Not necessarily a load of manure

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Well, salad greens do

Good, albeit lengthy article on Watts Up With That? today, reprinted from the Canadian oil newsletter BOE Report, that addresses the ongoing oil/gas disruption and the world’s reliance on natural gas feedstocks necessary for the production of fertilizer. If you’ve finished hiding the Easter eggs (yes, the Mickster hides his own — by tomorrow he’ll have forgotten where he put them), it’s a good read.

(Watt’s Up, by the way, has a wonderful collection of global warming alarms, under its “Failed Predictions” section; it goes back to 1962, and it’s fun, as well as serving as a useful reference.)

Canada and natural gas and fertilizer and get on it

Terry Etam

…. You all are here for energy news, which is not in short supply, because the internet is this week full of tens of thousands of brand new Strait of Hormuz experts, who moved on from being Venezuela oil experts a few weeks ago. Insta-geniuses are remarkably nimble with ChatGPT in the holster. 

Such swarming is unfortunate, because actually there is a ton of good information out there from true experts that have come to the surface. These experts have been there for a long time, but no one cared. And now they do. And some of those facts about the Strait of Hormuz are definitely attention-grabbing, well beyond oil markets.

But first, about those oil markets, which remain absolutely important because the price of oil drives everything, and US President Trump is as sensitive to oil prices as one can possibly be.

Thirty years ago, there was a mighty beast that lurked in the oil markets, mostly dormant, but sometimes not, and the beast was known as ‘geopolitical risk’. At the first sign of trouble in the Middle East, oil prices would jump by a significant percentage almost immediately, and just hover there nervously until whatever skirmish dissolved back into the weeds. 

For the past 15 years or so, markets got bored with that whole topic, and geopolitical risk was largely ignored, because the shale revolution flooded the market and held prices steady no matter what sort of bombastic goonery happened in the Middle East. In a period of remarkable growth, US oil production shot up dramatically, and seemed to be able to respond rapidly to price signal. Here’s a representative commentary circa 2015 that captures the spirit of the times, from the Strauss Center for International Security and Law: “The Shale Revolution may be changing some core structural dynamics in the oil and natural gas markets, in large part because shale production is believed to be more flexible and responsive to market conditions than most forms of conventional production. Shale production is more likely to be shut down when oil prices drop well below break-even points, and it can be ramped back up again more quickly than conventional production whenever prices rise. This is likely have significant long-term effects on the oil and gas industry…”

And it sure did. Until it doesn’t. 

The Wall Street Journal ran an article on this very topic the other day called ‘Why American Frackers Aren’t Rushing to Pump More Oil’. Various quoted executives captured the mood: ‘ “What we’re doing today is nothing different than I did yesterday,” said Wes Perry, chairman of Permian driller PBEX. “We’re not running any new economics.” ‘

‘ “We don’t like to whipsaw these programs up or down,” ConocoPhillips Chief Executive Ryan Lance told analysts.’

‘ “Do you really want to sign a contract at $75 plus oil, or let’s just say $90, and by the time you sign the rig contract, get the rig out there 90 days later, oil is straight back to $50?” Said a managing partner of Formentera Partners, a US oil and gas producer.

The most common theme amongst producers is that they would need to see prices rise and stay high for at least several months, and also show some strength in forward markets so that higher prices can be locked in for a period of time long enough to help ensure well payouts. Until that happens, producers will generally just take the extra cash to fortify themselves, pay down debt, or return to shareholders. 

So we are in a new world order, where OPEC is pretty much tapped out as far as being able to ramp up energy prices at will, and the world’s largest producer only reacting to prices and not managing them as OPEC did when in its prime. 

What’s scary this time around though is the reappearance of the beast, geopolitical risk, and this time it’s not messing around. (Best analysis I’ve found, one everyone should read, is here – a clear, concise explanation of the global machinery and strategies at play around Iran. This is not a US-bombs-a-country story. It is a geopolitical lynchpin to everything). [FWIW: even lengthier than the article you’re reading here, and fascinating — Ed]

There is a reason so much attention is being focused on the Strait of Hormuz situation. It is not just a pinch point for oil supplies, a huge amount of other materials flows through there as well. This region is a major transshipment alley between Asia and Europe. 

