▪️There is some truth to this meme, but it takes the numbers and trends out of context. According to the EIA, U.S. domestic oil production is expected to avg 12.76M barrels/day (bpd) by the end of the year, although those are projections, not actual numbers.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-crude-output-rise-record-1276-mln-bpd-2023-eia-2023-08-08/
▪️But under Trump oil production was already over 13M bpd by 2020. In Feb ‘20 it was at 13.1M and on track to avg well over 13M that year. Production then plunged during the pandemic & the yearly avg never got there. So basically oil production has returned to late 2019 levels and will probably reach early 2020 levels by next year.
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=WCRFPUS2&f=W
▪️Keep in mind, when Trump came into office in 2017 oil production was at just 8.9M bpd, so it saw a dramatic nearly 50% rise to reach 13M in just a few years. The current levels are just returning to pre-pandemic levels with small growth projected in the future.
▪️Meanwhile, domestic oil consumption is forecast to rise to 20.5 bpd by 2024, meaning there’s still room for rapid growth just to meet US needs, let alone the rest of the world. We need more than another 50% growth just to keep up with growing demand,
▪️With $80+ oil (compared to $50-60 under Trump) a president would really have to clamp down to keep companies from taking advantage of the 60% price increase. It would take draconian restrictions to keep companies from producing more oil at these prices.
▪️Which, thankfully they haven’t done yet. So despite Biden’s stated promise to “end fossil fuels” in 2019, he hasn’t, likely for pragmatic reasons. The meme is correct in pointing out what few people know (oil production could soon reach record levels) but ignores that the administration’s rhetoric is also openly hostile to domestic oil production.
So many of these right wing accounts are just whiners now, this is a diatribe about automatic sinks and towels, the horror! As I explained in a prior post, most of the newer terminals have great bathrooms, some now have completely private stalls and plenty of them. The worst and most crowded airport bathrooms are invariably found in aging terminals that are decades old. It’s a reminder that airports were usually drab and uncomfortable.
I think the heyday of the air hand-dryers was like 15-20 years ago, where often you couldn’t find real towels. Now you can at least usually get real paper towels in airport bathrooms. Remember those old cloth roller towels that would go in a loop and somehow “clean” themselves? Yuck! Public bathrooms have always been gross, it seems some are deliberately having selective memories.
Airport food and drinks were always expensive, but now practically everyone brings those huge cooler flasks with them and fills them up. So not sure what he means that ...
I first critiqued this terrible take by looking at how food has actually improved substantially. Even though I said the same could be done in every category, people said “you’re only doing food.” So let’s do air travel and see why it’s not gotten better, not worse.
▪️Aircraft have greatly improved. Just 15-20 years ago, many domestic routes (~15%) were flown by turboprops like the Brasilia, Dash 8 or Saab. Now, almost everything is in jets, and most aircraft have WiFi. Some even have Starlink, where you probably have faster WiFi than your home. Most major airlines offer dozens or hundreds of movies and shows to watch.
▪️Newer designs like the 787 have lower cabin altitudes and improved humidity, which make a huge difference in passenger comfort on long haul flights. The first/business class international market has gotten very competitive globally, with many carriers offering excellent service and amenities. Pods, suites, showers, etc. Coach still sucks but is dramatically cheaper ...
This is the complete opposite of an empirical fact. The right has now joined the left in being pessimistic about the modern world and completely unappreciative of the amazing abundance we now have. I’ll just focus on food here, but you could do it for almost every category.
▪️Fresh produce used to be available only in season. In the winter it was canned or frozen. People used to send fruit for Christmas gifts, it was that much of a luxury good. Now, you can get giant, sweet berries year around in every grocery store. Corn on the cob in February. Not to mention once rare items like dragon fruit, heirloom tomatoes or baby bok choy.
▪️If you didn’t live on the coast, seafood was either not available, frozen, or extremely expensive. If you lived in the Midwest and traveled to coastal locales you would quite literally be able to eat food you had never seen. Salmon has become much more abundant and accessible. You can get fresh ahi at Walmart today. Sushi and oyster bars exist everywhere ...
