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Today, the world is filled with conflict. Part of the problem is oil limits, but there are many other issues as well:
- Resources such as coal, lithium, and copper are also becoming more expensive to extract.
- Fresh water is often inadequate for the world’s rising population.
- Debt levels are very high.
- Complexity is very high.
- An adequate standard of living is becoming unaffordable for many people.
- The increasing world population leads to a need for more food and more paved roads.
These symptoms strongly suggest that the world economy is headed for a slow-motion collapse.
The system causing the problem is physics-based. Without enough affordable energy of the right types, the economy tends to collapse. This is the predicament we are facing today.
What should ordinary citizens do? I am not certain that there is one correct answer, or that I know it. In this post, I would like to offer some suggestions for discussion.
[1] Every day, give thanks for the many things you do have.
We are at the peak of resources per capita. This means that, as a group, we have as many goods and services as any population that has ever lived. We also have lots of natural resources remaining. We have a huge amount of complexity, with many young people receiving university degrees.
It is easy to lose sight of how much we do have. Most readers of this blog eat a variety of food in the quantities desired. We live in homes that are heated in winter. Even today, many people around the world are not as fortunate as we are.
[2] To the extent possible, stay away from conflict yourself.
The physics of the system will create conflict because the system must change if there is no longer enough oil to ship huge amounts of goods and services across the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans. Perhaps a few highly valued goods and services can be shipped long distance, but patterns must change to put the production of goods and services closer to the consumption of goods and services. This is a major reason why countries are quarreling now.
There is no point in individuals strongly objecting to cutbacks in trade because today’s lack of oil supply is demanding these cuts. The only way one country can lessen the impact of the reduced oil supply is to push the reduction in indirect oil consumption onto another country, using quotas or tariffs on its imports of goods and services. Needless to say, pushing other countries down to benefit one’s own country is likely to create conflict.
Another issue is that with reduced oil and other energy supplies, governments cannot continue to provide as many services as they have in the recent past. They need to reduce the number of government workers in many departments. This is the reason for the many cutbacks by the US Department of Government Efficiency and similar cuts in other countries. It also means that benefit programs, such as those aimed at seniors, the disabled, or hurricane relief, will need to be reduced or eliminated in the future.
We can argue about which programs should be cut back first, but ultimately, all government programs will need to be cut back substantially. Just printing money to try to solve the problem will likely lead to inflation; money doesn’t solve the physics problem we are facing. Energy products of the right kinds are needed for every part of GDP; not having sufficient oil is likely to cut back the supply of goods produced using oil products, including food.
If you get involved in protests, or even in war, you will be putting yourself in harm’s way. And, in the long run, you are unlikely to gain significant benefits personally.
[3] Expect declining complexity in the future.
There are many aspects to complexity:
- Much international trade
- Much debt
- Businesses with multiple layers
- Governments providing a wide range of services, including pension plans and health care
- Energy efficient vehicles
- Appliances that are designed to save energy
- Healthcare with many specialized physicians and high-cost drugs
- Agriculture with many hybrid seeds, herbicides, insecticides, and soil amendments
All these types of complexity will need to be scaled back in the future, but we don’t know precisely to what extent or how rapidly. We cannot go back to old solutions because these won’t necessarily be available. For example, we know from the past that if an economy no longer operates with horses and carriages, it will no longer make buggy whips.
We need to expect a rapidly changing world. Complex appliances we own will fail, and we will not be able to obtain replacement parts. Many drugs imported from Asia will no longer be available. Homes purchased with debt will be affordable by fewer and fewer people. We need to be aware of these issues and change our expectations accordingly.
[4] Expect fewer goods and services to be available in the future, and money to have less value.
We are no longer moving to an ever-better world; we are moving (at least for a few years, perhaps much longer) to a shrinking world economy. Do not be surprised if home values drop and stock market values fall.
Saving money for the future makes less and less sense because fewer goods and services will be available to buy in the future. Even saving gold will not necessarily work around the problem of there being fewer goods to buy. For example, farmers and others involved in producing food will likely get food before others, to assure the continued production of food. This will leave less food for others to buy.
Electricity is likely to become intermittent in the years ahead. It would seem wise to stay away from purchasing condominiums that can only be accessed by elevators.
[5] Focus on the present, not the past or the future.
In our current world, great stress is placed on planning for the future. For example, workers are encouraged to save for retirement, and young people are encouraged to take courses that will allow them to work in a well-paying occupation for the long term. This plan assumes that that the upward trend we have seen in the past will continue. We also expect that governments will be able to make good on their promises.
But we really cannot expect this pattern to continue for the long term. The best we can hope for is that what we have right now will continue. If a family member is lost, the remaining members will need to pick themselves as quickly as possible and continue as best they can. This is one reason an extended family is helpful in Africa. Such an approach will increasingly be helpful elsewhere.
Fossil fuels have made retirement possible. As fossil fuel availability declines, retirement is less likely to be available. Everyone will need to work as long as they are physically available. Thus, saving for retirement becomes a less useful goal.
[6] Living in groups, particularly family groups, will increasingly make sense.
When things were going well, and wages of most educated people were high, it made sense for many people to live by themselves. If they had an argument with their spouse, picking up and leaving might sound like a sensible idea. The job of each spouse would be sufficient to pay for housing for each separately.
As the economy goes downhill, people will need to live in more compact housing in order to save on heating and transportation expenses. Multiple generations will increasingly need to live together. In the case of singles, they will increasingly need to band together. Government programs will likely not be sufficient to provide separate living arrangements for a mother with children or for elderly individuals in care homes.
[7] Young people should not go into debt for higher education.
At this point, the US has educated far too many people with college degrees (and beyond) relative to the number the economy can afford to hire. With declining complexity, adding more college-educated workers to the pool makes little sense.
A better choice for most young people is a short course or certificate program leading to a useful skill, such as appliance repair or becoming a licensed practical nurse. Apprentice programs may also make sense.
If families are wealthy enough to pay for their children’s education, a few people with advanced degrees will probably be needed. There may be some solutions to today’s problems that can be tackled by these individuals.
[8] People will need to be more flexible in their career choices.
As the economy changes, job availability will change. Demand for workers in many of today’s high-paying careers will likely decline. For example, fewer specialty physicians will be needed. There will also be a need for fewer college professors, fewer stock market analysts, and fewer computer programmers.
The most immediate new jobs will involve the demolition of infrastructure that is no longer needed, such as movie theaters, shopping malls, office buildings, and many homes. Some materials will likely be saved for reuse elsewhere. This may involve heavy labor. Smaller, more local stores or open-air markets may open. Jobs previously held by immigrants picking vegetables and fruit will also be available.
How does a person step down from a high-paid desk job to a low-paid manual labor job? I don’t know. But, somehow, we need to be thinking through this issue.
[9] People should focus on taking care of their own health through healthy eating and adequate exercise.
I expect the healthcare industry will be forced to change. One part of the problem will be fewer imported drugs and medical devices; another will be that most people will be less wealthy. They will not be able to afford the enormous costs of today’s bloated US healthcare system. Somehow, the system will need to shrink back.
Fortunately, there is a way that people can become healthier, despite lower spending. People can cook their own food, instead of buying over-processed food available from grocery stores and restaurants. They can eat less meat than the average American eats, and they can stay away from sugary soft drinks. They can exercise more. Part of this exercise can take place by walking to more local markets.
[10] Planting a modest garden, as far as this is possible, is probably a good idea.
Most people do not have sufficient land to plant very much in the way of food crops. In fact, a large share of my readers probably lives in apartment buildings. And most young people, attempting to live on their own, will not have space to grow food crops. The cost of buying land is likely to be high, and property taxes will need to be paid.
If space is available on property that is already owned, fruit trees that grow and bear fruit without the need for pesticide spraying are a good choice. These trees will likely take several years to get started. Potatoes are another reasonable choice, as are vegetables in general.
It is not clear to me that people who set out to operate a self-sufficient farm will have much success. They require a complex infrastructure to support them. Such farms are very vulnerable to robbers and generally don’t have good backup plans if something goes wrong, such as the farmer becoming injured. I wish these individuals success in their endeavors, but I am not optimistic that these farms will succeed beyond their first major setback. We need a bridge to sustainable agriculture, but it is hard for me to see one right now.
