geopolitics
Mr. GlobalJoe Biden Is Climate Virtue Signaling Again. #breakingnews #gasprices #news #truth #trump #biden
- Critics of Biden's offshore ban ignore Trump's similar one. Answering a clip calling Biden's new offshore drilling ban sabotage, he notes Trump also banned drilling in many of the same waters, with a ban that did not start until July 1, 2022, and says the clip nearly repeats a statement from Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt.
- The ban is climate virtue signaling with no effect on output. It covers the East Coast, which has had no lease sale in over 40 years, eastern Florida and the Pacific Northwest, not the Gulf where production happens. California has had a federal leasing ban since 1984 yet still drills on existing leases, and companies hold over 24 million acres of unworked leases.
- He expects Trump to use the ban as an excuse. He predicts no impact on oil prices, gas prices or the climate, and reads the move as political theater that lets Trump blame Biden if he cannot bring down gas prices.
Mr. GlobalExplaining The Biden LNG Export Pause
- Biden's LNG pause only froze permits for new facilities. He says it stopped no current exports and no export terminals already under construction, and that exports skyrocketed under Biden. The administration imposed it under pressure from climate activists, pending a study of the climate impact of expanding LNG exports.
- The study found US LNG displaces coal now but renewables later. He says the study pleased neither the fossil fuel industry nor climate activists. It found US LNG has so far reduced coal burning abroad, but projects that additional exports will displace more renewables than coal globally, which he agrees with.
- The study's household cost estimate is trivially small. It put the cost of unconstrained exports at over $100 a year per household by 2050, a little over $8 a month. He calls that a huge miss when utility bills have already risen by more than that in four years, by thousands of dollars a year in some places.
- Ratepayers pay twice for "cheap" renewables. He says utilities building wind, solar and transmission get subsidies more than 10 times what fossil fuels receive, then seek rate increases from regulators. Renewables are cheap for the builder, he argues, because customers pay through both taxes and bills.
- He expects Trump to lift the pause, with effects years away. The comment period runs into the Trump administration, making a petition to Biden pointless. Because the affected terminals are not yet built and take years to complete, he expects any export impact only in the third or fourth year of Trump's term.
Mr. GlobalHow Politicians Play The Media, Their Donors, and Constituents Like A Harp.
- Biden's "permanent drilling ban" makes Trump's lease ban permanent. News reports framed it as Biden blocking Trump. He says it covers the same federal waters Trump banned for 10 years, and bans new leases in certain places, not drilling, chiefly places visible from billionaires' coastal mansions.
- Offshore bans are donor theatre with no effect on output or climate. He argues Biden and Obama issued theirs so groups such as Earthjustice and the Sierra Club could claim victory and raise money, and Trump did the same for wealthy donors who don't want to see platforms. Partisans then argue on social media while nothing changes.
- Existing leases keep producing long after a ban. He says California has had a state ban off its coast since the 1960s and a federal one since 1984, yet drilling continues because holders keep decades-old leases indefinitely; they simply cannot get new ones.
Mr. GlobalLegacy Media SILENT On Massive Verdict Against Renewable Energy Company
- A clean-energy company was ordered to remove a wind farm on Osage land. He says Enel built a wind farm in Oklahoma in 2011 without a lease from the Osage Nation. In 2017 the 10th Circuit ordered it to obtain a lease or stop operating, which he says it ignored. The final 2024 judgment requires removing all turbines and transmission lines, at about $300 million, plus $36 million in damages to the Osage Nation.
- Legacy media ignore harm to tribes when green companies cause it. He waited 10 days and found no coverage in the New York Times, Washington Post or Bloomberg, only smaller outlets and aggregators such as MSN and Yahoo. He reads this as coverage depending on who does the harm: had it been Exxon, he says, everyone would know.
Mr. GlobalIt just feels like nobody knows anything anymore.
- Low 2016 gas prices cannot be credited to Trump. A commenter cites AAA data putting 2016 average gas prices around $1.99 a gallon; he replies that Trump was not president in 2016 and accuses such commenters of picking the lowest year and attributing it to him. He tells them to look at 2017 prices instead, when Trump was in office.
