Brittany Griner (32) was held in Russian prison after a conviction for drug possession.  Viktor Bout (55) was held in American prison after a conviction for illegal arms sales, supporting terrorists and money laundering.  In a prisoner exchange that took place in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at Abu Dhabi airport, WNBA player Brittany Griner and Russian dealer Viktor Bout walked past each other on the tarmac.

NOTE: Saudi Arabia Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) negotiated the deal.  Yesterday, in federal court the U.S. dropped a lawsuit against MbS for the Khoshoggi killing.  The case was dismissed.  The timing is transparent.

The Biden administration gets a popular transvestite hero of the LGBTQ+ community, while Vladimir Putin gets a Russian born global arms dealer nicknamed “the merchant of death.”  All things considered, the exchange priorities sound about right.

(Joe Biden) – “Moments ago, standing together with her wife, Cherelle, in the Oval Office, I spoke with Brittney Griner.  She’s safe.  She’s on a plane.  She’s on her way home.

After months of being unjustly detained in Russia, held under intolerable circumstances, Brittney will soon be back in the arms of her loved ones, and she should have been there all along.  This is a day we’ve worked toward for a long time.  We never stopped pushing for her release.

It took painstaking and intense negotiations, and I want to thank all the hardworking public servants across my administration who worked tirelessly to secure her release.” (read more)

Video Below.

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The extreme vitriol against the recent OPEC+ decision to cut oil output, specifically the extreme Biden anger toward Saudi Arabia, now takes on additional context as the New York Times writes about a secretly negotiated deal between the Kingdom and White House officials that was never executed.

As the Times reveals, over the summer the White House thought their team had negotiated a deal with Saudi Arabia for increased oil production that would have lowered oil and gasoline costs in the U.S, strategically timed before the midterm election.

With that agreement in mind, Joe Biden went to Saudi Arabia a few months ago. However, as the western alliance began putting more pressure on Russia and increased the activity within Ukraine, the Saudi’s aligned with OPEC+ to support Russia via lowered oil outputs.  The White House felt double-crossed, hence the fury.

(New York Times) –  WASHINGTON — As President Biden was planning a politically risky trip to Saudi Arabia this summer, his top aides thought they had struck a secret deal to boost oil production through the end of the year — an arrangement that could have helped justify breaking a campaign pledge to shun the kingdom and its crown prince.  It didn’t work out that way.

Mr. Biden went through with the trip. But earlier this month, Saudi Arabia and Russia steered a group of oil-producing countries in voting to slash oil production by two million barrels per day, the opposite of the outcome the administration thought it had secured as the Democratic Party struggles to deal with inflation and high gas prices heading into the November elections.

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The global economic cleaving continues.  Western allied nations are intentionally shrinking their economies to meet intentionally lowered energy production, ie ‘the green new deal’.  However, as the phrase is used, “managing the transition to the green energy economy” still requires the use of oil and gas no longer being generated within the same western allied nations.

As a result of this self-serving and ideological dynamic, any foreign oil provider who restricts the western nations from having access to cheap imported energy is viewed as an enemy.  The U.S. and western alliance forbid domestic development of oil, coal and gas, but the U.S. and western alliance still need oil, coal and gas.  This is the backdrop for Biden creating a dependency on foreign oil and being angry at Saudi Arabia for lowering production. {Direct Rumble Link}  WATCH:

The era of great pretending continues.

In this example Jake Tapper pretends not to know that Biden’s policy to block U.S. oil development has made the U.S. vulnerable to foreign oil decisions.  Saudi Arabia is the bad guy for limiting oil production, but Joe Biden is not confronted for limiting U.S. oil production.  It’s a media game of pretending not to know things.

In a semi related note, do not forget the connections.  NYT/Politico are used for FBI/DOJ narratives.  The Washington Post is used for CIA/IC narratives, and CNN is used for State Dept narratives.   The US State Department is conducting the war operations in Ukraine which is the core issue in the CNN interview above.