[11] Concluding Observation: Why standing back from conflict is a suitable approach.
Most people have a completely mistaken idea regarding what oil limits will look like. They assume that oil limits will lead to very high prices or long lines at gasoline stations. They fail to appreciate that oil limits will arrive at the same time as many other limits, including affordability limits. They also fail to understand that prices that are too low for producers will bring down oil production quickly. In fact, too low oil prices, rather than too high, are the issue the world is facing today.
What oil limits really lead to is lots of conflict: among nations, among political parties, among people who feel that it is unfair that they have spent a lot of money on an advanced education but cannot find a job that pays well enough to repay their education-related debt with interest. As limits of many kinds mentioned in the beginning of this post are hit, today’s economy will need to greatly shrink back in size. Many governmental structures that we expect today, including the EU, the World Bank, and the UN, may disappear.
We don’t know precisely what is ahead over the longer term. Some people believe a religious ending is likely. Other people think that some of the research that is currently underway may eventually lead to a solution. Still others are concerned that some parts of the world will need to shrink back to a very low level, perhaps similar to hunter-gathering, before these economies can grow again.
Regardless of how things play out, it is the physics of the self-organizing system that determines what happens next. No matter how offended we as individuals may feel regarding what some political party or politician has done or has not done, individuals are not able to fix the system, except to the extent that available inexpensive energy supply allows such a fix. This is why standing back from whatever conflict is taking place seems to me to be a suitable strategy.
What do you think will happen to pensions and how soon will we see an effect on them?
In Europe there will be an immediate decrease as the EU agreed to pay a 5% of GDP yearly ransom to the US in the form of weapon purchases. Note that they work poorly in the field or in the air (Pakistan just beat India like a rented mule, and it was mostly Chinese against western tech) so this will not significantly improve Europe’s military standing.
Ursula is the Siphoner in chief and this is what she does best, siphon money out of the countries and into Brussels. In the US I think they will inflate away anything. $15 for espresso and croissant in the morning next year (I spent $9.49 for that in March, and I just spent $1.5 for the same in the small town near here).
>> EU agreed to pay a 5% of GDP yearly ransom
I saw headlines that they’re already walking that back … ?
The usual southern suspects want to peepl off. But I would bet it will stick for the current warmongers and satellite countries. UK, FR, GE, NL, DE… plus the teutonic order countries.
Like Russian pensions in the 1990s. A lot of Stalin’s minions had to survive selling their medals for a few kopeks.
I don’t really know.
To some extent, the overly generous pensions in the US are a product of the 1960s, 1970s, and perhaps early 1980s of the US. Actuaries didn’t understand that the high interest rates of those times could not continue. Also the high growth rates. They also didn’t think through the fact that people would often be getting pensions from several different sources.
As a result, multiple pensions, together with asset price inflation, have made quite a few boomers quite rich.
To a significant extent, these overly generous pensions have already stopped. Defined contribution plans are being used instead, in the US.
I expect that governments will try to push the problem as long as they can. They will cut back healthcare before they will cut back pensions. They will cap pensions at the current level, so inflation becomes a problem.
A major banking collapse could perhaps bring down the overall financial system, but I don’t know when that might occur.
The new legislation on abortion and assisted dying in the UK is badly in need of serious comment, and as I’m too shocked by the recent barbarous developments to comment myself, I am daring to present what some will consider a reactionary one that struck me as being “out of the ark”, as in being far too logical and commonsensical to be acceptable in 21st century Blighty.
England’s Mandatory Suicide & Women
by Briggs
You will have heard about the slow-motion suicide of the English has now made mandatory by their rulers, who evidently have grown tired of living with each other. And, since they are exhausted, they assume by their expertise commoners must be, too. Or, if they are not, they will be made to be.
Women there have ensured they can kill off their offspring, right up until the moment of birth, and, as these things go, likely for some time after that, too. They justify this by saying the lives inside them are not really alive, and are instead part of their, the killer-mothers’, bodies. This is married to the premise that women have a “right” to do whatever they like to their own bodies. That neither of the premises which allow the killing are remotely true does not matter. So the wee throats are slit. Sacrificed to the gods of Utility.
Though I gather the full passage of the law is not complete for some Lordly reason or another, England’s rulers also made it mandatory to start killing off people at the other end of the life. Old and unhappy English, or their representatives, will now to be able to ask quacks to kill them, or their charges, which the quacks will do. The state will pay for it, too. (If you enjoy life, stay away from doctors.) This is the place for the hackneyed Soylent Green joke, because we haven’t any idea what they’ll do with the corpses.
Although the other races crowding into Olde Merrie will be allowed to participate in these jollities, the great majority of the victims will be the English themselves. Their young are now a minority in many places, and because of these new laws, soon in all places. Of course, their replacements, not being as tired of life, when they are the majority will be able to vote themselves anything they want, so it’s not likely these laws will be permanent. They’ll last just long enough to clear most of the English out.
You may, in the excitement over these new laws, have missed a third category. The championing of “hate” laws. Many are arrested daily in England for sending “offensive” social media posts, which you know. Normal English themselves are not allowed to be offended, though, so it is largely only they who are arrested—and sentenced quite harshly. New laws would make “hate” itself illegal, especially “hate” directed toward pet Victims.
Though the set is complicated, all three categories rely in good part on the same feminine root. All were surely inevitable in these forms once women were allowed, by weak or ill-educated men, to participate in politics.
It is a characteristic of the breed—on average: we speak in generalities here—that in any argument women do not enjoy admitting error. Many react in horror at the idea. Like men, they want to get their way. Still, there are times in an argument when the facts prove a position wrong. When the facts are plain and agreed upon, even loudly and rudely, men will admit defeat. But for women, this is when the tears come out, or when the tone of the argument becomes a substitute for the argument itself. This explains the old joke, “It’s not what you said, it’s the way you said it.”
In early feminism we had women saying they were the equal of men and so demanded to be treated no differently than men. The fact is false the desire untrue. Tell a female colleague, “Boy, you’re really packing it on. You become any rounder and we can use you as a basketball”, which I once heard one man say to another (who laughed), and she will (a) likely cry, or (b) contact HR and have you punished for creating a “hostile” environment.
Women do not want fairness or equality, they want their way, and, like men, who also want their way, use the tools available to them to get it.
This is for women in the wild, and not in organized politics. And is natural behavior in a sex that is more or less physically powerless against a stronger one. Once women reach politics they do not replace their natures, because of course none of us can, so instead of tears and tone-shifts we have women pushing rules (in the workplace) and laws (on all of us) which forbid making women feel bad.
Here’s a female MP on the third set of new laws:”I’m delighted the government has accepted my amendment to make hate crimes against LGBT+ and disabled people aggravated offences, and will now table an amendment in the House of Lords to make it happen.”
A “hate” crime is being caught disagreeing with the moral position this lady, and other ladies, have taken. Nothing more. All “hate” crimes are feminine, or effeminate for men who tout them. They ensure persons holding peculiar positions never hear a discouraging word, or, if they do, the discourager is punished in the public square. Men will make laws, say, banning regime criticism or public disagreement with religious dogma. But the laws would be backed by logical argument, however flawed. It wouldn’t occur to men to ban “hate”.
It does to women. That’s why England has laws that make it a crime to silently pray where women are doing what they know they be wrong, but demand not to be shamed for. They have even made negative (to them) thought illegal. It is no coincidence they define areas in which certain thought is illegal “safe zones”. There is no increased risk of physical danger, but shame causes pain, and pain is “unsafe”.
I take it as plain that systematic laws supporting women killing their kids would not exist were women not in politics. True, with only men in politics there would be the odd infanticide and abortion, but it wouldn’t be programmatic, routine, and touted openly as good and “healthful” and the like as it is under women. The one exception to men, a return to patriarchal paganism, is scarcely likely, so a new public cult which sacrifices children to obscure gods won’t arise. Anyway, without women in politics there certainly wouldn’t be any laws against shaming women who get abortions.
