America

Submitted by Arthur Berman via OilPrice.com,

Enthusiasts believe that shale gas is simultaneously cheap, abundant and profitable thus defying all rules of business and economics. That is magical thinking.

The recently released EIA Annual Energy Outlook 2016 sparkles with pixie dust as it forecasts almost unlimited gas supply at low prices out to 2040 and beyond. Exuberant press reports herald a new era of LNG exports that will change the geopolitical balance of the world and make America great again.

A member of the National Rifle Association of America has made a chilling video calling out the Ayatollahs in Iran. In the video a cowboy country singer and NRA representative warns the Iranian spiritual leaders to pray to god that they never have to face the great redneck Satan. The NRA has published a number of videos making statements against the liberal elites, Hollywood celebrities and feckless politicians accusing them of wanting to take away their rights to bear Arms and defend the land of the free.

Emma Ashford reviews the recent Advancing American Security conference, and adds this:

Everybody’s talking about the new Nathan Heller piece in The New Yorker, profiling the new left-wing student activist generation at Oberlin College.  And boy, is it quite a read. You can read it and guffaw at the crazy Social Justice Warriors, but there’s something deeper going on there (and on many other campuses). Here’s the nut graf:

Reflecting on the coming nomination of Donald Trump, former Ronald Reagan associate Peggy Noonan hits where it hurts: “A large portion of the Republican base no longer sees itself as conservative, at least as that has been defined the past 15 years by Washington writers and thinkers.”

The no less perceptive progressive intellectual William Galston described the nomination of Trump as “the third major revolution in the Republican Party since World War II.”