“Pentagon No. 3 frustrates senators in closed-door briefing on Iran war, Trump defense strategy”, 17 September 2026 (Photo via The Hill — the original report)
As it ran on the front
Diesel closed Friday at $6.48 a gallon, the national average, against $3.68 a year ago, and the United Nations ambassador went on Fox News Live the same day to say where it came from: "What we're seeing in the war in Ukraine is that it is spreading to the global economy, and it's all the more reason that the president wants the war to stop." I keep the ledger, so let me run his entry against the dates.
The Ukraine column is real. The International Energy Agency counts a Russian refinery hit by a drone about once every three days through the first eight months of this year; by September half of Russia's six largest diesel refineries had cut or stopped, and Moscow banned diesel exports on July 8 and extended the ban through September. Those barrels are missing from the world market. Entered.…
…(cont) Now the other column. The strikes on Iran began February 28, and the Strait of Hormuz closed with them. Diesel set its all-time record on September 4 at $5.85, passed six dollars on September 11, and by that week was up 60 percent since the war began. Moody's puts what American households have spent on energy above what they otherwise would have since the Iran war started at $121 billion, $930 a household. The New York Times' headline on September 14 was two wars, not one, and the president himself that day blamed Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries for diesel, a week after his energy secretary played the pump down. So the ambassador's account is half a ledger: the one war of the two that his president did not start is in it, and the one he did is the one dated before every record.
Two entries, then, and both in the price. Russia's ban came in July, four months after the strait shut, and the record came in September with both columns full. A ledger that shows only the entry that happened to someone else is not a ledger, hon. It is a press release with a total. The same Friday, Tesla cut the ribbon in Sparks, Nevada, on the first plant for a truck that skips diesel altogether, which is one way to reconcile the account. The other is to put both wars on the same page and let the sum speak.
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“The ambassador dated the diesel record to Russia's war; the record's own dates run through the Iran war his president started, and both wars are in the price.”
“The administration's position is that diesel is a Ukraine matter, that the ambassador's chart begins in July, and that the strait, which closed in February, is a separate line item that we are not, at this time, prepared to”
Democratic and Republican lawmakers alike emerged Thursday from a closed-door briefing frustrated by what they said was a lack of clear answers from Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby on the Trump administration’s National Defense Strategy and the ongoing Iran war. The briefing with the Senate Armed Services Committee started off…
The fossil fuel industry is raking in big profits thanks to President Donald Trump's illegal war with Iran, and a new analysis finds that it's plugging a sizable chunk of these gains into propaganda. A report published by Clean Creatives on Wednesday reveals that fossil fuel firms across the world have "engaged 802 advertising and PR…
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U.N.-commissioned rights experts say there are "reasonable grounds" to believe the U.S. committed war crimes with strikes that killed scores of Iranian civilians.
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U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz joined a series of Trump administration officials who have blamed the Russia-Ukraine War for high diesel prices, pivoting the energy markets conversation away from the war in Iran and the Strait of Hormuz. “What we’re seeing in the war in Ukraine is that it is spreading to […]
President Donald Trump on Thursday said he is weighing whether or not to "annihilate" Iran in a renewed effort to end the illegal 201-day US-Israeli war of choice, musings that came on the heels of a report by United Nations experts who said the United States likely committed war crimes during earlier attacks on the Middle East nation.…
US House Speaker Mike Johnson said Wednesday that with seven weeks to go until Election Day, it was time for lawmakers to "go home to their districts and make the case to the American people"—a day earlier than scheduled. But with the US public overwhelmingly disapproving of President Donald Trump's war in Iran and demanding…
Matt Bell said he initially supported Trump's policies but now feels he and other farmers were "sold a bill of goods" that there was a plan to "put America's farmers and ranchers first."
Matt Bell has been farming in North Carolina for more than half his life. He voted for President Trump but said farmers are "fighting for survival" as they combat rising prices.
The Pentagon has failed its audit eight years running - the only major federal agency never to pass one Military Times, 19 December 2025
All of the Democrats in the Senate — excluding Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman — signed an open letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, pressing him to give Congress a cost breakdown of the war in Iran. The letter, although largely symbolic, reflects the frustration of many Democrats in Congress over what they perceive as a...
The Pentagon has failed its audit eight years running - the only major federal agency never to pass one Military Times, 19 December 2025
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who voted to confirm Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, is renewing his call for President Trump to fire the Pentagon chief after Army Secretary Dan Driscoll resigned. “He needs to go, whether it’s impeachment or the most expedient route — just the president to replace him — would be great,”
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) announced Thursday that four Republicans, including him, have signed the Epstein Files II discharge petition and expressed confidence it will pass the House. The news comes after House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) sent lawmakers home for a seven-week recess ahead of the midterm elections.
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.