Now there is a strong unisex (Enlightenment) utilitarian impulse to killing off those considered useless. And both men and women agree that if you’re going to kill, since we live in an Expertocracy, it’s best to have Experts doing the slaughtering. Thus if only men were in politics, these same utilitarian laws on doctor killings would have some chance of being passed. But there would not be the emotional blackmail we now see used to push the laws.
Why kill? Because tears. Because kindness and compassion, women’s special purview, though here put to ill use. Here’s a lady thinking how nice it will be when all are systematically slaughtered. It’s not surprising women pushing doctor deaths use “choice” as a key argument. What women (in these movements) choose to do is morally desirable, by definition. Only now the “right” to do what they like with their “own” bodies will be extended to your body.
We’ve already seen in other countries the Slippery Slope of doctor killings is well greased, so it’s rational to suppose it will be in England, too. Women’s misapplied pity, and many lures of utilitarianism, will broaden the categories of eligibility inexorably. Of course, outside war abortion is the most efficient means of killing, abetted greatly here by disallowing any live critique. The second most efficient way of killing, in a sense, was that first emphasized by Thomas Malthus, which is to prevent conception in the first place. And this Pride (in all its glories) does nicely, also accompanied by those laws which make it illegal to criticize.
There is no solution, save the age old one of waiting out the inexorable grinding down of all things wrought by democracies, with its emphasis on Equality. So suicide for England it is.
https://www.wmbriggs.com/post/57010/
Our food system is terribly flawed, as we have created a food system for masses that is neither healthy, not sustainable.
Production of grains with their sugar content and lack of other nutrients provides only poor food. With the possibility of importing tropical fruits, we have somewhat fixed it. But still, reliance on grains is a curse.
The need for population decline is thus deeply ingrained in our populations. With all the resources becoming more expensive and unaffordable, all meaning is lost: poor food, poor living conditions.
Nobody can stop the population decline, as the reason for it is the human greed for high population that due to its poor nutrition succumbs to diseases that will erase it anyway.
It is a sadness about our own greed, how we hide our poor nutrition under fancy clothes: like Adam and Eve that ate the wrong fruit in the Eden and realized that they are naked, vulnerable.
Belief in heavenly bread is thus a distant reminder of this original sin when we moved from quality food to food with high sugar content and high protein content to gain more strength. But this temporary strength meant crossing the limits which means that our population is always beyond its limits and the human society is both sad and ridiculous drama about constant failures.
Greenies never seem to learn. “You’re Welcome”: Pennsylvania Boasts About Saving ‘Green’ Maryland From Near Power Grid Collapse”
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/youre-welcome-pennsylvania-boasts-about-saving-green-maryland-power-grid-collapse
From the article:
“Regular rolling blackouts could become reality for Baltimore-area residents if a lack of energy supplied to the power grid remains unaddressed, Baltimore Gas and Electric Company Vice President Electric Operations Steven Singh warned.”
The situation depends on exports from elsewhere, particularly fairly nearby Pennsylvania, to fix its shortfall.
TACO .
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/crude-slides-after-trump-says-china-can-continue-purchase-oil-iran
Well, he seems really worried. So he goes to war with a shale patch about to go belly up, and now he begs China to buy more oil.
Does that mean Trump has approved Iran’s selectively shutting down Hormuz?
He is probably generating random numbers by now.
Lol then the materialists would say he’s gone back to Source. Lucky man.
WTI is now $64.88 per barrel. US$ is down some more.
Speaking about Richshaws, the first Rickshaw was invented by an American in Japan around 1869. His name is either Jonathan Goble or Jonathan Scobie, but whatever the real name was, he was an American.
France claims something like that existed in there, and some Americans claim there were rickshaws invented for a US missionary leaving for South America previously (although that seems to be unlikely since SA had no shortage of horses while in Japan horses were only for the samurai class), but every single source agrees that a Roundeye invented it.
During World War 2 some Japanese, knowing they are not inventive, created the story of two fictitious Japanese gentlemen who invented it in 1869, a claim quietly buried after 1945.
Now Rickshaws are usually combined with bicycles since it is more efficient, but the moral is Asians cannot invent anything to save themselves.
Rickshaws seem to come in different versions.
1. A seat with two wheels attached, that could be pulled by a human or animal using the poles attached.
2. A bicycle rickshaw, pulled with a bicycle.
3. An auto rickshaw, with one small wheel in front.
This is a photo of an auto rickshaw I saw in India, at a place where these rickshaws picked up and dropped off passengers.
https://ourfiniteworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/auto-rickshaw.jpeg
We were all taught in school that the printing press with movable type was invented in Germany by Johannes Gutenberg in about the year 1550. Not so. China not only invented paper but also the printing press with movable set type, which was in common use in China 1,000 years before Gutenberg was born. Similarly, we were taught that Englishman James Watt invented the steam engine. He did not. Steam engines were in widespread use in China 600 years before Watt was born. There are dated ancient texts and drawings to illustrate and prove the Chinese discovered and documented “Pascal’s Triangle” 600 years before Pascal copied it, and the Chinese enunciated Newton’s First Law of Motion 2,000 years before Newton.
…
The Chinese invented the decimal number system, decimal fractions, negative numbers, and the zero, so far in the past that the origin is lost in the mists of time. The Chinese tracked sunspots and comets with such detail and accuracy that these ancient records are still used as the basis for their prediction and observation today. The Chinese were drilling for natural gas about 2,500 years ago, wells 4,800 feet deep, with bamboo pipelines to deliver the gas to nearby cities. The Chinese pioneered the mining and use of coal long before it was known in the West.\\
…
China had printed paper money almost 1,500 years ago, done in ways to prevent counterfeiting. Wrapping paper, paper napkins and toilet paper were all in general use in China 2,000 years before the West could produce them. They were the first to invent and develop a full mechanical clock with a true escapement, many centuries before the Swiss had done so. The Chinese invented an ingenious seismograph still in use that tells not only the severity but the direction and distance of earthquakes. The Chinese invented hot-air balloons, the parachute, manned flight with kites, the wheelbarrow and matches. They invented hermetically-sealed laboratories for scientific experiments. They invented belt and chain drives, the paddlewheel steamer, the helicopter rotor and the propeller, the segmental-arch bridge. They invented the use of water power and chain pumps, the crank handle, all the construction methods for suspension bridges, sliding calipers, the fishing reel, image projection, magic lanterns, the gimbal system of suspension. China not only invented spinning wheels, carding machines and looms, but was the world’s leader in technical innovations in textile manufacturing, more than 700 years before Britain’s 18th century textile revolution.
Chinese expertise with fine porcelain was so advanced millennia ago, that even today it is admitted their ability has never even been equaled in the West, much less surpassed. The Chinese discovered not only magnetism but magnetic remanence and induction, as well as the compass. They invented gunpowder, smoke bombs, the cannon, the crossbow, plated body armor, fireworks, flamethrowers, grenades, land and sea mines, multi-stage rockets, mortars and repeating guns. China had irrigation canals that were also used for transport, and the Chinese invented the canal locks that could raise and lower boats to different levels 1,500 years before the Americans built the Panama Canal. China has earthquake-proof dams functioning today that were built around 250 BC.
https://www.unz.com/lromanoff/history-of-chinese-inventions-the-present-and-the-future-recent-chinese-state-of-the-art-innovations/
And before Joseph Needham compiled the history of Chinese technology in 1950s, nobody, including the Chinese, knew any of them existed.
Can you ever admit that non-white people have actually invented things?
Maybe 1000 years ago. But nothing relevant to modern civilization.
Math and canal locks are extremely relevant to modern civ. As is paper in its various forms.
Modern civilization wouldn’t exist without previous iterations. Civilization was created by Semitic peoples, not Anglo-Saxons.
Specially now, that China leads in 59 out of 64 crucial technologies worldwide?
All stilen or sold from the west
you wish. They dominate all solid state research, and honestly, western engineers suck. perhaps we will get to see some great aerial battle over the Iraqi skies, after which we will achieve consensus.
It is easy to get wrong ideas if a person only reads books by Western authors.
Why is (almost) everyone surprised that bombs are flying and people (especially children, babies) are suffering and dying? If one prepares for war conflict, it’s what one has..the the biggest lie is the opposite.