Mr. GlobalThe Feds Do Not Own Texas Oil
- Almost none of Texas oil belongs to the federal government. Answering a clip claiming Texas oil is all federally owned, he estimates the federal share at probably under one-tenth of 1%. Over 2 million acres belong to about 20 universities in the University of Texas and Texas A&M systems, generating over $100 million a year; private individuals and corporations own the rest.
Mr. GlobalDebunking a common conspiracy theory.
- "Fossil fuel" was a chemist's term, not marketing. Rejecting a claim that a marketing genius coined it, he attributes the term to Caspar Neumann, a German chemist and professor, in the 1750s.
- Finite supply does not lift oil prices today. He argues price reflects current supply and demand, not estimated reserves underground; with perhaps 100 to 200 years left, finiteness has no effect. Only if just 10 years remained would producers stretch it out, cutting output and raising value.
Mr. GlobalThe Best Gas Price Explanation
- US 2024 oil output has already set an annual record. He says 2024's daily average production has passed any year by any country in history, so the record would stand even if production stopped now; commenters asked why prices are still high.
- Demand growth absorbed non-OPEC gains that offset OPEC cuts. OPEC produced about 37 million barrels a day under Trump, falling to 35, and is now about 3 million barrels a day below that level; non-OPEC producers added about 3 million. Global demand meanwhile rose from 99–100 to 102–104 million barrels a day, which he says is why oil is about $70 rather than $55 and gasoline around $3 a gallon rather than $2.60.
Mr. GlobalQuestion About Landman (TVShow).
- Landman is not a true picture of oilfield operations. He says Billy Bob Thornton's character does a job that does not exist in real life. A survivor of a three-fatality incident being back at work within days, and the pipe-trailer incident as shown, are things he says do not happen today, though they might have long ago. His own first day in the industry was replacing someone killed on location about 12 hours earlier.
- The character interactions ring true, but mostly for an earlier era. He has seen, and been involved in, the kind of retaliation the show depicts against men who hurt a son, but says that was a long time ago. His wider point is that real operations are boring: a planned Discovery Channel reality show following his crew was dropped once producers saw it, so any oilfield show full of drama is staged.
Mr. GlobalWhat’s This (We) Shit?
- Import volumes say nothing about the industry's health; profits do. The US imports crude grades it does not produce, and refiners buy foreign oil to refine and sell products back abroad. He answers a commenter who expected domestic drilling to lower gas and oil prices, saying "we" means oil companies, not the public.
- Producers cut output and investment when prices fall, whatever presidents say. He cites Trump spending his presidency asking OPEC for more oil as evidence that US companies will not produce on command. New entrants would not put capital into oil while a president promises lower prices.
- "Drill baby drill" runs against capitalism, he argues. Oil companies chase profit, not oil, and would as readily make money from wind turbines, solar panels or pharmaceuticals. He casts demands for cheap government-delivered fuel as socialist, and low wages as the commenter's problem, not the industry's.
Polis Pandit$Democracy This Week - December 16, 2024
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Mr. GlobalOur immigration issue is not Canada’s problem.
- US immigration problems are America's own failure, not Canada's. He says Canada already has stricter immigration and border enforcement, with fines for employing illegal immigrants over 30 times greater than in the US, where they go unenforced. In his reading, immigration stays unsolved because it is a political football.
- Trump's public trolling of Trudeau seeks attention, not results. He calls humiliating an allied leader counterproductive, and the "negotiating tactic" defence worse: the three signs of a weak negotiator are being unprepared, complaining and being too aggressive.
- Trump does not grasp how interwoven US and Canadian energy is. He says over a million Americans get electricity from Canada and over a million get natural gas from it. He cites the OPEC 2020 deal as proof of Trump's incompetence as a negotiator, calling it the worst deal any world leader has made.
- Trudeau was weak enough to concede privately; public insults wasted that. He says Trump could likely have got most of what he wanted in a private meeting, but has now angered many Canadian leaders. He predicts neither country will cut the other off, and that Trump will get nothing yet still claim victory.
Mr. GlobalDemocrats Tried To Beat Trump In A “Who’s More Full Of Shit” contest and lost.
- Democrats lost by trying to out-spin Trump instead of telling the truth. He argues Biden could have been honest about inflation and gas, energy and home prices — the reasons he gives for the election loss — but chose instead to attack oil companies and big corporations, probably on advisers' counsel.
