THE FRACKERS: DOING MORE TO PROTECT WESTERN CIVILIZATION THAN THE PEOPLE WHO ARE TASKED WITH PROTECTING WESTERN CIVILIZATION. The Trickle of U.S. Oil Exports Is Already Shifting Global Power.

The sea stretched toward the horizon last New Year’s Eve as the Theo T, a red-and-white tug at her side, slipped quietly beneath the Corpus Christi Harbor Bridge in Texas. Few Americans knew she was sailing into history.

QuickTake U.S. Crude Oil Export Ban

Inside the Panamax oil tanker was a cargo that some on Capitol Hill had dubbed “Liquid American Freedom” — the first U.S. crude bound for overseas markets after Congress lifted the 40-year export ban.

It was a landmark moment for the beleaguered energy industry and one heavy with both symbolism and economic implications. The Theo T was ushering in a new era as it left the U.S. Gulf Coast bound for France.

The implications — both financial and political — for energy behemoths such as Saudi Arabia and Russia are staggering, according to Mark Mills, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute think tank and a former venture capitalist. “It’s a game changer,” he said.

For the Saudis and their OPEC cohorts, who collectively control 40 percent of the globe’s oil supply, the specter of U.S. crude landing at European and Asian refineries further weakens their grip on world petroleum prices at a time they are already suffering from lower prices and stiffened competition. With Russia also seeing its influence over European energy buyers lessened, the two crude superpowers last week tentatively agreed to freeze oil output at near-record levels, the first such coordination in a decade and a half.

The political effects need not wait until U.S. shipments become more plentiful, Mills said. “In geopolitics, psychology matters as much as actual transactions,” he said.

If only we had a diplomatic operation that could take advantage of this.