Even Addie Hitter pointed the obvious back in Greater Germany (the original for coining the expression “Make Germany Gear Again).
It is reported he once remarked to a reporter in so many words, ” Why is everyone surprised about this at all. Do you think I created this military only to showcase in parades?”
Time to be honest with ourselves…sorry, obviously too much to ask..
Agree Mike. Many of us have known for 15 years now that they would use war in order to provide political cover for peak oil Collapse, Hand or no Hand. Covert, supranational Degrowth Agenda or no covert, supranational Degrowth Agenda. War is conservation by other means, as Steve Ludlum would put it.
The world cannot support the current population. This is the obvious problem.
I heard that before also…
Lebensraum” is a German word meaning “living space”. It was a key concept in Nazi ideology, particularly in the context of expansionism and racial policy. The Nazis used the concept to justify their territorial ambitions in Europe, especially in Eastern Europe, by claiming that Germany needed more land for its population and to establish a Greater German Reich.
And that was when the planet had @2 billion…
Suppose we’ll find always find some reason to do it
Lebensraum from the Third Reich’s perspective was the reestablishment of the Germanic territory of the Second Reich. Re- being the operative prefix. That makes it a cultural policy and not a racial policy. There were many Jews and part-jews among the Reich’s ranks. The godfather of the cultural policy himself, Aldred Rosenberg, was full jew.
Alfred
Here’s what AI says:
“The surname Rosenberg is both of German origin and is also a common name among Ashkenazi Jews. It is a habitational name meaning “rose mountain” and can be found in various locations. While not exclusively Jewish, it’s a relatively common surname within the Jewish community, particularly among Ashkenazi Jews with roots in Central and Eastern Europe.”
So Jewish people could have copied the existing German name, just as black Americans are more likely to be called Smith than Kdogo. “Alfred Rosenberg” is not a definitively obvious Jewish name in the way that say Moishe Cohen would be in England.
I have also never read that Alfred Rosenberg had or was suspected of having Jewish ancestry, in the way that say Heydrich allegedly was. Nazi party members were required not to have any Jewish parents or grandparents. Admittedly, some members did have such ancestry that wasn’t found out, who managed to join because they didn’t look Jewish but were also committed to the Nazi cause.
If you were Jewish but not a party member, you might be tolerated. When Himmler told Hitler in 1943 that his (Hitler’s) cook was Jewish, Hitler replied: “Aryanise her!”
Reante might be right. It is possible that he was in fact a Jew but history was rewritten extensively after WWII, and a Jew in that position would not fit with today’s narrative. I guess we will not easily know.
Thanks. That funny anecdote about Hitler’s vegan cook is a fine example of Aryanism philosophy. Arya means noble (of mind) in Sanskrit. Maybe you know that already. I think it’s funny because I assume that Hitler was joking but the joke also implies that Ashkenazim — or at least some subset of them — could of course be noble minded, too, under the right circumstances. Obviously they weren’t the cardboard villains they were made out to be however demagogic their governance also obviously was.
Though his dad was a merchant, which doesn’t necessarily mean anything, I figure that his parents just were not practicing. Secular. Who knows before that? It’s highly possible that the family had a different name altogether at some point before that. Like I said, if Rosenbaum, and Rosen, are unequivocally Ashkenazi for religious reasons then Rosenberg is also very much looking the part. How many gentiles are really going to be named after a mountain with roses growing on it?
” How many gentiles are really going to be named after a mountain with roses growing on it?”
Rosberg is a decently common swedish name. Ashkenazi surnames and swedish surnames (and probably also to some extent norwegian surnames) are often constucted in the same way. Just different languages.
There is a huge variation of surnames containing the word berg in Sweden.
Alfred Rosenberg was not joo-ish at all. You’re just assuming that because his name ended in “berg”. Ms. Tverberg will feel insulted now.
Are you sure. On what grounds? What about the Rosen part? Ashkenazis have been in Germany for a very long time.
Why does AI say that Rosenberg is generally Ashkenazi but not always, and on the basis that Rosenburg is a German toponym for “rose mountain” yet the surname Rosenbaum is universally acknowledged as Ashkenazi despite that it means “rose tree?” Welcome to the mainstream Matrix, wherein so-called ‘Nazis’ are not allowed to be black sheep ethnic Ashkenazis fighting against Old Testament Capitalism. Because that would help confirm that Rosenberg’s Aryanism wasn’t a racist philosophy but a cultural philosophy that was militantly anti-mercantilist.
Why would the Reich elites deny being Jews? Because Jews are religious adherents of Judaism and they weren’t adherents. They were radical anti-capitalist identitarian German nationalists.
Besides, the rose of Rosen- is one of the greatest symbols of Judaism. A rose among thorns. The kabbalah tree of life is a 13 petaled rose.
And Yiddish is an early Germanic language because Khazaria was an eastern European kingdom.
Biology has had a long history of adaptation. It will adapt, that process may not be linear but have a few blind alleys.
It will be bumpy, a cubic mile of Pt would go along way to solving at least some problems.
Dennis L.
Next month the Indian automotive industry stops . No perma magnets from China .
https://www.rediff.com/business/report/rare-earth-magnet-importers-consider-force-majeure/20250623.htm
Are they still able to manufacture bicycles and rickshaws?
If so , no need to panic only if all their footwear is imported like in the United States from China and other Sh#tole places
Yes, the world needs more bicycles and rickshaws.
Well, you escaped MN to the south. We still have snow and ice in winter, pretty funny trying to haul a rickshaw up an inclined road with a bit of ice and snow.
How quickly we forget.
Dennis L.
I think a big part of the problem (at least in the west) is that private automobile owner helps generate a lot of taxes, fees and jobs. That is why the west wants to promote electric cars over bicycles and public transportation.
These new battery aided bicycles also have RE magnets.
The plain old ones are more sustainable.
Roads are hard to maintain, however.
No problem,as Addie Hitter pointed out about maintenance issues, just put twice as many
bodies as needed and give them twice as less.
Problem solved… Albert Speer as apt in seeing it got done…of course, he later claimed he was unaware what less was given..
So, he also said that was no excuse and he should have known and he shared the quilt and spared the hangsman loose
What’s up with Kurt Cobb thinking that south China sea tensions are caused by untapped oil and gas reserves in the region? He been standing still since 2010, 2015?
Kurt Cobb links to this 2024 report by the EIA, regarding resources in the South Sea.
https://www.eia.gov/international/content/analysis/regions_of_interest/South_China_Sea/south_china_sea.pdf
I suggest you look more closely, yourself. And quit being so critical of others.
I looked thank you and I don’t see that at this late date these hydrocarbons will make much difference at all, if any, to the fate of these nations. Do you?
I’m not criticizing Cobb for standing still. He can do whatever he wants. I’m just characterizing it as such because systems theory is a living field that always grows alongside events. That’s a crucial point in peak oil theory. You know that as well as I do because you do it just as well as I do, which is why I’m still here despite your growing censorship.
I wish you were not so argumentative with other posters. Fossil fuels that can be extracted economically will likely be extracted. I don’t know details about the economics of extraction of these fields.
I’ll try harder thanks Gail but your making me debate ideas with david with one hand tied behind my back only puts more of a chip on my shoulder. Especially when you know full well what david is doing during those conversations. If you want to make a rule that neither of us can talk to each other then that would be fair. I’m only human.
To me, the south China sea stuff just clearly falls into the category of Greenland. It would have been tapped a decade ago if it was going to be tapped at all because the world was wealthier a decade ago. If we can’t collective own fundamental concepts like that then it inhibits building progress of the systems theory.
Obviously there’s a grain of truth to Cobb’s analysis because all of those regional bureaucracies are not operating on peak oil theory, so it stands to reason that they would be increasingly territorial over these hydrocarbons given the state of the world economy, but that doesn’t mean that, to us, their territorialism isn’t misplaced, and also that the territorialism doesn’t make them more easily manipulated by the Hand which needs to manage the unwinding of globalized trade arrangements all over the planet via misplaced political theatrics.
To be fair, David can be provocative, and when he objects to something someone else has said, he can be as argumentative is Reante.
Reante is younger, I believe, and on that count alone it’s only natural that he has more fight in him.
