WayeeCool

Saudi Arabia isn't the only nation with a lever to pull which can manipulate global fossil fuel markets. The US also has a lever and is the largest producer on earth, able to punish nations like Saudi Arabia whose entire economy depends on oil being profitable enough and whose oil infrastructure is the only thing they have that can bring income into their nations. This is exactly what the US has been doing under the Biden administration, pushing its own oil production to record levels higher than any other nation in the history of the world while stroking instability (wars, coups) in oil production regions of the world. Remember that the US has the capacity to produce enough oil to meet its own domestic and export needs while maintaining the ability to start destroying the oil infrastructure of smaller nations. What makes the US different from other major petroleum producers is the US government can only increase their own production (or blow up other nations production capacity) while most other governments maintain the ability to decrease their own oil production rather than merely increasing it.

Everyone thinks about gulf states when it comes to oil production but the US is actually the largest player in petroleum. The US can produce more than enough oil domestically to meet its own needs, international markets only effect the US domestic price of fuel because the US government allows their oil companies to maximize profits within reason. Those US firms like Exxon and Chevron understand this, that there are unspoken limits. The US cares about nations like Saudi Arabia to ensure oil prices on the international market stay high enough for US oil firms to be profitable but still within enough reason that the US government can maintain the pretense of free market economics.

This is also why many people who say US wars are about oil are still wrong. They tend to believe the US destroyed Iraq or Libya because they wanted cheap oil, when the real reason was to control global supply and ensure US oil stays profitable. The two levers are increasing US domestic oil production or ordering the US military/CIA to destroy the oil production infrastructure of nations who don't play ball.

Funny because US presidents have immunity from criminal prosecution, have always had it, but when other countries set their laws up the same way it's dystopian.

That's a funny thought. The sister is the one that gives extreme bureaucrat vibes, right?

Right wingers seem to like Dune

Dune is actually rightwing, a conservative morality play and distant future. Frank Herbert was what today would be called a chud and was very open about it. That being said, Dune is still amazing space opera and something unique.

I do find it funny when leftists who don't know the background of the author and his own interpretation twist themselves into knots trying to make Dune into some kind of leftist agitprop.

The tech CEO?

Yup. Bread and Circuses, a cornerstone of good state craft going back to the first city-states millennia ago.

Also have a shortage of entertainment due to Hollywood executives and shareholders deciding to play hardball with their crews, writers, and actors. Not talked about in mainstream media outlets but there was also a drawn out strike among the editors at some of the Big 5 book publishers which resulted in a shortage of high quality fiction books due to publication dates being pushed back more than a year.

I thought I remembered seeing accounts that the US 'disabled' them somehow

They didn't even do that, at least in some instances. There were videos of Taliban fighters confirming they functioned along with finding documentation, tools, and supplies. I'm sure someone did the math and decided it wasn't worth the cost to transport out all that stuff.

The US seems to have only taken their helicopter gunships and left their Blackhawk transport helicopters rather than taking the time to load them onto cargo planes. I say this because there are videos floating around the internet of Taliban fighters finding lots of them sitting around abandoned US bases and outposts. There were also videos of them learning through trial and error how to fly Blackhawks, so they apparently left them in working condition instead of at least sabotaging them by ripping out key components.

Didn't see any Chinooks but iirc they have a lot more range than regular helicopters and with refueling can make the trip without being loaded into cargo planes. One of the reasons the US military is replacing their Blackhawks with the V-280 Valor is for that extended range compared to regular helicopters.

that seems... convenient. how do they know?

Because there has been over 50 years of extensive research?

https://www.iaea.org/resources/databases/marine-radioactivity-information-system-maris

We actually take samples and monitor those sunken reactors: https://www.hi.no/en/hi/news/2019/july/researchers-discovered-leak-from-komsomolets.

Yeah. Annoying because nuclear powered container ships are the only realistic way to decarbonize transoceanic shipping. When you do the math, the biofuel and e-fuel plans western shipping firms have all presented are obviously not feasible. There isn't enough farmland on earth to produce enough feedstock for the required amount of biofuel and with e-fuels the economics don't work out due to how much electricity is needed per liter of fuel synthesized.

If you want to create a generation of antisemites, this is exactly how you go about it. I have to wonder if zionists welcome, even stoke, anti-semitism outside Israel because it helps drive Jewish people to Israel.