In the long history of Joe Biden gaffes, this is pretty small potatoes, and it’s possible that he was exaggerating for effect. But discussing his meeting with Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ivanov, Biden attributed Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s changed attitude to “all of a sudden, oil is no longer $190 a barrel,” cutting deeply into Russia’s foreign earnings.
Indeed it is not; it never reached that, or within 40 dollars of that. Oil topped out at $147 a barrel briefly in July of last year.