Putin just did Democrats a favor by invading Ukraine. Not only will the media have an ongoing opportunity to distract us from more relevant problems closer to home, but it will be able to blame the worst of these problems — runaway inflation — on the familiar boogeyman Russia.

Already we hear that prices are going up because energy is going up because Putin. They are counting on us to forget that prices have been skyrocketing since Biden took office, mainly due to grotesquely excessive wasteful government spending.

True enough, energy prices help drive up the price of everything else. This is why it was so damaging that Biden declared war on the energy industry immediately upon taking office, shutting down drilling on public land and killing the Keystone XL pipeline out of sheer moonbattery.

As Democrats wise up to the political price they will pay for inflation, Biden has begun to bark at the energy sector that he demonizes to increase production. From last month:

Amid persistent criticism over rising inflation and high gasoline prices at the pump and faced with falling approval ratings, the Biden administration, in an about-face, has asked the U.S. oil and gas industry to raise production on existing leases as quickly as possible.

This came after OPEC refused to pick up the slack after Biden hobbled the US oil industry.

The administration’s recent plea for increased production marks a sharp contrast with policies it has imposed to curtail oil and gas production.

Killing the crucial Keystone XL pipeline on his first day in office is not all Biden has done to drive up energy prices. For example:

Shortly thereafter, the administration issued a moratorium on new oil and gas leases on federal land and in the Gulf of Mexico.

The Biden administration subsequently instituted new regulations limiting methane emissions from oil and gas production, making the construction of new wells, storage, and transportation, and the maintenance of existing facilities more expensive.

In addition, in early January, the administration, through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved a plan to block a natural gas power plant in Connecticut capable of powering 500,000 homes.

Will the mountains of red tape be moved out of the way of the oil companies? Don’t count on it. Now, they can just tell us that the skyrocketing prices are Putin’s fault.

On a tip from seaoh.