Before becoming president, Trump regularly said the US should have taken Iraq’s oil, ignoring the sovereignty of Iraq and proposing that the US just take other countries’ national resources by force.
It would have been wrong to dismiss comments like this by taking Trump seriously not literally. Trump literally meant that, and as president he has implemented similar policies by using military force to remove Venezuela’s former leader and actively trying to take a percentage of Venezuela’s oil for the US.
Getting Venezuela’s oil production up and running will take a tremendous amount of investment, and its unlikely that right-minded investors will invest in such a thing because it is too much money and risk if political winds change in the US or Venezuela. This means, it will likely require taxpayer money or the president strong-arming US companies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Baz2pNyH0DU
The US strategy in Iran is one of economic warfare through sanctions and blockade forcing: Iran to give in or a revolution in Iran. There doesn’t appear to be the forces necessary in Iran to create a successful revolution, but it’s not impossible.
The war isn’t the US economy VS Iran’s economy, it’s Iran’s economy and a regime willing to let its people take extreme suffering VS something breaking in the international economy that forces the US to give up.
The war against Iran has made the supply of oil low, and if something else happens like a natural disaster to decrease it further…things will be much worse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeQwZgWN9dw
Israeli settlers in the West Bank have been stealing people’s homes and harassing those who try to stay. The IDF tends to protect settlers and not sufficiently punish settler crime against Palestinians. Leaders will condemn settler violence, but not actually enforce the law against them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYcetG52YCo
With Supreme Court justices hiding their personal deliberations and keeping their notes secret for decades after their deaths or even destroyed, and with a heavy amount of rulings coming from the shadow docket where they don’t have to explain themselves…the Supreme Court has a transparency problem.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GZMk-JIpQU
For many years, Republicans have made it easier for wealthy people to cheat on their taxes. WTF?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUU6jUZKkm0
How will Mecca agreement become an operational framework? | Inside Story
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FlgGk16-OI
Who Was Abraham?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACnwwfyqr7c
Russia and China are helping Iran kill Americans.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68d6APZOP1k
Palestinians have agency and many of them have used it to commit themselves to terrorist tactics in order to target civilians and destroy Israel and then hide amongst their own population so that if Israel wants to aggressively defend themselves, they have to kill many many civilians. The mass death in Gaza is primarily the fault of Gazan terrorists who chose to prove their commitment to the destruction of Israel on October 7th.
Israel is a bad actor and its founding was unjust. But, it’s a country now that has existed and developed for multiple generations. I understand why Palestinians would refuse to accept Israel and commit themselves to its destruction, but, if they are going to do that, then they are choosing to get their own people slaughtered when they use them as human shields.
There will be no peace in Palestine if the Palestinians don’t give up on terror and give up on ending Israel. It’s hard to seriously push Israel to stop its own bad actions when they are honestly in an endless struggle with terrorists determined to slaughter Israelis and end their country.
https://www.econtalk.org/hamas-and-the-future-of-gaza-with-ahmed-fouad-alkhatib/