Dan E. Miller

For most of my life, I considered myself a liberal. I still hold to those traditional liberal values: that all men are created equal, that no one should be judged or given preferential treatment because of the color of their skin, and that who someone shares their bed with is nobody else’s business. I haven't changed. My values haven't changed. The world has shifted under my feet. But for many years now, the Democratic Party and American liberals in general have drifted away from those principles. When 9/11 happened, I blamed George W. Bush and the conservatives, and I still believe they carry a significant part of the responsibility. So when Barack Obama was elected in 2008, I was genuinely excited. I thought I understood how politics worked, but I was wrong. It only took a few years into his presidency for me to see the truth. Obama turned out to be something very different from what he had promised... a Trojan horse quietly steering the country down the wrong path. I still didn’t align with the Republican Party, but I could no longer deny that he wasn’t the solution I had hoped for. Then came 2015 and the Democratic primaries. I watched as Hillary Clinton and the DNC stole the nomination from Bernie Sanders. That was the first time I truly noticed the mainstream media operating in perfect unison, constructing a fake version of reality. It wasn’t the first time they had done it, but it was the first time I clearly saw it happening. At that stage, I wasn’t a Donald Trump supporter. I had nothing against him, but I certainly wasn’t on his side. What I did feel strongly was disgust toward Hillary Clinton and the DNC for the way they had cheated Bernie... the deviousness, the lies, and the rigged process. I wanted Hillary to lose so badly that it actually pushed me to support Trump. If they were going to cheat, I wanted them to face the consequences. That choice became the turning point for me. Once I witnessed how the media could coordinate to build a false narrative, I started seeing the same patterns everywhere. I realized the deception had been going on for a long time. And then, right after Trump secured the Republican nomination, everything shifted dramatically... like a light switch had been flipped. The same media outlets that had given Trump constant coverage during the primaries—part of their “Pied Piper” strategy to boost him because they believed Hillary could easily beat him... suddenly turned on him with full force. The coverage flipped from building him up to tearing him down. Both major parties and the press seemed to unite against him. That moment shocked me, saddened me, and angered me. Not because I had become a die-hard Trump fan, but because I finally saw how the system really operated. The illusion had shattered, and there was no putting it back together. This is what I have to say to today's liberals... You have been manipulated. You continue to be manipulated. You have allowed the media to create a spectre out of Donald Trump in order to control you. They've created a hatred in you that has clouded your ability to see the truth of what's been happening in this country. Their continued survival depends on your hatred and blind rage. I wish you clarity. For the sake of this country, I wish you honest insight unencumbered by your hatred of Donald Trump.

Before the war, Iran was exporting 1.1M barrels of oil at $47 a barrel Right now they're exporting 1.5M barrels of oil at ~$120 a barrel