I don’t think you’re understanding of what the Saudis have to accomplish. Every dollar in reduced US production cost puts more pressure on the Saudis and reduces the margin they have to play with to play these games...holds true even if their production costs were $0.01 a barrel.
Also, other OPEC nations have a higher production cost than the Saudis...so their margin to play games with is even smaller, and would be more dramatically affected if we reduced US costs.
You haven’t addressed the predictable negative impact such a tariff would have on US exports (which require energy to produce).
And since my arguments are ‘silly’, I presume you are of the opinion that reducing US oil production costs, by eliminating artificial government interference, is ‘silly’. We disagree on that point.
The only part of your argument I find silly is the claim of self-induced on the debt financing. You can’t finance all this investment in drilling without a LOT of it. Allowing the market to crush some companies because the Saudis play games is not a free market responding to too much debt.
As for the exports, the exporters that are benefiting the most are moving to natural gas run factories, which are not affected by the tariff. And those that want to keep running on oil will have even more incentive to source from here, at a fixed rate contract if necessary.