Opinion by Samuel Strait – March 19, 2022 I have elected to give my brain a momentary rest from the absolute insanity revealed at nearly every encounter with the Del Norte Unified School District's Citizen's Oversight Committee, but stay tuned that circus will be making an appearance shortly. I happened to catch the rather inane comments offered by the City's City Manager, Eric Wier on of all things why he thought gasoline and diesel prices have shot up over the last nine months to the rarefied air that they currently occupy. Wier has taken a relatively simple task of explaining price rise and twisted it into an almost unrecognizable state. And this is the man who offers advice and guidance to the City Council? Crescent City Manager, Eric Wier Granted he is on the money when he points to environmental concerns that every spring causes fuel suppliers to jump through hoops in order to satisfy California's summer blending requirements and substantially increases fuel costs. The problem there is unless suppliers were proactive in pricing for the blend change nine months ago, Wier's argument is a bit out of touch. He goes on to say that the "pandemic" caused a decrease in domestic production and lays the blame on oil companies inability to "catch up" with prepandemic levels. Sorry Manager Wier, the price of fuel did not climb until a year and a half into the pandemic, strike two. Wier then stumbles on to the go to cause, the Russian invasion of the Ukraine and the subsequent and dilatory response by the Biden Administration to suspend purchases of Russian Crude. Nice try, Manager Wier, but the price at the pump had already climbed well before Dictator Putin's merry band invaded the Ukraine, strike three. After that series of collisions with reality, Wier moved on to safer ground. Looks like the governor, on vacation from his latest book tour, or maybe just back from vacation period, according to Wier, has noticed that things under his watch haven't noticeably improved since he took office. In typical Hair Gel fashion manipulation of money is his go to response. His current "solution is to "pause" the gasoline excise tax and offer tax rebates, like that will please his environazi base. Just saying, the political animal he is….At least someone is awake in Sacramento with Wier's reference to AB 1638 winding a tortuous path through the State's Assembly to suspend that excise tax. Lest we hold our breaths. And finally the man in DC has put down his ice cream cone long enough to release 50 million barrels of crude from the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve. That ought to be good for at least a couple of days of fuel consumption here in the United States. Wier finalizes his ignorance of the rising cost of fuel by suggesting that all his word salad has even the remotest connection to reality by saying the City could put pen in hand and write the governor and legislators in support of California's flailing in Sacramento. Not one word, of course not, of any mention that it could possibly be the policies of the Biden White House as the cause of the increasing price of fuel. Scratch my head and repeat, "is this the man in charge of advising local City leadership?" I have to say that even children with the most tenuous grasp of current affairs might have noticed that Biden came into office in January of 2021, made significant changes in US policy surrounding oil production, embarked on "Green New Deal Insanity", and has largely been stuck behind an ice cream cone while walking on the beach in Delaware since he first stumbled up the steps to the White House. In the brief time following his appearance as President, it has not taken that particularly observant child to connect the dots, and determine it just might be the Biden policies may have led to the rise in fuel prices, all other causes as implausible…… Needless to say the talking points are out there and locally the City's Council has lapped them up. No hesitancy about the awkward timing that is obvious for all to see, that the talking points are so much garbage, just the blind continuing to lead the blind, at least on the Crescent City Council…..