By Wittman Sullivan

For the last eight months, war has raged in the eastern European nation of Ukraine due to Russia’s illegal invasion of the country. This invasion was started as a, according to Russian President Vladimir Putin “special operation” in order to liberate what they felt was Ukrainian-occupied Russian territory.  

This is based on the presumption that the people of Ukraine and Russia are one people and therefore one nation. This belief has guided the Russian president in his invasion. 

The invasion started with a quick Russian advance through the east of the country in order to form a land corridor to Crimea, and an advance on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv. The northern advance toward Kyiv was swiftly met with fierce resistance that led to Russia's retreat from the northern front. 

After that Russian defeat, the war came to a multi-month stalemate with only minor gains on the eastern front for both Ukraine and Russia. The two major events of the time were the fall of Mariupol and the troubles at the Zaparitia nuclear power plant. 

That was until within the last month Ukraine embarked on a major counteroffensive against Russia resulting in entire regions of the country being liberated. This has caused the Russians to retreat from many major cities, most recently the town of Lyman.

Recently a major development in the war has been the sham elections in four Ukrainian regions that are now being used as justification for Russia to annex these regions. Almost every country in the world has not recognized these annexations. 

There has also been the bombing of the Crimean Bridge, the bridge was the only thing connecting Russia with Crimea. Russia pinned the blame on Ukraine and has responded with civilian-targeted missile strikes. 

Wittman Sullivan

After months of speculation and negotiation, Elon Musk has made his final $44 billion acquisition of the social media site Twitter. On October 29th he finalized the long-awaited transaction with a promise of improvement and free speech. 

His sweeping changes have already started and have been widely celebrated or hated. First, the homepage has gone from the old original style homepage to a new discovery page. These are issues that would have normally been fought over for months, but Musk has seemingly taken an iron fist on old unuseful things on the site. 

It’s expected that there are many more changes to come as Musk begins to fully understand what he has bought. Musk has begun sweeping reinstations of people such as Andrew Tate who was banned for hate speech and multiple right-wing pundits banned for either misinformation or hate speech. He has also been changing features of the site while overworking a smaller and more burnt-out staff at Twitter. 

This comes after, in an attempt to modernize the site, Musk fired thousands of Twitter employees and then offered them their jobs back after realizing the mistake he made. 

Musk has also made other money-driven decisions such as attempting to slash worker benefits and getting rid of free lunch in twitter’s offices. On the site, he has made verification a feature for users and clients to pay for instead of earning.

With that, he has simultaneously lost over two hundred billion dollars in net worth due to his reckless business practices and has even considered in recent months possibly stepping down as CEO. That came after a Twitter poll that he posted that asked whether or not he should step down with over 55% of respondents answering that yes he should step down. 

Also in recent months, there have been calls for companies and government agencies to rescind their presence on Twitter. This is due to the rise in hate on Twitter along with concerns over privacy on the site due to its current stability issues.

By Wittman Sullivan

In the last year, Russia has waged a destructive war on Ukraine causing significant ramifications worldwide. Every sector of every economy and corner of the world has been in some way affected by this unprecedented war. 

Before the war started in March of 2022, many western countries and unions were facing ideological issues. Consistently there were two significant issues that military alliances were facing, internal political divides in countries, and these political unions seeming pointless. They seem outdated in a more peaceful world without imminent threats to western countries. This had two major growing ramifications: first off, Western countries began facing internal issues from internal divides. The recent rise in deindustrialization, neoliberalism, populism, and authoritarianism all led to dividing nations throughout the western world. This further caused deterioration in political systems, as issues weren’t acknowledged and disdain among the general public grew. As people became more dissatisfied with their governments and lives, the initial issues worsened, fueling the cycle.  This dangerous echo chamber led to weaker and angrier western countries consequently causing the west to become more divided upon internal political issues. Second, after the fall of the USSR and the downward spiral of communism along with the end of the war on terror, western political and military alliances have become seemingly purposeless. This has led to both, leaders and the public alike, calling for either their respective countries to leave such unions or the dissolutions of said unions in their entirety. 

The invasion of Ukraine has been a wake-up call for the mostly peaceful Europe and the west as a whole. It has given the once outdated and useless alliances and unions such as the EU and NATO a new purpose for existence. It has also united people not only throughout the west but also the world against Russia. It has led to an overall increase in general unity across the world, as well as, to another era of cooperation in western countries. Nations have a new calling for international security and unity against a new threat. While it has not been long enough to judge the war's long-term political ramifications, its short-term ramifications worldwide have been significant. 

By Wittman Sullivan

In the last year oil prices, and in turn, gas prices have been incredibly fluctuant. Before understanding why gas prices are rising, it’s also important to acknowledge what isn't causing it. There is no major domestic American policy causing a spike in gas prices, no it’s not environmental regulation, no it’s not Joe Biden, and no it's not Donald Trump. Gas prices are an incredibly fluctuant market that is heavily affected by major international affairs.

Originally when gas prices began to rise back in April, it was due to fast economic growth and demand. That growth outpaced the growth pace of the oil industry. The war in Ukraine caused many western countries to sanction Russia. Russia is a major oil producer, and these sanctions further strained oil supply chains. 

As the world built supply chains around Russia and other major oil producers increased production; by the end of the summer oil prices began to steadily go down. 

Another Major player in the oil market is OPEC. OPEC is a group of major oil-producing countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, The United Arab Emirates, etc. 

Recently OPEC met to discuss oil prices and production. OPEC along with OPEC partners like Russia decided that in order to increase oil prices, and in turn profits, they will cut oil production by 2,000,000 barrels per day. This has already begun to boost oil prices in the U.S. and around the world. 

U.S. leaders have already vowed retaliation in the forms of broken military and economic bonds.