So inflation numbers are out and prices rose at a 7.5% annual clip according to the Department

of Labor's latest data.

Now Joe Manchin was quickly out with my told you so and he has framed his opposition

to the Build Back Better Act as rooted in a fear of what he calls the inflation tax.

Where I'm at right now the inflation that I was concerned about, it's not transitory,

it's real, it's harming every West Virginia, the cost of gasoline, the cost of groceries.

But a significant chunk of that has nothing at all to do with federal spending,

but is instead a function of rising energy prices.

When oil prices rise we not only pay more at the pump, we pay more for everything

that's produced using energy, which is nearly everything.

So that puts oil prices right in the center of not just our domestic politics,

but our foreign policy too.

Now since we last covered the war in Yemen on this podcast a year ago,

after Biden promised to end support for Saudi Arabia in the UAE's quote,

offensive operations there, the war has only ramped up and the conditions on the ground have only gotten worse.

The question for American foreign policy makers seems to be,

how many Yemeni lives are we willing to trade for how many new barrels of oil?

This week President Biden, Saudi King Salmon, spoke and oil production was on the agenda,

but Jared Kushner is still at work in the region.

The autocrats there appear to be hoping they can wait out and perhaps help drive out the Biden administration

to get back to the more explicitly transactional politics of the last administration.

Bloomberg reported Thursday that Kushner recently met with the Crown Prince,

...