I’m not saying either one of them is wrong. Indeed, neither of them is wrong to argue or even to provoke the other. It’s a guy thing. Just rough boys’ fun and games. And I love ’em both.
It’s also a matter of different conversation styles. We assume we are all speaking/writing the same language, but we don’t always understand the impact or the impression of our choice of words or our conversation style on other people. (Although sometimes we do, or course. And it is naughty to deliberately provoke others, of course.)
But Gail at her time of life doesn’t want to have to act as a referee between young (or middle-aged) bucks who like to lock horns and head butt each other. Having the burden of moderating this sort of thing must be very hard on her nerves.
It has taken her a year to recover from all the moderation work Fast Eddy gave her. 🙂
Anyway, no real harm done. Far worse things happen at sea, or in Gaza or the Donbas.
“To be fair, David can be provocative, and when he objects to something someone else has said, he can be as argumentative asReante.”
true!
I see lots of fast doomer nonnnsense.
it will be gradual slow degrowth for the next few decades!
the end of IC only in the 2nd half of this century!
BAU tonight, baby!
I’m beginning to wonder whether China is having production issues with rare earth magnets. Perhaps some of the inputs are becoming difficult to extract, or they need more diesel for extraction. Whatever the cause, importers want a lot more rare earth magnets, and I am suspicious that China does not have them to sell, especially if it needs a good supply for its own use.
Also a consideration, pollution. China appears to have done a good job with pollution in the last years, rare earths(an oxymoron) are not that scarce but refining it is a mess. CA in the US was a source and while I cannot site the source, I recall it was too dirty for CA so they outsourced it.
SpaceX seems to be having problems, we need to get mining, refining and manufacturing off our spaceship earth. The last static test was disappointing.
Dennis L.
You are right. Pollution, and the difficulty of containing it, may be an issue.
The orange man is crying in his beer that no one is paying any attention to him. It was so wonderful while it lasted, to be the queen of the dance. walk away from this if you can, moron. 3 US soldiers killed in iraq.
Wasn’t he the one that claimed he would end the war in Ukraine and have a deal with Iran within
Fact check: It wasn’t ‘in jest.’ Here are 53 times Trump said he’d end Ukraine war within 24 hours or before taking office
By Daniel Dale, CNN
https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/25/politics/fact-check-trump-ukraine-war
Well, I said that figuratively, and I said that as an exaggeration, because to make a point, and you know, it gets, of course, by the fake news [unintelligible]. Obviously, people know that when I said that, it was said in jest, but it was also that it will be ended,” Trump said, according to Time’s transcript.
This “in jest” claim is a lie.
On the campaign trail in 2023 and 2024, Trump said on dozens of occasions, in an entirely serious tone, manner and context, that he would end the war in Ukraine either within 24 hours of his return to the White House or even sooner than that. He said over and over again, including at both presidential debates of 2024, that he would have the war “settled” when he was president-elect, before his inauguration.
Trump Said He Would Be a ‘Peace President’ But ‘It Was All Lies,’ Say Critics
Trump campaigned to stop “endless war,” but now he’s bringing the U.S. into a dangerous new one.
Stephen Prager
Jun 23, 2025
On the campaign trail, Trump lambasted his predecessor, Joe Biden, as a “warmonger,” promising to end the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza. However, both conflicts not only continue to rage, but have grown bloodier.
Massacres by Israel Defense Forces soldiers in U.S.-administered aid sites have ramped up in recent months as Israel advances with what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described in February as “U.S. President Trump’s plan for the creation of a different Gaza.”
As Trump has abandoned talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Russian aerial attacks on Ukraine have likewise surged in recent weeks. Shortly after Trump’s airstrikes on Iran, the Kremlin launched over 300 drones and dozens of missiles at Kyiv, leaving seven people dead and 31 injured, according to The Washington Post.
So, all I can add we knew what we were getting…
Poor guy can’t make everyone happy. Israel-first administration and neocons vs MAGA non-interventionists, he just wants to be liked!
Honey, I am tired and ashamed of our infantile serial lying. Tonight you are sleeping on the couch.
Donald, tweeting from the couch: UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!
There are lots of powers that be that need to be satisfied. Trump, like other leaders, needs to satisfy them. Even if he wants to stop wars, and his constituents want to stop wars, he can’t do that directly. Once the supply of ammunition runs out, wars of the current kind will have to stop. We seem to be reaching that point, quickly.
“The orange man is crying in his beer that no one is paying any attention to him.” Maybe, maybe not. He publicly had planes going to Guam in two weeks or less, they flew direct in a few days. Metaphorically, they did not come from the east but the west.
Have no idea of middle east politics but do recall that the enemy of my enemy is my friend or some such.
The world has many problems, sometimes a band aid is better than nothing.
Dennis L.
You are a very intelligent man. Our President has the ultimate wealth, five children, eleven grandchildren.
For all the rancor against him, his achievements are not trivial and in the US there have only been 45 men who have achieved the Presidency. That is a very small group, competition is fierce.
It is not a job which lends itself to making friends, Germany and Japan come to mind; stormy relationships at times.
Dennis L.
why, he has been nominated for the Nobel Prize now!
All wars are resource wars . Kurt Cobb ,
https://resourceinsights.blogspot.com/2025/06/the-turbulent-globe-resources-and.html#more
A major point Kurt Cobb makes is
“But it’s not just energy, of course, which invites conflict. Water resources are becoming increasingly a focal point of contention.”
I am still reading the occasional post by GVB (Geert Vanden Bossche, or the Great Vaccinologist Belgian), and he often comes up with ideas I am unfamiliar with. For instance, be careful what you gargle with!
In his latest Substack post, he states:
For those who’re curious how SARS-CoV-2 has been gaining function in highly C-19 vaccinated populations:
Back when Omicron hit, lots of people with high levels of vaccine-induced antibodies got that infamous razor-blade throat (me included—I caught Omicron just weeks after recovering from Delta). That was likely antibody-dependent enhancement of infection (ADEI), which made the virus more infectious and triggered severe inflammation. Now, we’re seeing similar symptoms again, but it seems to be more about the virus being highly infectious on its own, plus weakened innate antiviral responses (especially due to suppression of interferons). The good news (for now) is that the inflammatory reaction following more vigorous infection mostly keeps the infection in the upper respiratory tract—probably because it helps the virus bind to local dendritic cells there. However, from what we’re hearing, it’s not always the case, and in certain regions, the hospitalization rates have already risen quite a bit. What really worries me is that if repeated exposure of C-19 vaccinees keeps compromising their innate immunity, viral replication could get way more intense and long-lasting. That increases the likelihood for a new variant that suppresses inflammatory responses to suddenly dominate in prevalence. If that happens, we’re in trouble: the virus would have a huge competitive advantage—not only already largely resistant to adaptive immunity, but now also able to sideline the innate immune response in large parts of highly C-19 vaccinated populations. That’s when we’d start seeing serious virulence!
So, bottom line:
The virus no longer focuses on evading vaccine-induced adaptive immunity since the host immune system is now increasingly mobilizing more innate immune capacity to restrain the virus. As innate immunity is not targeted at specific antigens, the virus is just sabotaging it broadly—giving itself more time and more room to multiply. And the more abundantly it multiplies, the higher the chance that some random mutation lets it breach that last line of immune defense by shutting down inflammation altogether. Dysfunctional adaptive immunity combined with compromised innate immunity, plus warm weather, is cranking up the pressure in highly C-19 vaccinated populations to keep the virus infectious. Which means—if such a mutation happens, it could spread like wildfire and outcompete all the other variants out there. I don’t know exactly when that’s going to happen, but I have a strong feeling we’ll see it this summer. That said, since the collective immune pressure in highly C-19 vaccinated populations is no longer selective, the diversified mutation patterns we’re seeing now don’t really predict where the virus is headed next.
My advice? Have a solid 3-month emergency plan ready. You might need it if we get hit with a full-blown pandemic resurgence that knocks out key parts of society. In the meantime, just stash the plan in a drawer and live your life.
