I’m pretty sure he thinks allies of the US are beta males that follow the US alpha male…
Vance said Trump was “America’s Hitler”. Before Vance realized that he could get power by supporting Trump.
You seem to be using “he thinks” in the sense “Vance genuinely believes”. I am not convinced Vance believes anything, his actions look like pure opportunism.
I actually don’t understand what Carlin is saying, then. “The wars I don’t like are bad”?
An overbroad and often false generalization is not a good joke. So yes, it isn’t much of a joke.
All the pollsters were pretty close to each other. If you posit fabricated polls, then you are saying that every single pollster in the US is completely compromised. That is just tinfoil hat, in the uncool way.
Asia is $60/bbl higher.
Asia get their oil through the Hormuz straight. Of course their oil price is higher.
There probably isn’t oil tankers enough in the world to equalize the supply between the US and Asia. Hence you should not expect the price to be perfectly equalized between the US and Asia.
We have tons of untapped oil fields
But that is likely irrelevant for the timescale of this conflict, right? Surely the lead time for bringing new oil fields online is measured in years.
Oil prices are pretty global. If you look at the prices for European oil (Brent crude) and US oil (West Texas Intermediate), then they are $14 apart. Which is not nothing, but WTI is still up by 63% from pre-war. That is still going to hurt the US economy, a lot.
Also, in the US the oil price windfall is privatized, while the oil price pain is socialized. So the US will still feel almost the full pain.
It is not just at the pump. The whole supply chain depends on oil. Industrial processes, plastics, fertilizer.
The price rise at the pump is often masked by taxes. The percentage jump for industry will be larger.
But isn’t lifting sanctions on Iranian oil actually the smart thing to do? Get all the oil to market, to ameliorate the supply shock. Even though it looks horrible from a PR angle.
It truly should be a learning experience. But I genuinely don’t think Republicans in the US are capable of learning anything, especially not something as narratively inconvenient as this.
Why not? 77 million people voted for Trump. And before you cry “election fraud”, the pre election polls measured similar numbers.
Carlin’s quote said nothing about “defense”.
And in any case, e.g. NATO’s prevention of the genocide was not “defense”. Was that also like "fucking for Virginity”? I have met some people from Kosovo, and they certainly do not think so, naming their children after Bill Clinton and all… No, Carlin is an idiot here.
It’s so ironic then that Biden was so criticized for the consequences of Trump’s agreements with the Taliban 💀
Trump was responsible for the vast majority of bad outcomes, yup. And the media did not reflect that.
Going by Trump’s actions in first term, the “no wars” thing was the rare promise that was actually pretty believable.
Trump first term didn’t start new big wars, and withdrew from e.g. Afghanistan (in a bullshit way, but still). Based on past actions, and yes because Trump promised it, I believed that Trump would be isolationist in his second term.
But the oil price shock is going to hurt Trump electorally, and normal people’s wallets, way worse than the Epstein files. So in a sense it is silly to say that the distraction is “working”.
Which is a really stupid thing to say. Should e.g. Ukraine not fight for peace? Should Britain not have fought for peace in WW2?
selfishness
The wild thing is that thing would be so much better, if they were just capable of being rationally selfish. Like, don’t elect a blatantly corrupt selfish billionaire to be President. Instead elect people who don’t want tax cuts for the 1%.
Sometimes, like your comment, I wonder if “conservative” is used as a synonym for “stupid”.
Yes their airspace and US military bases are used for offensive attacks on Iran.
Source?
That is absolutely a legal target for Russia too. I
Not according to international law, as I understand it.
It is not a zero sum game. Letting the oil through, and thereby preventing the world market from a total tail spin, probably helps the US more than it helps Iran. So is on the surface surprising, but surprisingly rational on second look.