If energy people, and Alberta, and Canada, take one thing out of the Hormuz situation it is this, and it is a very big deal, possibly as big as it gets, and the solution is obvious and the right thing to do:

One third of the world’s supply of nitrogen fertilizer passes through the Strait of Hormuz. The reason so much fertilizer originates in that unstable part of the world is because of access to cheap natural gas. This is little else more relevant to Canada than that.

Are you listening politicians? Danielle Smith? Tim Hodgson? Mark Carney? It is possible that the world will be in a very desperate need for fertilizer soon, and there is no better place it should come from than Canada, with our pathetically low natural gas prices. 

No, creating businesses is not the government’s business – getting out of the way, is. Clear the regulatory detritus! Canada can shine in a remarkable way, not just from our resources, but from…feeding the world. Even more than our awesome farmers already do. Politicians, put your crafty little heads together and clear the path. Stop chasing climate goblins and get to work.

Of course, none of those key governmental people are reading this. But someone is that knows someone that knows someone that can force these facts into their field of view, along with Alberta’s perpetual low gas price environment. 

And also of course, there is no way Canada could develop a fertilizer industry in time to deal with this crisis. Possibly the current situation resolves itself, and there is peace in the Middle East forever more.  You may calculate the odds on that at your leisure.

What the current situation in both Iran and Ukraine is teaching us is that modern warfare is a new kind of  asymmetric – major upheavals that are very hard to eradicate can be triggered very cheaply. Bad actors can render key pinch points like the Strait helpless with relatively cheap and hard to detect drones or drone boats. The current imbalances are stark, where $3 million missiles are used to shoot down $40,000 drones. (This has always been the case; a handful of terrorists responsible for the 9/11 terrorist attack have added who knows how much to global travel bills ever since in the form of enhanced airport security costs. Or look how the October 7 attack, at a cost of almost nothing, has roiled the world and now cost probably trillions. Terrorist acts are the epitome of cost asymmetry. But this current situation is all new in the sense that we can see that a third of the world’s nitrogen fertilizer supply can be cut off in this way.) If Canada has an ounce of strategic thinking capacity, it should be a gaping global security hole that this country could be in a relatively unique position to fix. AECO gas is a global outlier in terms of being so bad (for producers) but potentially great (for industrial users), if we don’t boat anchor any industries with unnecessary regulatory and climate costs.

Here’s a thought a little more blunt to help get their attention: Eight billion people do not survive without a healthy global fertilizer industry. The industry is built on affordable natural gas. Canada has vast quantities of natural gas, cheaper than almost anywhere in the world. Is that bullet-pointy enough, politicians?

There is no better way for Canada to regain relevance; the building blocks are there and ready to go, the people and technology same. Chasing Chinese EVs is ideological nonsense; building the world’s biggest fertilizer industry should be Canada’s number one priority.

The author’s arguments and pleadings for change won’t happen, of course (unless Alberta’s secession movement succeeds), because Canadians seem set on transforming into a third world country, the better to make their immigrants feel at home. Still, food for thought.

The best part of birth citizenship is that it produces true, loyal Americans (Updated)

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The proud parents

Siblings Accused of Trying to Attack Air Force Base are Children of Illegal Aliens

The parents, Qiu Qin Zou and Jia Zhang Zheng, illegally entered America over 30 years ago.

Last week, the DOJ charged siblings Ann Mary Zheng and Alen Zheng for allegedly trying to attack MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, FL.

The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced they are children of…illegal aliens!

Alen Zheng faces charges of attempting to damage “government property by fire or explosion, unlawful making of a destructive device, and possession of an unregistered destructive device.”

“According to the indictment and statements made in court, on the evening of March 10, 2026, Zheng unsuccessfully attempted to detonate an improvised explosive device at the MacDill Airforce Base Visitor’s Center in Tampa. Law enforcement later discovered the device, ensured it was safely disassembled, and determined it to be an improvised explosive device,” the DOJ wrote in the press release last week.

