As conflict with Iran disrupts refineries and reshapes global energy flows, diesel prices in the United States have climbed to record highs — a reminder that geopolitical decisions made far from American shores arrive, eventually, at the pump and the grocery shelf. Vice President Vance stepped forward this week to argue that the Trump administration had held back a worse fate, even as the visible evidence of disruption continued to mount. The claim of crisis averted and the reality of record prices exist in uneasy tension, and the market — indifferent to political framing — will render its own