41 pages • 1 hour read
Rachel MaddowBlowout
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2019A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 21-23Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 21 Summary: “Because They Could”
This chapter focuses on the power dynamics of the oil and gas industry in Oklahoma, and how the citizens of the state were caught in the middle of Big Oil and Gas’s interests. Maddow chronicles the 2014 legislative proposal, pushed onto the ballot by the major oil players in the state—Devon, Chesapeake, and Continental—which would give every driller in the state a major tax break. When the bill passed with considerable margins, the tax break was made permanent, at the expense of tornado shelters in public schools. Oklahomans had grown so accustomed to the realities and implications of the oil and gas industry that they had become dependent on its whims. As Maddow puts it, “The story of oil and gas in Oklahoma is pretty much the story of modern Oklahoma. […] Oil was discovered in Oklahoma long before it was a state and still trumps government and governance” (263). The state’s identity is fundamentally intertwined with the machinations of Big Oil, and it cannot fathom a life without its primary industry. Thousands of families receive royalty checks from oil and gas drillers on a regular basis, which left countless other families across the state hoping that somehow their land would also yield a lifetime of checks for their mineral rights. The title’s chapter refers to a Bill Clinton quote during the Monica Lewinsky scandal: “I did it for the worst possible reason. I did it because I could” (268). Maddow argues that Big Oil continued to exploit the Oklahoma taxpayers for the same reason—because they could.
Chapter 22 Summary: “We Greatly Value Our Relationship”
Maddow resumes the story of the ExxonMobil-Rosneft partnership, brokered by Rex Tillerson, Vladimir Putin, and Igor Sechin. This deal would finally provide the Russian energy sector with the gigantic breakthrough it had been hoping for: drilling in the Russian Arctic with America’s biggest oil company by its side. Thus, Putin, Sechin, and Tillerson were anxious to see how this potential gamechanger would play out. As Maddow argues, this “could change Exxon’s future, and Russia’s, and the world’s” (274). Meanwhile, Putin was still dealing with the aftermath of the Crimea annexation and the changing political landscape in Ukraine. In July 2014 a Malaysia Airlines passenger plane was shot down en route to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam. All 283 passengers and 15 crew members were killed as the plane flew over Eastern Ukraine. When the international team that conducted the eventual criminal investigation of the disaster finally released its findings, the report revealed that the plane was shot down by anti-aircraft weapons manufactured in Russia. This damning report caused international outrage. Just as Rosneft and ExxonMobil were about to kick off their Arctic drilling efforts, they now had to wade through international sanctions. Tillerson remained unmoved by the incriminating evidence that the Kremlin had caused the deaths of nearly 300 innocent people.
Chapter 23 Summary: “Pobeda!”
In September 2014 the Obama administration declared that any operations in Russia needed to be ceased by US companies. Despite its power and influence, this included ExxonMobil, which was in the middle of its operations in the Russian Arctic. Soon after the sanctions imposed on Russia, Rosneft struck oil thousands of feet beneath the floor of the Kara Sea. The newly discovered oil field was given the not-so-subtle name of “Pobeda,” which translates simply as “Victory.” But Putin was still hounded by the PR nightmare of the Malaysia Airlines fiasco, the Crimea annexation, and the subsequent sanctions imposed on Russia. Nothing would change him, though, not accusations or sanctions or scrutiny. In the months after Pobeda was discovered, Putin and Sechin eliminated their critics, literally. Boris Nemtsov, Putin’s fiercest critic on the issue of the Crimea annexation, was shot and killed on a walk home after dinner. Standing at a close distance was Rex Tillerson, who presumably didn’t agree with Putin’s methods but who was only concerned with business.
Chapters 21-23 Analysis
These chapters are connected by the recklessness of Big Oil and Gas, which plows through innocent lives, whether in the plains of Oklahoma or on a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. Oklahomans’ expectation that somehow the Big Oil companies would bail them out of economic hardship provides the real human backdrop of the story Maddow paints in these chapters. Meanwhile, Putin and Sechin and Tillerson and Harold Hamm make what they want of the world, all indifferent to the concerns of ordinary citizens or long-term environmental effects.
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