- Honesty would not have cost Biden his climate agenda. Rejecting a viewer's claim that the climate-activist left prevented candor, he says Biden would still have passed all his major climate legislation. His reading is that voters' passion for any cause, climate included, only goes as far as their pocketbook allows.
Mr. GlobalThe Media Needs To Stop Acting Like Everything Trump Says Is The New Law
- Trump's statements are not law, and the media treats them as such. Responding to the report that Trump said investors of $1 billion or more in the US could bypass environmental regulations for faster permits, he says that is not something Trump can do because laws exist and he cannot change them by saying so.
- The real news is what Trump said and why he cannot do it. He faults Aaron Parnas, whom he otherwise praises, for presenting the claim as if it would happen without explaining that it is not within Trump's power.
Mr. GlobalWhy we will reduce drilling activity for oil in 2025
- Drilling budgets follow the oil price cycle and shareholder returns. Responding to Chevron cutting its CapEx by $2 billion and drilling less in the US in 2025, he explains that companies drill more when oil is around $120 a barrel and can still return plenty of cash, but must cut budgets when they expect $65–70 a barrel for a sustained period.
- He expects oil rigs to fall and gas rigs to rise slightly. He does not expect the total rig count to change drastically, because he expects natural gas prices to rise in the near future, pulling some rigs toward gas while oil-directed drilling declines.
- Producers are wary of Trump from his first term. He says producers watched Trump get foreign countries to flood the market while US companies went bankrupt at a rate of about one a week. His own reading, stated as certainty rather than sourced, is that Trump's return was a major discussion point when the CapEx cuts were decided, alongside the cycle itself.
Polis Pandit$Luigi Mangione and the Dangers of Vigilantism
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Polis Pandit$Where Has Joe Biden Been?
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Mr. GlobalHow the minimum wage impacts everyone not just those earning it.
- The minimum wage anchors pay well above the minimum. Rebutting a viewer who said it no longer matters, he argues the $7.25 federal minimum is the starting point for wage negotiation, so people earning more still earn less than they should; he puts the average hourly wage at a little over $11. His illustration: at a $2 minimum, earning $4 is "twice the minimum" yet still leaves no money in your pocket.
Polis Pandit$The Fall of al-Assad and the Major Implications for the World
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Mr. GlobalYes, you can make gasoline from tar sands.
- Canadian oil sands crude can be made into gasoline. Rebutting a viewer's claim that it is too dirty and only good for byproducts, he says gasoline can be made from almost any fossil fuel, even coal; once upgraded, oil sands bitumen is basically oil and is refined like any other. He concedes it is much dirtier and more energy-intensive to produce.
- Any oil removed from the market moves gasoline prices. He argues the grade is irrelevant: taking any barrels off the market, Canadian oil sands or Venezuelan, raises the price of oil and therefore of gasoline.
Mr. GlobalThe Federal Minimum Wage is 4.93 an hour not 7.25. I explain why.
- Inflation has cut the real federal minimum wage by a third. The $7.25 an hour set in 2009 now has the spending power of about $4.93 (he also rounds it to $4.90), so in his framing the effective minimum wage is $4.93.
- Politicians promise lower costs instead of higher wages. He argues politicians and big business prefer pledges to cut gas, heating, energy and mortgage costs, saving people $100–200 a month, over paying them perhaps $400 a month more. In his reading this appeases workers with a little breathing room while keeping wages near subsistence.
Mr. GlobalThe Dispatch (And a promo code!)
- The media's main problem is self-importance, not bias. He relays a Jonah Goldberg article in The Dispatch arguing the media believes it can define what matters to the public; exit polling shows the issues it hammered during the election ranked at the bottom of voters' priorities. The video is also a promo: code "Mr Global" gives a free month of The Dispatch.
Mr. GlobalBREAKING - OPEC TO MAINTAIN CUTS
- OPEC is defending a price floor, not unwinding cuts. It is reported that OPEC decided at a meeting that day to keep its production cuts through March; he predicts a further extension at the end of March. He reads the aim as letting demand growth catch up with supply in a market he calls mostly balanced but tipping toward oversupply.
- He still expects an oversupplied market in 2025. He says demand will not catch up by the end of March and the decision will not change the oversupply, but it will limit how far oil prices fall in 2025.