If you’re vaccinated, make sure you’ve got access to antivirals. f you’re unvaccinated, your (trained!) innate immunity is still your first—not your last!—line of immune defense, and you shouldn’t gargle daily with antiseptics as some medical doctors suggest—that could prevent continued training of your innate immune system! Focus instead on staying healthy: eat well, keep your weight in check, move your body, and get good sleep.
https://voiceforscienceandsolidarity.substack.com/p/when-the-first-line-of-immune-defense
Nicely written, concise and ideas follow well.
Thanks,
Dennis L.
“Japan Releases Bombshell Vax vs. Unvax Data on 18 Million People”
https://www.vigilantfox.com/p/japan-releases-bombshell-vax-vs-unvax?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
7 NBA players tore their achilles tendons this season, which is consistent with my outlier theory that the mRNA are classified broad-spectrum tumor signaling exosomes that were either scrubbed from the BLAST database or they are simply ones that were never entered into the database. Tumor exosomes are extremely genetically diverse. The main traumatic effect of these injections is fibrotic disease wherein one of the two main classes of these exosomes signal to fibroblasts to vastly upregulate fibrin production which wreaks havoc on tissues. Achilles tendons are doing more heavy lifting in basketball than any other body part. If they are suffering from too much tendinopathy/tendonitis from fibrotic disease they are liable to snap just like if the heart wall is suffering from too much fibrotic disease it gets diagnosed as myocarditis. See the pattern.
that is actually interesting, thanks for that.
Too-late trigger warning for david.
It’s that ‘low’ because the marginal consumer is getting poorer all the time even if you aren’t david. Which means it’s less affordable. Affordability is the peak oil theory systems metric.
Ivermectin is from a family of esters which are alcohols. Alcohols cut fat. It is highly fat-soluble and at the right, low dose it can destroy the super-delicate lipid membranes of infinitesimally small ‘viruses’ (signaling exosomes) while only stressing larger and thicker cell membranes. That’s all it is, no special magic involved. There is no special magic in conventional medicine, just the imperial blunt force from conspiratorial surgical strikes.
“Since it was proposed as a potential host-directed antiviral agent for SARS-CoV-2, the antiparasitic drug ivermectin has been investigated thoroughly in clinical trials, which have provided insufficient support for its clinical efficacy. To examine the potential for ivermectin to be repurposed as an antiviral agent, we therefore undertook a series of preclinical studies. Consistent with early reports, ivermectin decreased SARS-CoV-2 viral burden in in vitro models at low micromolar concentrations, five- to ten-fold higher than the reported toxic clinical concentration. At similar concentrations, ivermectin also decreased cell viability and increased biomarkers of cytotoxicity and apoptosis. Further mechanistic and profiling studies revealed that ivermectin nonspecifically perturbs membrane bilayers at the same concentrations where it decreases the SARS-CoV-2 viral burden, resulting in nonspecific modulation of membrane-based targets such as G-protein coupled receptors and ion channels. These results suggest that a primary molecular mechanism for the in vitro antiviral activity of ivermectin may be nonspecific membrane perturbation, indicating that ivermectin is unlikely to be translatable into a safe and effective antiviral agent. These results and experimental workflow provide a useful paradigm for performing preclinical studies on (pandemic-related) drug repurposing candidates.”
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10634736/
david you are feeling pressed and jumping to conclusions. Three months from now you’re going to have a hard time participating at all if you keep this up.
Amazing report. I lived there for over one year and consider the Japanese medical system the best I have encountered out of 7 countries (I also admire many aspects of their culture). Note how little the global elites have penetrated Japan culturally. And this is hardly the only time I have seen them do this. In 2015 another high impact paper showed that high cholesterol leads to longer life expectancy. You will not get many prescriptions for statins there, and the paper has since been quietly removed from google searches.
Data look impressive. I wish this was an article in the peer reviewed literature. As it is, it is difficult for others to quote. The images are quite fuzzy. The image showing the separate results has Japanese captions. I hope it will make it into Peer Reviewed literature, with exhibits in English.
cases, hospitalisations ……..
The data in Germany – with which I am most familiar – shows that in the 2020 there was no increase either in respiratory infections or in hospital occupancy rates.
In my city the death rate remained unchained. Since 6% of deaths in that year were attributed to ‘covid’, that meant that ‘non-covid’ causes of death fell by a corresponding amount.
GVB’s arguments are dependent on long chains of – to non-specialists – opaque reasoning. He’s made such wide of the mark predictions in the past that I wouldn’t take him too seriously, lthough perhaps he is right that the blunt pencil of the virus has been sharpened by the jabs. Thanks for reporting anyway,
Tim, I believe you reside in Japan. I have never visited, but am fascinated by what appears from the outside to be Japan’s social breakdown – plunging birth rates, hikikomori, atomisation et al.
Would you care to give your informed opinion? Where is this going?
Thanks in advance.
I’m not sure I can give you a satisfactory reply, but if you’ll permit me to ramble a bit, I’ll try. I’ve lived in Japan for over 40 years, and I speak the language and read the daily newspaper at breakfast time, but I don’t follow the society in the sort of detail that a native would. Also, I live in the countryside, and am out of touch with how the vast majority who live in the cities are thinking and feeling.
As a very broad generalization, Japanese people tend to be socially conservative and conventional, and now that the population has aged, this conservatism has deepened. Also, they don’t show their feelings in public as much as Americans and Europeans do. This makes most Japanese appear calm and unfazed on the surface.
But I do talk to people when I can, and I get the impression that a lot of them are vaguely worried about the country’s future but at the same time fairly content in their own lives because (a) they are busily employed at making and spending money, and (b) there isn’t much evidence of social collapse or breakdown if you don’t specifically look for it.
Hikikomori and have been hiding in their parents’ home for as long as I’ve been here. These are people who practice voluntary social isolation to escape the social dynamics that put them under psychological pressure. Often they rely on their parents to provide them with food and shelter. Sometimes this goes on for decades, or until the parents are dead. Other hikikomori live alone and some work remotely and hold down careers without having to meet and mingle very much socially.
Interestingly, the hikikomori lifestyle has been found to be associated with autistic traits and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). And regardless of the root causes of hikikomori or of autism, modern society with the computerization of so much work, entertainment, and communication, has enabled the hikikomori lifestyle.
Japan isn’t exactly a basket case. It has managed to hold onto a lot of its manufacturing industry, particularly high-tech, and it has excellent transport and communication infrastructures. The cities are very safe and fairly tidy, although often ugly, the trains run on time, and a formal politeness is the order of the day. Shop staff will greet customers politely regardless of whether the former are having a ratty day or not. Even the policemen are polite. The last time a patrolling officer spoke to me, he began with the Japanese equivalent of, “Excuse me, may I ask your name?”
There is little in the way of what the English call “Bloody-mindedness” in Japan. You can go out in the expectation that nobody will mug you, scream abuse at you, beg you for money, or corner you a supermarket aisle and start telling you their life story. If you lose your wallet or mobile phone, it will almost certainly be returned to you in my experience. Contrast this with some places in the UK, where you only have to put your phone or wallet down on a cafe table in order to risk somebody pinching it.
Where is this going? Prediction is difficult, especially about the future. The Japanese population is bound to continue declining as there are not enough young adults to sustain a large enough baby boom to reverse the trend, but immigration from nearby human-resource-rich nations such as China, Vietnam, and the Philippines may ameliorate the decline.
This, once enough Chinese, Vietnamese and Filipinos are settled in Japan, is bound to change the culture, possibly in the direction of making the cities more like Singapore. The Japanese hardly need police patrolling the streets, because effectively they have a policeman inside their heads. The non-Japanese, not so much. So they would need to be policed and controlled more by rules and laws that spell out precisely what they are not allowed to do.
Apart from that, it depends on how big and nasty the economic crises that grip the world are going to become. No country can escape getting hit by The End of More. And the geographical proximity to China could be a major issue if the latter goes to war against the US. But I don’t expect Japan to plunge into anarchy or civil war. If it goes down, it is more likely to go down like the Titanic, with the women and children getting the lifeboats.
Many thanks Tim.Very interesting!
Interesting!
quite trivial advice, no? eat well, sleep well, the immune system will take care of things 99% of the time. in extreme cases get some antiviral.
Quite!
As if anyone wants to eat badly and sleep badly.
