Attorney General William Barr will deliver the Barbara K Olson Lecture at the Federalist Society’s 2019 National Lawyers Convention.
One Map That Explains the Dangerous Saudi-Iranian Conflict
What the map shows is that, due to a peculiar correlation of religious history and anaerobic decomposition of plankton, almost all the Persian Gulf’s fossil fuels are located underneath Shiites. This is true even in Sunni Saudi Arabia, where the major oil fields are in the Eastern Province, which has a majority Shiite population.
As a result, one of the Saudi royal family’s deepest fears is that one day Saudi Shiites will secede, with their oil, and ally with Shiite Iran.
.. Similar calculations were behind George H.W. Bush’s decision to stand by while Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons in 1991 to put down an insurrection by Iraqi Shiites at the end of the Gulf War. As New York Timescolumnist Thomas Friedman explained at the time, Saddam had “held Iraq together, much to the satisfaction of the American allies Turkey and Saudi Arabia.”
What the Divestment Movement Doesn’t Understand (w/ Rob West)
Rob West, founder of Thunder Said Energy – an energy consulting firm, understands that the total decarbonization of the energy industry will be fueled by political attitudes around the world over the next few decades. However, West argues that proponents of ESG investing fail to understand that this transition will involve massive investment in fossil fuels and cooperation with villainized oil majors. He explains his framework for total decarbonization of the energy industry by 2050, and highlights the new technologies and investment vehicles that will be necessary to drive the transition. Filmed on October 18, 2019 in New York.
How The United States Got Hooked On Foreign Oil
The United States is predicted to become a net energy exporter by 2020. This will be the first time since 1953 that the country exports more fossil fuels than it imports. For almost a century prior, the United States of America was the largest oil producer in the world. So how did the United States get hooked on foreign oil.
Every American president since Richard Nixon has pledged energy independence as a way to strengthen us geopolitically, make us more secure, or boost our economy.
The story of American oil begins in 1859 in Titusville, Pennsylvania. Small amounts of oil had seeped from the ground for a long time, but no one knew how to extract it. Until, Edwin Laurentin Drake, a former conductor, was hired. After many failed attempts, he finally struck gold — black gold.
The next FEW decades, major oil finds in Texas, California and Oklahoma contributed to U.S. emergence as a major economic power. The 1901 Spindletop gusher in Texas nearly tripled U.S. oil production.
Henry Ford’s Model T invention in 1908 – the first mass-produced car – made America the most motorized country in the world. Other industrialized countries like France, Britain and Germany were ways behind.