In her first interview since becoming the Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris reiterated her position that she will not ban fracking in the United States, a complete reversal of what she said four years ago.
While we wait for November 5th to cast our ballots based on two different takes from the same person, there is a question of whether or not a fracking ban is bad for the United States. President Biden and Vice President Harris are both major environmentalists in favor of the Paris Climate Agreement and in favor of massive reductions of domestic oil. They eliminated the Keystone XL Pipeline project, an alternative route for Canadian oil to be transferred to the United States.
Yet, their ideas are in favor of wildlife and the elimination of greenhouse gas emissions. Oil spills across the globe have caused the deaths of thousands of oceanic animals. Air pollution causes a significant number of public health issues, including cancer. The United States cannot afford to let environmental harm get out of control, and that's the rationale behind taking down the oil industry. However, for several reasons that we'll go over, this is not a good idea.
Reason #1: The Environment is Fine
The UN is constantly pushing the narrative that severe climate change will, among many other serious impacts, destroy ecosystems, hurt food production, and limit the water supply. That theory works under the assumption that the earth is increasing greenhouse gas emissions at a substantial rate each year. There are a few reasons why the environment is fine.
The idea that fire and smoke is something brand new to the world is just absurd. Famously, 1,960 years ago, a great fire destroyed the city of Rome. Emperor Nero sat there and played his harp as he watched the city burn. The Great Fire of 1910 destroyed 3 million acres and took out whole towns in its path.
And yet, we still have Antarctica, ecosystems are still pretty much the same, Phoenix expects the hottest weather in the United States as expected, food production is rising, and major illnesses have reduced as compared to the 1800s. If the idea is to claim that our level of greenhouse gases are supernatural today, the political figures of the world are using science to discredit history. I trust the eyes of true stories more that I trust guesses based on predictions that don't really tell us anything.
Maybe the world is warming up. Maybe the temperature changes are effecting the weather, because that's a good science principle. Maybe production is harder in some areas where it wasn't before. Or maybe the ideas of global warming are a product of our imagination. To be honest, it still gets colder at the same period it did 15 years ago.
Reason #2: The Price of Gasoline
Over the course of the Biden Administration, the price of gas has skyrocketed. When President Biden took office in January of 2021, gas was $2.42 per gallon nationwide. By June of 2022, gas prices jumped to $5.03 per gallon. While gas prices are not that high anymore, the current price of $3.51 per gallon is a dollar more than the previous administration had prices at.
The reason that gas prices are going up can be directly attributed to oil prices also going up. The price of oil accounts for half of the price of gasoline, so oil production is vital in this case. Oil prices are spiking because of the reducing international supply of oil due to production cuts from OPEC+. As a result, Americans pay more at the pump, but they can't necessarily consume less gasoline than before because gasoline is an essential consumable product.
This is why domestic production of oil is so important. If the international community decides to make cuts on oil production, that directly impacts the United States economy in a negative way. Gas prices go up when American salaries stay fixed. It increases the cost of living and the burden of American employers to provide a substantial income to families across the country.
Reason #3: The Valuation of the Oil and Fracking Industry
Despite our reliance on foreign production, the United States is the world's top oil producer at approximately 13 million barrels of oil produced each day. We, along with Russia and Saudi Arabia, are responsible for 40% of the global oil production. The world depends on all three countries to produce oil in order to keep the world moving.
Additionally, the United States oil industry gained over $332 million in revenue during 2022 and provided Americans with over 10 million jobs valued at over $100,000. The majority of our oil comes from the state of Texas, which produced over 2 billion barrels of oil in 2023.
The people of America and the people of the world depend on the United States of America to keep producing oil and to do it at a rate that keeps everyone afloat and keeps everyone moving. Kamala Harris wants to eliminate that production that the world depends on. That will be disastrous for America.
Reason #4: The Danger of Absolute Dependence for Necessities
A fracking ban would force absolute dependence on foreign oil, which would already be an issue for the economy because of United States production of oil being removed from the equation. It would drive up gas prices to a far more serious rate.
However, the main danger of absolute dependence is the idea of leverage. For example, the United States has routinely placed Iran under economic sanctions. This started due to the Iran Hostage Crisis, where American citizens were held hostage at the Iranian embassy in Tehran for over a year. The sanctions were kept on Iran throughout the 1980s, 1990s, and the 2000s.
During the 2000s, America became aware that Iran had been experimenting with Uranium and had their own nuclear facilities. This led to negotiations and a nuclear deal in 2015 where the United States lifted a substantial number of sanctions in exchange for access to their nuclear facilities. Iran used its nuclear program as leverage to coerce the United States into removing economic sanctions. The threat of nuclear proliferation from a known supporter of terrorism made the U.S. act with protection of innocents in mind.
That being said, the United States allowing that sort of influence to exist in the international community is a national security threat by itself. The ability to control the United States is a power that many people around the world would love to possess, and that's the scary thing. It's a power that we cannot let fall into the wrong hands. Our rights and freedoms come into play if we allow that to happen, so we need to be extra careful who we allow to influence American politics.
A fracking ban would make the American economy completely dependent on foreign oil because we don't have a more efficient energy source yet. While it would be great for the United States to possess such an energy source, electricity still has its limits. Automobiles and the automobile industry rely on domestic and foreign oil to stay afloat.
Dependence on foreign oil would put the entire United States economy at risk if we were to stray from international interests and values that were contrary to our own. Our constitutional freedoms would be hanging in the balance by creating a more vulnerable economy. We can't sacrifice freedom that Americans have paid for with their lives. We must keep the oil industry afloat.
Conclusion
A fracking ban is a means to destruction, which is why suggesting it is really extreme. While Kamala Harris has seemingly backed off that front, we won't officially find out whether or not she'll ban fracking unless she takes office. Oil is one of the many resources our country depends on. Let's not give away the house until we're ready to sell it.
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