once again using our cars.

Now re-read that sentence above that last one. Yeah... there wasn't a lot of gas to put in all those cars. And i'll bet you the very first thing you learned in your very first economics class was that, as demand goes up and supply goes down, prices increase.

Some of us recognized that and thanked Biden for it...

Yeah! Let's go Brandon!

Some of you didn't see it that way. In fact you blamed Biden. Fair enough. But tell me... if YOU were president, what would YOU have done?

The price of gas today

This brings me to yesterday, when my car's computer told me i had 2 miles of fuel left in the tank.

Not that long ago, this would've cost me about $20 less! I'm sure you've noticed the same phenomenon. Something you might not've noticed because it happened a half-planet away, but also not that long ago, was that President Donald Trump began bombing Iran. Iran responded by shutting down the Strait of Hormuz.

About 1/5 of the planet's oil travels through the Strait of Hormuz. Shut that supply down and .... well... i'm sure you remember that supply and demand thing i mentioned just a few paragraphs up.

And... maybe you knew this and maybe you didn't... oil is used to make gasoline. Are we seeing a connection?

Why the fuck would we do that?

Trump gave a few reasons as to why Iran needed a good bombing.

First he said it was because Iran was murdering protesters and people in detention.

Then he said it was because Iran was close to building a nuclear weapon, even though he himself ended the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement that was preventing it. And in June 2025 the U.S. completely and totally obliterated Iran's capability (just in case you weren't sure).

My last question i swear

Maybe you're cool with exploding gas prices. It's worth it to be exploding Iran too.

But lets say you're not quite a billionaire yet, and all that extra money you're spending each month is really hurting you. And you realize it can never be made up by the tax cuts you really aren't getting and couldn't say how much even if you were.

So tell me... if YOU were president, what would YOU have done?