It’s like advice that tells you to “eat a healthy balanced diet”.
Everyone wants to do that. The question is what exactly ‘is’ a healthy balanced diet. People can have different opinions and do.
Ah, but a lot of people do eat badly and sleep badly notwithstanding their wants.
It’s past my bedtime now, and I am still on the internet!
Israel and Iran agree to a ceasefire.
The Don’s Nobel Peace Prize should be in the bag now!
Iran and Israel have agreed to ceasefire – Trump
The Middle East archrivals will end their “12-day war,” the US president wrote on his Truth Social platform
Iran and Israel have agreed to end hostilities, US President Donald Trump claimed on Monday evening. The announcement came hours after Iran fired missiles at a US military base in Qatar, in response to American strikes on its nuclear facilities.
“It has been fully agreed by and between Israel and Iran that there will be a Complete and Total CEASEFIRE (in approximately 6 hours from now, when Israel and Iran have wound down and completed their in progress, final missions!), for 12 hours, at which point the War will be considered, ENDED!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
“Officially, Iran will start the CEASEFIRE and, upon the 12th Hour, Israel will start the CEASEFIRE and, upon the 24th Hour, an Official END to THE 12 DAY WAR will be saluted by the World. During each CEASEFIRE, the other side will remain PEACEFUL and RESPECTFUL,” he added.
“On the assumption that everything works as it should, which it will, I would like to congratulate both Countries, Israel and Iran, on having the Stamina, Courage, and Intelligence to end, what should be called, “THE 12 DAY WAR,” Trump wrote.
Neither Tehran nor West Jerusalem has reacted to the announcement. Unconfirmed reports on social media claimed that Israel continued striking targets in Tehran after Trump’s post.
Open war between Israel and Iran broke out on June 13, when the IDF launched strikes on military and nuclear facilities across Iran and carried out assassinations of senior Iranian commanders and nuclear scientists. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the operation was aimed at preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Iran, which denies having a military nuclear program, responded by firing missiles into Israel.
https://www.rt.com/news/620375-trump-israel-iran-ceasfire/?utm_source=browser&utm_medium=push_notifications&utm_campaign=push_notifications
A post befitting an overwrought antichrist lol
Not really. “Iran, which denies having a military nuclear program, responded by firing missiles into Israel.”
Maybe they are both getting tired of killing one another. One can hope.
Dennis L.
The USA has completely erratic leadership. Within a day , the big problem with the nuclear program is gone, probably for good. Now Iran will exit the NPT and IAEA, and will continue to play ball. For the time being, if I understand it correctly, this is only a 12 hours ceasefire. I would bomb Israel on either side of those 12 hours, just make sure that all power plants are broken. When Israel will relent and let people leave, a new reality on the ground will appear. Iran is far from getting tired, say my Iranian friends, and I think so too. You don’t let criminals bomb your country unprovoked. The people of the global South will see things as I am describing them. and the USA was kicked out of the Red Sea by the Houthis. Connect the dots.
Of course the West may be plotting a surprise atomic bombing, that’s what they do and they have nothing else to try. It should be soon announced that some nukes are now stationed in Iran, just to guide petulant children like Ben Gvir (sp?).
What a bizarre war. USA and Iran trade missiles, making sure not to do any real damage or kill anyone. Political theater.
Wasn’t something close to this happening, at least at first, in Ukraine?
We seemed to have people in costume performing.
I am the optimist. People are strange beings, perhaps seeing what could happen as opposed to what did happen is sufficiently sobering to encourage talk over killing. There could be benefits to near misses.
There is a movie, “War Games.” At the end Whopper comes to the conclusion regarding nuclear war that the only way to win is not to play.
I liked the Imsai 8080 computer at the beginning, had one of those back in the day.
Dennis L.
It did turn into trench warfare and a multi-year grinding. But you know, the chosen ones do not have appetite for such things as selfie opportunities are rare and anyway anti-semitic lamp posts are everywhere. It turns out that the Samson option that so terrified the world is in fact the Samsonite option as they hastily relocate to various resource-rich countries to see if they can milk these livestocks in human form one more time.
“The Phoney War (French: Drôle de guerre; German: Sitzkrieg; Polish: Dziwna wojna) was an eight-month period at the outset of World War II during which there were virtually no Allied military land operations on the Western Front from roughly September 1939 to May 1940. World War II began on 1 September 1939 with the invasion of Poland by Germany. Formal declarations of war by the United Kingdom and France followed on 3 September, marking the start of the so-called ‘Phoney War’ period with little actual warfare occurring.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoney_War
It could look ‘phoney’ at first…
Grist to Fast Eddy’s mill.
who?
Iran launches missile attack on US base in Qatar
DAVID RISING, JON GAMBRELL and MELANIE LIDMAN
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran launched a missile attack Monday on a U.S. military base in Qatar, retaliating for the American bombing of its nuclear sites.
Witnesses reported seeing missiles in the skies, followed by explosions, but it wasn’t clear if there was any damage.
Iran announced on state television that it attacked American forces stationed at Qatar’s Al Udeid Air Base. A caption on screen called it “a mighty and successful response” to “America’s aggression” as martial music played.
OK, have a good time..Is this how our current leaders negotiate?
Asking for a friend.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wD9_Sil8CDU&pp=ygUdVGF4aSBtb3ZpZSBzY2VuZSBkZW5lcm8ga2l0ZWw%3D
https://www.axios.com/2025/06/23/iran-retaliation-trump-israel-war
Iran confirms missile attack on U.S. military base in Qatar
From the WSJ
https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-trump-tariffs-trade-war-06-23-2025
Stocks Rise, Crude Oil Falls After Iran Launches Missiles at U.S. Base in Qatar
Markets fade early reactions to U.S. bombing; yields fall after top Fed official says she could support July rate cut
“Iran’s Supreme National Security Council released a statement confirming the attack on Qatar and claiming the number of missiles fired was equal to the number of bombs the U.S. used in its strike on Saturday — signaling a desire to de-escalate.”
oh? de-escalate?
after “entering” the itty-bitty Israel-Iran war, the USA might be exiting so soon?
that was always highly probable.
in my opinion.
Ah crap. Iran hitting US bases. If this is more than demonstrative and coordinated with USA – and I doubt it is – then where this leads could get us all killed.
I also wonder whether Iran would have taken this action without explicit backing by Russia and China. What this constitutes, I don’t know.
Isn’t it wonderful, especially after Trump soiled himself and sent zero, yes zero bombers(so zero bombs) into Iranian airspace. It was another Syria type show of idiocy. Fire a few missiles at entrances that were covered over(to lessen the impact) 3 days beforehand.
Iran knows the game being played and it’s nice to see them yet again, force the hand that is desperate not to have to show its cards(which were made in China).
https://en.mehrnews.com/news/233570/Iran-launches-missile-attack-on-US-troops-in-Iraq-Qatar
I can’t wait to see some of Irans newer stuff and if, as seems likely, they now have the advanced Chinese fuel and explosives, seeing Ishell burning would be the icing on the cake(maybe as a little gift to China they could destroy Guam after Diego Garcia).
The Al Fhanis must be regretting thinking that were in the big league, just because they had money and the British ss at their disposal.
Al Fhanis should be Al Thanis(Qatar mob).
Some of the things said:
CNN said that US bases in both Qatar and Iraq were attacked by the Iranian missiles.
Israeli sources claimed to CNN that 1 missile was fired at Ain Assad base in Iraq.
According to the latest reports, 10 missiles were fired at US base in Doha.
Sirens are sounding in entire Bahrain, media have reported.
It’s going to be interesting to see how far Iran pushes. Then again maybe Trump. He threatened and they replied(quickly for them), now he has to escalate or lose face. Does anyone think he’ll except losing face?
Concerning Bahrain, a single decent siren would cover the entirety of the tiny island,. Although small, it wouldn’t be too much of a surprise to see the population kick off(they are no fans of their parasites, or western influence), so probably just try to scare them, although I wonder if it might just bring out the fight in them and that won’t be against Iran.
We live in interesting times 😁
“It’s going to be interesting to see how far Iran pushes. Then again maybe Trump. He threatened and they replied (quickly for them), now he has to escalate or lose face. Does anyone think he’ll except losing face?”
