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Re:Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare by pathseeker on Wednesday November 21, 2018 @04:24PM (#18506232)
America now produces enough oil that cutting off Saudi Arabia wouldn't be any kind of energy crisis. The only reason to be nice to tolerate their journalist murders at this point is for military strategic advantages in the middle east.
Re:Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare by rcMgD2BwE72F on Wednesday November 21, 2018 @04:46PM (#18506364)
>for military strategic advantages in the middle east.

Really? As a European, I feel much closer to Iran's history and culture than Saudi Arabia's. My understanding is that the US chose a side a long time ago (cf. ARAMCO foundation) and decided to go "all in", even if it goes a long way against its interest. And things are getting worse with time.

Re:Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare by ancientworldnow on Wednesday November 21, 2018 @06:24PM (#18506867)
Saudi Arabia has a much larger budget to spend on arms deals (the real US interest) and allying with Iran would anger Israel who the US considers an important ally (for tech, geopolitical, military, and electoral college reasons).
Re:Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare by rcMgD2BwE72F on Thursday November 22, 2018 @08:29AM (#18509864)
All these factors link back to oil. It's crucial to sell arms there because there's oil in the region. Israel has become a big ally because it's the closest one in the world's oil well. Switch to renewables and the US won't care about the region (just like the US doesn't really care about Africa and South America).
Re:Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare by mattnewport on Wednesday November 21, 2018 @05:02PM (#18506467)
The main reason the US cares about "military strategic advantages in the middle east" has been oil, at least since the fall of the USSR.
Re:Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare by enraged_camel on Thursday November 22, 2018 @01:55AM (#18508352)
>>America now produces enough oil that cutting off Saudi Arabia wouldn't be any kind of energy crisis.

This is naive. When you cut off Saudi Arabia, you cut off all OPEC. And that would devastate America, even at the current levels of domestic production.

Re:Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare by stjohnswarts on Wednesday November 21, 2018 @07:09PM (#18507066)
Why would Saudi Arabia be any different than Russia or China (who we trade with (minus the Trump idiocy) without compunction) we don't comment on their murder of journalists or their dictatorships? Saudi Arabia is our only big ally in the region, why do you want to cut off all ties to them? It won't change anything and will just hurt us in the long run.