I agree, but we don't get a majority from the Saudis (see chart).
Nevertheless, I think if we could provide at least 80% of our own, it would have a huge impact on our politics, our finances and our security.
If Shoebat is a Saudi, he is under the aegis of a prince. That's the way the KSA brand of petro-feudalism works.
Trying to figure out which KSA prince did what .. or which one is a good guy and which a bad guy ... is a really good way to go nuts. The Saudi game is one with very high stakes. They have a "nationally (family) owned" limitless supply of a commodity that they produce and ship for $2/bbl that eventually sells for $100/bbl X millions of bbls every day. About 5% of that is more than enough to run the country on a very lavish scale. The rest is for mischief.
In KSA, one really can't even "Follow the Money," The House of Saud in some unfathomable way splits it up about 3 million ways and it changes every day. We don't get a vote. We don't have to like it. We do have to know that whatever follows this "goverment" is bound to be much worse for our national interest. A Westerner, or a Western Government can believe NOTHING these people say ... and that's the people from whatever is currently the top on any given day, to the bottom.
Say, here's an idea just off the top of my head. Since we've got plenty, why don't we just produce our own oil?
These people are nothing but nomad Bedouins, and should be dealt with like the trash they are.
No one would give a crap about them if it wasn’t what they were sitting on.
It is more expensive to produce more of our own oil than it is to import it. When the price goes up the Texas oil wells get put down. When the price goes down - it no longer makes economic sense to pump it up and they cap the well.
Here is an idea off the top of my head - let us buy up all the cheap oil they want to sell us for the next couple of decades and save ours until the supply starts to diminish or until the price goes up.