Chris, Melanie, and Zack consider the economic measures taken by the United States and Europe to punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, especially those pertaining to oil and natural gas. To what extent are these policies responsible for rising gasoline prices? Can other measures be taken to replace Russian oil on the global market? Or should Western governments also employ demand restrictions, including possibly compulsory measures to discourage or prevent energy usage? And what political price should democratically elected governments be willing to pay in order to affirm the moral and strategic imperative of defeating Russia’s aggression against Ukraine? Grievances for Columbia’s Jeffrey Sachs who claimed that COVID originated in a U.S. lab, for super-virtuous people who take to Twitter on the Fourth of July to talk about how horrible the United States is, and toward self-absorbed TikTokers known as “Gentleminions.” Attapeople to FIRE (the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression) and to the Quincy Institute for a smart report on defending Asia, and an atta-thing for all the ways that computers make our lives better (until they kill us).

Episode reading at: https://warontherocks.com/2022/07/an-energy-strategy-to-defeat-russia