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CBS pretentious pretender Margaret Brennan interviews Joe Biden’s Energy Security Coordinator Amos Hochstein about the trip to the Gulf Arab States and subsequent energy policy developments.  [CBS Transcript Here] Hochstein spins the non-existing benefits of the trip by attributing the pre-existing Saudi cease-fire in Yemen as an outcome of Biden talking to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Quite a stretch.

Hochstein still thinks there is going to be a way for ‘western governments‘ to place price caps on Russian oil exports by getting the entire planet to agree only to pay Russia a set price for oil.  With Russia an OPEC+ member, and the members of OPEC not in ideological alignment with the Biden administration on a host of geopolitical issues, good luck with that.  The producers (OPEC) have control over what prices the consumers (Non OPEC) pay; they are not going to give up that mechanism just to please the Biden administration.

On the domestic front, while there is little possibility of a global oil production increase from OPEC, Hochstein claims to have assurances from U.S. oil producers they will increase their production capacity by November.  At the same time the institutions in charge of Biden energy policy are going to keep targeting the oil producers to destroy them. Quite a weird dynamic.   Hochstein finishes by saying solar and windmills are the future of U.S. energy production and if we invest more, well, we can save the planet. WATCH:

It is worth remembering what MbS said about the meeting: “We agree on many things, but we differ on a few others. Every country has its own culture and circumstances. I respect yours, you respect mine. Do not impose your culture on us. Do not impose your beliefs on us.” … “We agree we need to do more for climate change, but you guys are doing it wrong by favoring certain energy sources over others. The world needs energy security. We need all energy sources including oil & gas. We are doing our part on both fronts: climate change & energy security.” … “The stage of a country’s economic & social development must be considered in climate change negotiations.” … “We are increasing our production capacity to 13 million barrels per day (from 12 mb/d), but that is it. We cannot do more.”

The message here is: You guys do your part and invest more if you want to avoid energy crises, recessions and unemployment. Do NOT blame us!

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Joe Biden is heading back from an embarrassing trip to Saudi Arabia and the middle east.  Putting aside the fact that physically and mentally Biden looked weak, foolish, and generally incoherent, in an odd way he was appropriately representative of the current of U.S. influence on the global stage.

Before getting to detail, first it is important to emphasize a point that doesn’t get attention domestically.  Democrats are exceptionally weak on all aspects of foreign policy, specifically because their modern ideology is based on hypocrisy of a stunning magnitude.

Domestically, the U.S. media protect democrats by spinning everything into the best light possible.

However, on the world stage the non-western leaders like Putin, Xi and MbS use that hypocrisy like geopolitical ammunition.

Examples… Domestically the U.S. media do not bring up the Joe Biden Afghanistan mess, the rise -and current legitimacy- of the terrorist Taliban; or the brutal mess Barack and Hillary created in Libya; or the unauthorized intervention into Syria that created ISIS; or the complete fubar that was an illegitimate invasion of Iraq; or Hillary’s insufferable “reset” in Russia; or their inability to deal with China’s proxy province of North Korea (because they pretend it’s not); or the current circus célebrè in Ukraine.

Each region, and there are many more, a typical example of how modern democrats are fundamentally weak on foreign policy.  It is not just Joe Biden either; just about every leftist head of state within the alliance of “western democracies” are also pathetically impotent when it comes to influence on a global stage.

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During his press conference from Saudi Arabia, the installed occupant of the White House was asked about the possibility that congress will not pass the $500 billion spending proposal to continue the radical transformation of the American energy sector. [Transcript]

Q On the issue of climate, Joe Manchin obviously made significant news right now, which appears to be torpedoing what was one of your biggest priorities as it relates to energy and to climate back at home. Your message to those Americans right now who are looking for that relief that would have a wide impact as it affects the climate and energy specifically?

Joe Biden: “I am not going away. I’m going to use every power I have as President to continue to fulfill my pledge to move toward dealing with global warming.”  Thank you very much.” [link]

Put another way, “you will eventually eat the bugs.”

As previously noted, regardless of how much chaos, crisis and hardship they create, the collective western government leaders are not going to stop pushing their Build Back Better climate change agenda.  These are committed ideologues.  They are united in their objective and not a single politician is willing to see the catastrophic damage they are creating.

