Remember when the Trump administration managed to negotiate peace deals between Israel and many of her Arab neighbors? During the Trump administration, we were on the road to peace. Now, not so much.

On Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal posted an article about President Biden’s recent outreach to leaders of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in an attempt to build support for Ukraine and tamp down oil prices.

The article reports:

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and the U.A.E.’s Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al Nahyan both declined U.S. requests to speak to Mr. Biden in recent weeks, the officials said, as Saudi and Emirati officials have become more vocal in recent weeks in their criticism of American policy in the Gulf.

…The Saudis have signaled that their relationship with Washington has deteriorated under the Biden administration, and they want more support for their intervention in Yemen’s civil war, help with their own civilian nuclear program as Iran’s moves ahead, and legal immunity for Prince Mohammed in the U.S., Saudi officials said. The crown prince faces multiple lawsuits in the U.S., including over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.

It should be noted that in addition to being a journalist, Jamal Khashoggi was quite probably an active member of the Muslim Brotherhood (article here). I don’t support the brutal murder of Khashoggi, but I do think that facts have been omitted and slanted by the media in reporting the event.

The article in The Wall Street Journal concludes:

But the Saudis and Emiratis have declined to pump more oil, saying they are sticking to a production plan approved between their group, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, and a group of other producers led by Russia. The energy alliance with Russia, one of the world’s top oil producers, has enhanced OPEC’s power while also bringing the Saudis and Emiratis closer to Moscow.

Both Prince Mohammed and Sheikh Mohammed took phone calls from Russian President Vladimir Putin last week, after declining to speak with Mr. Biden. They both later spoke with Ukraine’s president, and a Saudi official said the U.S. had requested that Prince Mohammed mediate in the conflict, which he said the kingdom is embarking on.

Despite his claims to the contrary, President Biden has cut American energy production drastically. Until the restrictions that the Biden administration has put on energy companies and their drilling are lifted, the price of gasoline will not go down. The solution to the current high prices at the gas pump is for America to become energy independent again. Nothing short of that will solve the problem.