Ann Mary Zheng’s charges include assisting after the fact. The DOJ accused her of “knowing that her brother, Alen Zheng, had attempted to damage government property by fire or explosion, assisted him in order to hinder and prevent his apprehension, trial, and punishment.”

Ann Mary also faces accusations of “corruptly altering, destroying, mutilating, and concealing a 2010 black Mercedes-Benz GLK 350 with the intent to impair its integrity and availability for use in the federal prosecution of Alen Zheng.”

It turns out that the siblings’ parents, Qiu Qin Zou and Jia Zhang Zheng, illegally entered America over 30 years ago:

In 1993, they both applied for asylum, but an immigration judge denied those claims and ordered both Zheng and Zou removed from the U.S. in 1998. The Bureau of Immigration Appeals denied multiple attempts by the pair to have their case reopened, but they illegally remained in the U.S. for decades despite being ordered removed almost 30 years ago.

Authorities arrested Ann Mary upon her return from China.

Her brother remains at large in the communist country.

“Automatically granting citizenship to children of illegal aliens born in the U.S. is based on a historically inaccurate interpretation of the Citizenship Clause and poses a major national security risk. That reality became apparent last week when two U.S.-born children of Chinese illegal aliens were indicted for planting a potentially deadly explosive device outside MacDill Air Force Base in Florida,” said Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis. “This incident underscores the severe national security threat that illegal immigration and birth right citizenship pose to the United States.”

That seems inarguable, but, of course, it is; in fact, we have a huge contingent of Democrats who do exactly that.

Although the parents of these two terrorists apparently came here to stay, a related issue if Chinese “birth tourism” whereby Chinese, whether wealthy in their own right or subsidized by the CCP, come to America to produce an auto-American and then return, taking their spawn with them to raise and indoctrinate before, presumably, sending them back her to work their magic.

I asked GROK for some numbers on this birth tourism, and got one, albeit loaded with ambiguity and uncertainty, but it’s fair to say that somewhere between 25,000 and 36,000 (high estimate, 100,000) are bred here each year, with a cumulative total between 750,000 -1.5 million.

There are no official U.S. government statistics that specifically track or count “birth tourists” (pregnant non-residents who enter on tourist visas or visa waivers specifically to give birth so their child automatically receives U.S. citizenship under the 14th Amendment). The U.S. does not require hospitals or birth registries to record the mother’s visa status or intent, and data on foreign-born mothers’ births come from broader sources like CDC birth certificates and the American Community Survey (ACS).

Estimates therefore rely on indirect methods (e.g., comparing birth records to resident surveys), industry reports, Chinese media/government sources, congressional testimony, and law-enforcement cases. They vary widely and are often contested, especially higher figures promoted in recent political debates. Chinese nationals have consistently been described as one of the largest (or the largest) national groups involved, with organized “maternity tourism” agencies in China advertising packages costing tens of thousands of dollars.

Key Estimates for Chinese Birth Tourism

Here is a summary of the main figures, focused on recent years (roughly 2015–2025, including pre-pandemic peaks):

  • Lower/more data-driven estimates (total birth tourism, all nationalities): The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), using CDC vs. ACS data on foreign-born mothers who appear to have left the U.S. shortly after birth, estimated 20,000–36,000 birth tourists per year in the mid-to-late 2010s (revised downward to ~20,000–26,000 in their 2020 analysis for 2016–2017 data). Chinese nationals were a major share of this total, especially after 2012.

  • Chinese-specific figures (mid-2010s peak):

    • Chinese government sources (cited in U.S. affidavits ~2015): ~4,200 Chinese babies born in the U.S. in 2008, rising to ~10,000 in 2012.

    • Media/industry reports around 2015: Roughly 20,000 Chinese birth tourists per year.

    • Pre-pandemic (2016 until COVID): One report cited ~80,000 Chinese women per year traveling to the U.S. for this purpose.