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After calling Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (aka MbS) a “pariah” for killing CIA operative Jamal Khashoggi, a Qatar-based Brotherhood member who was working under the CIA cover of a Washington Post press credential, Joe Biden now greets MbS in Saudi Arabia with a fist-bump.  WATCH: 

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John Kirby is the former Pentagon spokesperson who is now the National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications.  The people in/around the White House have shifted Kirby, a very good spinner of parseltongue, into a place where he can give the media an impression of White House competency.

The LGBTQ, racially inclusive and woke checkbox hires are not up to the task of their positions.  Incompetence is running amok.  As a result, it is somewhat ironic and representative the Biden hypocrisy, that Kirby is needed to take the pressure away from administration checkbox hires.  In this interview Kirby defends the White House policy on the Russia-Ukraine war, interventionist and dependent foreign policy, and the energy policy that has resulted in high gas prices.

Video prompted to 04:05, where the topic of Biden’s upcoming visit to Saudi Arabia is discussed.  WATCH:

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It is very curious timing in this article from Newsweek, containing massive geopolitical implications, using identified Saudi Arabia sources, would come in advance of Joe Biden’s visit to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Is this strategic geopolitical pressure from Saudi leader Mohamed Bin Salman (MbS) ahead of the meeting with Biden; or is this a genuine possibility that looms as likely?  If the former, then Joe Biden is being geopolitically slow roasted by Saudi Arabia for his previous disparagements and ideological hypocrisy in his visit.  If it is the latter, well, then the tectonic plates of international trade, banking and economics are about to shift directly under our American feet.

We have been closely monitoring the signs of a global cleaving around the energy sector taking place.  Essentially, western governments’ following the “Build Back Better” climate change agenda which stops using coal, oil and gas to power their economic engine, while the rest of the growing economic world continues using the more efficient and traditional forms of energy to power their economies.

This article from Newsweek is exactly about this dynamic with Saudi Arabia now potentially joining the BRICS team.

NEWSWEEK – Finland and Sweden’s green light to join NATO is set to bring about the U.S.-led Western military alliance’s largest expansion in decades. Meanwhile, the G7, consisting of NATO states and fellow U.S. ally Japan, has adopted a tougher line against Russia and China.

In the East, however, security and economy-focused blocs led by Beijing and Moscow are looking to take on new members of their own, including Iran and Saudi Arabia, two influential Middle Eastern rivals whose interest in shoring up cooperation on this new front could have a significant impact on global geopolitical balance.

The two bodies in question are the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and BRICS. The former was established in 2001 as a six-member political, economic and military coalition including China, Russia and the Central Asian states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan before recruiting South Asian nemeses India and Pakistan in 2017, while the latter is a grouping of emerging economic powers originally consisting of Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) upon its inception 2006, and including South Africa in 2010.

Here is the money quote:

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It is quite remarkable to consider that almost 100% of these global issues could immediately disappear if the far-left ideologues behind Joe Biden would just unleash the American energy sector.  Alas, the seemingly religious cult of climate ideology will not allow it…. therefore we get these bizarre outcomes.

The U.S. has economic sanctions against oil exports from Iran, Venezuela and now Russia.  The EU is economically collapsing under their inability to power their economies without energy products, a specific outcome of the latest NATO and EU sanctions against Russia.

The green energy programs in the EU cannot sustain the needs of the population.  As a result, German Chancellor Olaf Schultz and French President Emmanuel Macron are asking Joe Biden to lift sanctions against Iran and Venezuela and let Iranian and Venezuelan oil replace the missing Russian oil.  Again, none of this would be needed if the U.S. just developed more oil and gas domestically; but Biden won’t change policy.

(Reuters) – The international community should explore all options to alleviate a Russian squeeze of energy supplies that has spiked prices, including talks with producing nations like Iran and Venezuela, a French presidency official said on Monday.

Venezuela has been under U.S. oil sanctions since 2019, and could reroute crude if those restrictions were lifted.  Indirect talks between Iran and the United States to revive a nuclear deal that could see sanctions on Tehran lifted and its oil exports resume have been on hold since March, but are due to resume in Doha soon.

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