- US oil production growth is flat despite better annual averages. He expects the 2024 annual average to come in about 400,000 barrels a day above 2023, but says that reflects a much stronger first quarter of 2024 than of 2023. Output now is barely above December 2023, and he expects it to stay flat.
Mr. GlobalWhy “Drill Baby Drill” Is Not A Thing
- Record output came with far fewer rigs. He shows rig counts peaked two and a half years earlier and have since lost over 250 rigs, more than 30% of the fleet, yet US oil and natural gas production hit records in 2023 and he says will again in 2024. He credits technology and science, not rig numbers, and says people in the industry grasp this least.
- He expects oil rigs to fall and gas rigs to rise under Trump. He says this is not driven by any Trump policy but by lower oil prices after two years of record production, and by higher natural gas prices after a period of low prices from overproduction. He expects the overall rig count to hold roughly steady only because gas rigs are added.
Polis Pandit$Before You 'Eat the Rich', Consider This
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Polis Pandit$Elon Musk Wants You To Have More Children, But There's a Problem
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GeoHussarSyria losing Aleppo is disastrous for them
- Losing Aleppo is nearly a death blow for Assad. It is Syria's largest city, about 2 million people, and its economic hub; its full recapture in 2016 had ended most hope of defeating Assad. The new assault worked, the host says, because every rebel faction agreed to stop fighting each other and aim at one enemy.
- Assad's backers are too overstretched to save him. The host cites Russian losses of over 700,000 troops in Ukraine and Iran's proxies being decimated by the IDF. A fall would cost Iran its training ground against Israel and cost Russia Tartus, its only Mediterranean port, on top of the humiliation of its client being pushed back.
- Damascus is exposed and outside powers may be converging on Assad. Israeli officials said the regime would pay for aiding Hezbollah, and the host expects more Israeli incursions; Turkish-backed factions joined the offensive. The host speculates, explicitly unconfirmed, that Turkey and Israel may be cooperating to sever the Russia–Iran nexus.
- Any successor to Assad is a net win, despite HTS's ideology. The host acknowledges Hayat Tahrir al-Sham's fundamentalist leanings but cites reports it has grown more pragmatic; any post-Assad regime will be unfriendly to Iran and Russia. It is win-win if it reunites Syria with Kurdish autonomy, and the host predicts a chance of regime change in Russia, Iran and Syria under Trump.
Mr. GlobalClearing up myths about oil imports in the U.S.
- US crude imports track refining, not domestic need. Since 2005, when he says US consumption peaked, production has risen by 8.5 million barrels a day while imports fell only a little over 3 million barrels a day. Refiners import crude, refine it and ship products back to the source countries; imports have risen slightly over the last 18 months as refining capacity grew.
- Oil tariffs would hit refiners and invite retaliation. Rebutting a viewer who said domestic drilling means no tariffs on oil, he argues all US refiners importing crude would pay the tariffs regardless of where products go. He expects retaliatory tariffs on US oil exports to follow.
- More US production means more exports, not fewer imports. He compares refiners to an alternator maker that imports parts globally, assembles them and sells worldwide: some output serves the US, some does not.
Polis Pandit$Give DOGE a Chance, But Be Realistic
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GeoHussarTikTok Live 10/15/2024
synopsis
In this solo TikTok question-and-answer live, held shortly after the 2024 election, the host ends where the evening's questions keep returning: Trump's announced agenda is largely unworkable and, if carried out, inflationary; immigrants are an asset America depends on; and Hamas's October 7 attack has handed Israel, now unrestrained by Biden, licence to clear Gaza. Despite all this, the host maintains America remains the best country in the world for an immigrant to start from nothing.
Platform and crypto. The host opens by recounting TikTok cutting creator funding without explanation, then restoring it, and pushes viewers to Patreon and YouTube. On crypto, the host refuses to tip meme coins or a Bitcoin top, discloses an average Bitcoin purchase price of about $24,000–25,000 with nothing yet sold near $90,000, and says the US government has no need to buy Bitcoin when it already holds tens of billions in seized coins.
The Electoral College. Following a response video to a large creator, the host defends the Electoral College as protection against mob rule and foreign influence campaigns, rebuts a viewer's math with the ten-largest-states simulation, and notes states' partisanship changes across generations.