  • Higher/recent claims (often from Chinese sources or conservative analysts, cited in 2025–2026 Senate hearings and Supreme Court arguments):

    • Average 50,000–100,000 Chinese citizens per year giving birth in the U.S. (or U.S. territories), according to some Chinese research/intelligence references. One 2018 Chinese research-firm figure cited was as high as 180,000.

    • Cumulative total: 750,000 to 1.5 million Chinese-born U.S. citizens (or “American babies raised in China”) over the past 15 years or so, per China-watchers, Peter Schweizer (Government Accountability Institute), and Republican lawmakers in 2026 letters/testimony. These have been referenced in debates over birthright citizenship.

Context and Trends

  • Peaks and declines: Activity surged in the 2010s (hundreds of Chinese agencies advertised services; one California operation alone served >500 clients). It dropped sharply due to Trump-era visa policy changes (2020 rule targeting birth-tourism intent), COVID travel restrictions, and heightened scrutiny. Some resurgence has been reported post-pandemic, but numbers appear lower.

  • U.S. territories (e.g., Northern Mariana Islands/Saipan): Easier access via visa waiver for Chinese; peaked at 581 foreign-tourist births in 2018 (vast majority Chinese), but fell to ~47–58 by 2025.

  • Other notes: Separate but related is international surrogacy in the U.S. (Chinese nationals were ~42% of foreign intended parents in recent ASRM data, with thousands of cycles annually pre-COVID). Some high-end totals may blur lines between maternal birth tourism and surrogacy. Individual operations (e.g., raided California firms) served dozens to hundreds of Chinese clients each.

In short, credible U.S.-based analyses put annual Chinese birth tourism in the low tens of thousands at its peak, while higher Chinese-sourced or politically cited figures reach 80,000–100,000+ per year (with cumulative claims of ~1 million+).

UPDATE

I missed this post about birth tourism (vs anchor babies) in yesterday’s PJMedia page. I won’t excerpt it here, but it’s excellent; if you’re at all interested in the topic, it’s very much worth reading.

Moron academic "Experts”

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Michael mcfaul — stupid and proud of it

As if Marxist eco-poets like the Columbia professor mentioned in the previous post weren’t sufficient to demonstrate what’s wrong with higher education as practiced today, take a look at how a product of that system, a person Obama (well, Obama) considered qualified to serve as our Ambassador to Russia:

X BODIES Obama-Era Diplomat For Asking and (Wrongly) Answering His Own Iran Question

Take former Obama ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul. His résumé reads like a leftist wet dream. He studied at Stanford AND in the Soviet Union (huge bonus points there), and was a Rhodes Scholar. He is a professor of International Studies at his California alma mater, as well as a director and fellow of think tanks filled with other experts. Before becoming ambassador, he served on Obama's National Security Council. 

In short, McFaul is better than us in every way, so we should always listen to him and agree with him. 

Except that McFaul is also, apparently, as dumb as a box of rocks. 

Earlier today, he tried to dunk on the Trump administration regarding recalcitrant Europeans who aren't helping enough in the war against Iran. He did so by asking and answering a question from recent military history. [A post that he’s now deleted out of shame and the ridicule that’s being heaped on him — Ed]

Did we join the UK in support of their war against the Falkland Islands? no.

— Michael McFaul (@McFaul) April 3, 2026

Ambassador McFaul could have spared himself this ignominy had he merely strolled across the hall and consulted his fellow-Hoover Institution resident, Victor Davis Hanson*, who comes from a different era of education, when critical reasoning, rather than “critical theory” was taught, and thus retained the ability to think clearly and knowledgeably about history, politics, and life.

(Critical reasoning is the logical, analytical process of evaluating arguments, evidence, and assumptions to determine what to believe or do. Conversely, critical studies (often rooted in Critical Theory) is an academic approach focused on challenging social power structures, inequality, and ideologies. Reasoning evaluates logic; studies critique society)

Trump didn’t wreck NATO — he just exposed its anti-US hypocrisy

Trump didn’t wreck NATO — he just exposed its anti-US hypocrisy

Here’s the portion of Hanson’s article that McFaul might have found useful to correct his ignorance of relatively recent history:

During the 1982 Falklands War, a solitary Britain faced enormous logistical challenges in steaming halfway around the world to eject Argentina from its windswept and sparse islands.

