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To the things I learned because of this administration’s clumsy, corrupt, and stupid nature, now, I can add to the list the fact that diesel fuel in America is sold in two varieties: clear and red.
Clear diesel is used for transportation; it is what those massive trucks on the highways and interstates fill up with before they go off to terrorize henpecked men on lonely stretches of the desert. Red diesel is functionally identical to the clear stuff sold to truckers and the like but dyed so that its unique color so it can be easily identified for tax purposes. You see, the red stuff is sold for use that doesn’t involve the US interstate or road network: farm equipment and home heating for the northern reaches of the nation. As it is never supposed to touch the highways, it is exempted from the federal highway fuel tax, making its per-gallon cost somewhat cheaper, a benefit that accumulates when one needs to buy so much of the red diesel to make your farm work or to keep from freezing to death in the middle of a New England winter. The highways taxed and non-highway taxed versions of the fuel is logical and serves both consumer communities, until now.
Trump, either manipulated by allies or as a product of his own narcissistic ego, launched a war in the Middle East disrupting the global petroleum markets, driving up the costs of everything downstream of the oil wells, including diesel fuel. The escalating fuel costs combined with the economic terrorism of his tariffs accelerated inflation, the beast that had slain the Biden administration just as inflation had begun to falter. The vast farm states in the middle of the country suffered from both policies as retaliatory tariffs destroyed their markets and skyrocketing fuel costs consumed their budgets from the other side of the equation. Of course, no fence kept the inflation to merely the Trump-supporting farm belts and prices rose throughout the country and an electorate content to ignore the administration’s criminality are unwilling to ignore the injuries it inflicts upon them.
So, the president who helps maintain a far-left socialist government in South America, that considers the Red China leadership his friend, and acquires ownership stakes in private US corporations, turns to his friends in the Kremlin to try, vainly, futilely, to save his government in the face of public wrath. Trump announced a “deal” to purchase fuel from Russia, a small and insignificant amount that he attempted to disguise by reporting it in tons instead of the industry standard of barrels and which is even questionable, given the war there, if it will ever be delivered. In addition to a phony deal that supplies hard cash to a nation that is assisting the killing of American troops, Trump has also announced an intention to allow red diesel to be sold and used for transportation purposes, hoping, irrationally, but everything he does is irrational, that this will somehow and magically tame inflation in time to save him from a hostile House and Senate.
However, the cold equations of supply and demand doom this move to failure with the predictable result that those farmers, who so enthusiastically threw their support to Trump, will suffer even more. Without expanding the supply of the fuel, allowing the trucking industry to use it on the nation’s highways only increases the demand for the red-dyed diesel which, as any highschool-level economics class with tell you, correspondingly drives up the price.
The Midwest is learning the lesson of the Second law of Trump, the first being that Everything Trump Touches Dies, and the Second that is Trump Always Betrays His Partners.
From installing industry-nationalizing socialists, to close friendship with dictators, to acquiring ownership stakes in private business, to his inclination to command the economy, Trump is the most communist, most socialist chief executive this nation has ever seen. It is fitting that his most recent idiotic move is to make red fuel available everywhere.