Personal finance and housing. Asked how to reach financial security, the host describes saving four to five months' rent by walking to work and eating the cheapest food, then automatically investing paychecks in appreciating assets. On housing, the host speculates that boomers downsizing could produce a glut, and says private equity owns perhaps 1% of homes.
Trump's plans. Recounting a podcast appearance that day, the host calls the plans unrealistic and hopes they are posturing, since even moneyed interests would lose if all were enacted. The host details the missile-shield supply chain and the farm-labour math of deportation, and dismisses talk of invading Venezuela, whose oil is plentiful but poor quality.
Immigration and America. In a long exchange, the host argues immigrants work harder, commit less crime and educate their children, and that childless Americans are worth less to the government than immigrant families. Challenged by viewers, the host concedes US flaws — about 2 million people imprisoned, private prisons, an insurance-lobby-driven health system, widening inequality — but blames voters who turn out only for presidential races.
Gaza. The host argues pro-Palestinian protests that celebrated Hamas pushed wealthy Jewish donors the host knows to Trump, and asks whether 40,000 dead, possibly 100,000 or more, is "worth it". Pressed by viewers, the host traces the conflict back to the 1947 partition, calls Netanyahu a butcher who funded Hamas, labels Israel's treatment of non-Jews apartheid, and insists on a two-state solution. The host calls Tulsi Gabbard's nomination a joke.
Closing questions. The host sees Russia–Ukraine as a stalemate, says ending it will not lower prices if tariffs arrive, backs nuclear power as the cleanest energy, and lists China's compounding crises.
- The Electoral College guards against an easily swayed popular vote. The host argues foreign disinformation targets the masses, who once accepted slavery and denied women the vote. By the host's own simulation, a 51–49 split in the ten largest states would outweigh the other 40; state leanings shift too, as New York, Texas and California all voted for Reagan in 1984.
- Trump's all-American missile shield and mass deportations are unrealistic. The host says such a shield would need TSMC chips, from a lead of a decade or two, Dutch ASML lithography, and rare earths mostly from China. Deporting 10 million undocumented workers, including about 1 million of 2.5 million farm workers, would leave crops rotting and raise food prices; "big money" is already pricing in inflation.
- Undocumented immigrants are a net gain the government quietly values. The host argues they pay state and local taxes, spend locally, are 1.6 times likelier to start businesses, and have more children while the US birth rate is 1.67. If elites truly wanted them gone, the host says, they would fine employers a million dollars a day rather than close the border.
- Hamas's attack gave Israel carte blanche, the host argues. The host blames Hamas's October 7 assault for the deaths that followed and predicts that under Trump, Gaza may be cleared of Palestinians within four years. The host also calls Israel's treatment of non-Jews apartheid, saying West Bank Palestinians get water below the UN minimum of about 100 litres a day while settlements have pools.
- China's stimulus is too small for its stacked crises. The host cites $23 trillion of local-government debt against an $18 trillion economy, record youth unemployment, deflation, a shortage of women from the one-child policy, and little immigration. The host predicts India will eventually reach China's level, perhaps in 30–40 years.
Mr. GlobalCan Trump Re-Open The Keystone XL?
- Keystone XL cannot be "reopened"; it never operated. The original Keystone has run for 14 years, while the XL was 8% complete when Biden cancelled it and the pipe that was laid has been dug up. He expects TC Energy would need a new permit, then face lawsuits and perhaps 10 years in court.
- No pipeline opening has ever lowered prices, he argues. He says gas rose over a dollar a gallon in the four years after Keystone opened and rose significantly after the Alaska pipeline opened. He calls the lower-prices promise a line oil companies give politicians to win approval.
- Trump, not Biden, was the one begging the Saudis. Biden asked Saudi Arabia only to undo the OPEC 2020 deal, while Trump's 2018 pressure crashed the market, drove up US oil and gas bankruptcies and cost 30% of drilling capacity. The OPEC 2020 deal cut production by 10 million barrels a day, and when the Saudis refused Biden, he used the SPR.
- Fracking was not limited under Biden. He cites a 2023 record for Permian wells drilled and completed, and over 2,000 wells on federal land in the last two years against a level Trump never reached. He offers the commenter a bet of any size that Trump's gas-price plan is to ask Saudi Arabia for more output.