American aid was critical to the effort: The United States stepped up to help with intelligence, reconnaissance, the supply of some 2 million gallons of much-needed gasoline and crucial restocking of Britain’s depleted Tomahawk missiles.

The assistance prompted anger from most Latin American nations of the shared Western hemisphere, as well as from many Hispanic American citizens at home.

No matter — President Ronald Reagan rightly saw the importance of solidarity with a NATO member and a longtime US ally.

So he gave Britain a veritable blank check for Washington’s aid.

*If, somehow, you’re unfamiliar with Hanson, here’s an AI-generated biography of the man:

AI Overview

Victor Davis Hanson (born September 5, 1953) is a prominent American military historian, columnist, and classicist specializing in ancient warfare

. A senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, he is known for analyzing modern conflict through the lens of classical history, writing extensively on agriculture, and contributing to conservative political commentary.

Background and Education

  • Roots: Born in Fowler, California, Hanson grew up in the San Joaquin Valley, where his family were long-time farmers.

  • Academic Training: He earned a B.A. from the University of California, Santa Cruz (1975), attended the American School of Classical Studies in Athens, and received his PhD in Classics from Stanford University in 1980.

Academic and Professional Career

  • Classics Program: In 1984, he joined California State University, Fresno, to initiate a classical studies program.

  • Hoover Institution: He currently serves as the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow in Classics and Military History at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University.

  • Teaching Awards: In 1991, he received the American Philological Association Excellence in Teaching Award.

Key Works and Themes

  • Military History: Hanson is known for books such as The Western Way of War (1989), The Second World Wars (2017), and The Savior Generals (2013).

  • Classical Studies: His early work Warfare and Agriculture in Classical Greece (1983) and The Other Greeks (1998) emphasized the role of the small farmer in developing democracy and military tactics.

  • Commentary: He has authored numerous articles on current events and politics for the National Review, The Wall Street Journal, and American Greatness.

Awards and Recognition

  • National Humanities Medal: Awarded in 2007.

  • Bradley Prize: Awarded in 2008.

  • Eric Breindel Award: For opinion journalism (2002).

Farming and Personal Life

  • Hanson is a 5th-generation grape farmer in California, which inspired his books Fields without Dreams (1995) and The Land Was Everything (2000).

  • His work often touches on the decline of the traditional family farm and the cultural shifts in California, such as in his book Mexifornia.

Student loan forgiveness? For these people, or their students? C'mon, man.

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From the Washington Free Beacon:

‘I F'—ing hate this University’: Columbia Student Workers Union Erupts Over Anti-Semitism Task Force’s Reccomendation To Hire Middle East Professors Who Don’t Hate Israel

A Columbia spokesman told the Free Beacon university policies make clear that instructors "may not use their classrooms to advocate any political or social cause and must allow the free expression of opinions with civility, tolerance, and respect for ideas that differ from their own."

…. A SWC member, identified as "Ethan," wrote that "the thing about we can’t talking [sic] about Israel Palestine except in directly relevant classes is really bad. And I will never follow it."

He also complained that time, place, and manner rules aimed at ensuring protests do not disrupt classes are so restrictive that "any actually disruptive protest is impossible." [I believe that’s the point, Ethan — Ed]

Months after the anti-Semitism report was published, Johannah King-Slutzky, an SWC board member and doctoral student studying "theories of the imagination and poetry as interpreted through a Marxian lens," warned the union’s group chat that its members should be cautious in what they text as "you wouldn’t want a bad faith reporter to see."

More from Miss/Mister/Whatever King-Slutzy (King Slut? Really?):

"Happily everyone already knows where I stand so I can say ‘death to America’ and ‘death to Israel’ whenever I want but not everyone is so lucky," King-Slutzky wrote on March 2. She added that the "world would be a better place if Columbia did hate America, god willing."

I say we honor her request to God.

