Bethany McLean on the shale boom and bust (2018)

These days, the rhetoric of “energy independence,” meaning an America that no longer depends on anyone else for its oil, not even Saudi Arabia or OPEC, is in perfect harmony with “Make America Great Again.” But rhetoric doesn’t produce profits, and most things that are economically unsustainable, from money-losing dot-coms to subprime mortgages, eventually come to a bitter end.

~ Bethany McLean, "The Next Financial Crisis Lurks Underground: Fueled by debt and years of easy credit, America’s energy boom is on shaky footing," The New York Times, September 1, 2018