And here’s what she/it is teaching and being paid to do by Columbia:

Biography

My dissertation is on fantasies of limitless energy in the transatlantic Romantic imagination from 1760-1860. My goal is to write a prehistory of metabolic rift, Marx’s term for the disruption of energy circuits caused by industrialization under capitalism. I am particularly interested in theories of the imagination and poetry as interpreted through a Marxian lens in order to update and propose an alternative to historicist ideological critiques of the Romantic imagination. Prior to joining Columbia, I worked as a political strategist for leftist and progressive causes and remain active in the higher education labor movement.

She gets a salary, funded by federal taxpayers and her students’ own loans to produce worthless drivel and indoctrinate future “educators” who will perpetuate the cycle; time to end that.

But wait, there’s more!

Another union member chimes in:

Caitlin Liss

“I mean, I wake up every day and I look at my phone to see if I’ve gotten a text message telling me that one of my friends has been abducted. It’s really scary. And on top of the sort of personal relationships with our friends and comrades who are at risk, there’s the sense that also our careers are industry are at risk. So, and many other members of student workers of Columbia have spent many years dedicated to getting a PhD and being in academia and it’s increasingly starting to feel like academia might not exist for that much longer. So it’s feeling pretty bleak”

“Getting a PhD and being in academia” — that’s exactly the problem.

Tell me again why we're in NATO, especially if, as the NYT tells us, it comprises just us and Canada?

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Victor Davis Hanson: Trump didn’t wreck NATO — he just exposed its anti-US hypocrisy

…. All the US had initially requested was basing support in disarming a common Western enemy that, for nearly half a century, has slaughtered American diplomats and soldiers and tried to kill an American president and secretary of state.

But most NATO members could not even offer tacit help.

Some damned the US effort as either illegal or unnecessary.

The American public watched the British waffle for days over permitting the US to use their Diego Garcia airbase.

The Spanish banned American use of their NATO bases and airspace.

The Italians refused a request from American bombers to land and refuel at a Sicilian NATO base.

Many NATO heads of state rebuked the United States to their domestic audiences while, in typical two-faced fashion, publicly offering empty verbal support for the US campaign.

The NATO response to an Iranian missile aimed at fellow NATO member Turkey was anemic.

Even worse was the pathetic British reaction to another Iranian missile launched at a British base at Akrotiri, Cyprus.

Yet neutering a theocratic Iran is clearly of benefit to Europe.

So is preventing the international waters of the Strait of Hormuz from becoming a tollbooth run by the Iranian regime.

Such passivity stood in sharp contrast to the five-year-long Ukraine War on Europe’ border.

Ukraine is not a NATO member.

Nonetheless, Europeans made urgent requests for the US to honor the spirit of NATO solidarity and help protect Europe’s territorial integrity.

Yet continental Europe is not intrinsically weak.

The combined population of the European Union and European NATO members is around 450 million — more than 100 million greater than that of the United States.

These same European nations enjoy an aggregate annual GDP of more than $22 trillion, 10 times the size of the Russian economy.

European diffidence comes on top of Trump’s perennial effort to harangue NATO members into honoring their commitments to spend 2% of GDP on defense — especially in the case of deadbeat Spain and Canada, which for years have welched on their pledges.

Trump’s rhetoric is not what has undermined NATO.

Instead, he ripped off a happy-face scab and exposed a festering wound of increasingly anti-American hypocrisy beneath.

If you wanted to wreck the alliance, there would be no better way than to follow the duplicitous example of Western Europe’s NATO members.

But at least there’s happy news on another front:

UPDATE: Josh Hammer asks the same thing: “What Exactly is the Purpose of NATO in the Year 2026?”

And South of the Village continues to show signs of life

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333 Sound Beach Avenue, (linked fixed now — thanks) $3.850 million, pending after 8 days. Bidders must have been disappointed to learn that the “dining room window treatments (curtains, to us little people) are excluded”. I suppose I understand the owners’ reluctance to part with these gems of the draper’s art; they match the upholstery on two of the chairs, but this might perhaps have been a convenient time to reconsider that decorating decision.