I don’t care, but since the USA did far more damage, to his ego that is probably “winning”.
we are all guessing, and I am guessing the USA has “exited” the Israel-Iran war for now.
time will tell.
“but since the USA did far more damage”
Only to it’s own reputation.
Exiting would be sensible, I hope you are correct.
okay, if Trump thinks the USA did more damage, then his ego will accept that as “winning”.
As the bases are empty it will be largely demonstrative. It is a step that shows confidence though. I suppose an off ramp will be offered at some point, like in yemen.
After Trump’s own words, he’s just been backed into a corner. Very confident from Iran.
Trump must be the only man on the planet that can blow his own brains out, multiple times a day and feel absolutely no ill effect.
“However, the Iranians were careful to keep all the uranium out of Trump’s reach like an adult hiding matches from a dribbling moron.”
https://www.normalisland.co.uk/p/serial-child-rapist-avoids-prison
Some humour from the eternal victims.
https://substack.com/@kitklarenberg/note/c-128225865?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=7c6fx
B posted about were we are heading on Saturday. I’m surprised not to see any mention here.
https://thehonestsorcerer.medium.com/a-long-overdue-reckoning-efa69860264b?source=user_profile_page———0————-ac0b01447819———————-
Putin knows he has no choice but to do the correct thing, a quick glance at a map proves that.
Honest Sorcerer conclusion:
“Then, of course, as oil and other energy and mineral resources continue their long decline following their respective depletion curves, these newly built alliances will eventually falter — giving rise to another round of hostilities… Rinse and repeat a several times, till we got nothing but localized, low-tech, scavenger economies all across the globe. After all, it is physics and geology which will have the final word.”
I agree, rinse and repeat.
until the end of IC in the 2nd half of this century.
the days of the USevilEmpire are numbered.
I would point out the Honest Sorcerer’s post too.
B starts out by asserting that Iran never had a plan to build nuclear weapons; it would have been against its religion.
He talks about US “negotiations” with Iran as being simply a ruse. He says:
“The whole story feels so 2003 again when the US went into war with Iraq…” and
The Brookings paper he links has had quite a lot of exposure lately and does follow the actions closely, so I’m far from convinced that it’s over.
Talk of a ceasefire looks like prepping an excuse for blame. I would be a bit disappointed if the squatters got off this lightly, just as their air defence is so depleted that even slow drones have been getting through. On the plus side, we’ll get to see how many run when they are freed from being human shields.
Different subject:
Ivan, I am not good enough to carry your metaphoric slide rule so please do not laugh at VBA.
Am using Copilot to make classes for accounts used in QB. To my eye, Copilot is damn good. I cannot hold all this in my head, do in spreadsheets, speed up with VBA to organize before importing COA to QB.
Old guy here, Fortran in middle/late sixties, 360/30 with real core. VBA would leave Fortran in the dust and my workstation would have the program run before the 360/30 could load JCL. Sort of miss putting a few sheet feeds in for the line printer, nothing like banging out 132 columns at once. Operators became irritated with students’ sheet feeds, a few beers afterwards generally helped.
Before multiple screens, had a DBII program, printed it out, maybe 50 feet long, crawled along the floor looking for issues. Dot matrix, the good old days.
For all the doom here, what has been done over the last fifty years is incredible.
As for the middle east, sort of like “My dad can beat up your dad.” It is biology and we are along for the ride.
Dennis L.
Young Montana farmers find labor using TikTok and offer free housing
https://youtu.be/6pjOAUSN9-I?si=1zT0ohbD2R6Mjh52
These farmers use conventional machinery (using oil) to help grow their salad greens and other products. They offer free housing for 15 hours of work on the farm. Most takers are young women found using TikTok. These young women often get part-time jobs in restaurants to provide the income they need.
As far as I can tell, the only pay these young women received for their work farm was free housing. I would hope that Workers Compensation coverage would cover them if they get injured on the job.
At least some of these young people would need vehicles to get to their places of work. They would probably need to buy food and clothing, and cover health related expense, besides food.
How the taxes would work would be critical. Will the Federal Government impute income to these young people for the work they perform? Will these workers need to pay taxes on this income? Or will they be eligible for low-income credits and get benefits such as food stamps?
I would expect that if only one or two employers are doing this, they can skate by with little government interference. But if the practice becomes wide spread, the government will want to make sure it is getting adequate tax revenue with respect to this arrangement.
The devil is in the details. Not everything is as it looks.
The government may put cheap food ahead of tax revenue. Once a crop rots, there is nothing until the next cycle/season and prices are set at the margin.
Dennis L.
Good points!
That’s been used for decades to have Free” labor during crunch season for farms or more likely market gardens. As a matter of fact, back in 1988 I myself was an “apprentice ” at Rocky Mountain Permaculture with Jerome Osentowski. He provided an organic salad mix to the trendy Aspen Co restaurants…it was a magical time never to be repeated.
Last I checked he set up a Land Trust for his place and is retired.
PS I never pursued that path, like Gail, found growing it was a big challenge.
ZH has completely turned on Trump only a couple months after celebrating it’s inclusion into the Whitehouse press pool. Things that make you go hmmm. Last in first out lol how long til Liam Cosgrove gets ZH kicked out?
Simplicius says there may be a lot more to this B2 bombing “raid” on Iran’s three nuclear sites.
Like the Syrian air fields which Trump lobbed a few cruise missiles at during his first term, and advertising their arrival, we may have more of the same “show response” in Iran with a motive- to make it look like the US “really means it” when they say it’s going to take action against Iran.
Did the B2 bombers even overfly Iran? In view of the deterrence by the Houthis this spring and loss of US jets, leading to cessation of the bombing in Yemen, I wonder if the B2 “bunker buster bombs were ever dropped on Iran because the B2 losses couldn’t be risked. And then there’s the question of the actual ineffectiveness of the bombs themselves if they had been dropped. Would they have even worked?
https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/shayrat-redux-trumps-invisible-fleet?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1351274&post_id=166525735&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=16win7&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Can anyone give some information on the possible impact for US of Strait of Hormuz closure?
(without mentioning problems related to price, which are clear..)
There are actually already various articles on the web saying that the problem is only for China and Europe, because US imports only 7% of its Oil from Hormuz passage.
So, no problem for US.
I have the impression that inside that 7% there is mainly diesel for US.
Any data to understand better?
Thanks
Unclear. Yes, the US needs to import a lot of heavy oil and yes, it is mostly from Arabia and Russia. Closure can be selective, that is, vessels bound for China can be let go. Yemen already did that in the Red Sea. Variables at play:
1) I am not a good enough petro-chemist to determine whether the US can really stop imports of heavy oil. In principle it could be just a retrofitting of the Gulf of Mexico refineries, plus a way to send heavy oil solvent (obtained from light oil) to canada. If anyone has a link discussing this I would be grateful. Retrofitting would be dear and long of course.
2) which side is Russia on? Tribe loyalty is stronger than any stupid BRICS idea. Not optimist about this but the generals have now more power.
3) Arabia can not do much and will not do much. Yes, the rulers are hidden jews (put in power by the brits in 1936), but they have no force, and the moment they try to pump oil to the red sea coast to ship from there they are going to lose a few pipelines.
All in all, this might be something aimed mostly at Europe. Best possible step now for Iran is to become the Ukraine of China. But unlike Ukraine, it does have a chance to win.
>> Closure can be selective
but then ships can simply post incorrect destinations and go elsewhere once they transit the strait
This happened with the Houthis. They bombed another ship from the same shipping company. But offices can be set up in Brics capitals for confirmation purposes. That would be problematic for non Brics of course.
Yeah I realized that after posting, that BRICS could maintain a whitelist. But it would take a little time to organize.
A geopolitical analyst of the Doha Institute, interviewed today by Al Jazeera-live, said that Russian help is and will be just simbolic.
That happens because Russia has many double Russian-Israeli citizens and it is strongly linked with Israel since its beginning.
Considering that also China will not go to help Iran, what I would do being Iranian leaders is a ‘regime change’ in Judo style.
That is a regime change that will not be a regime change at all.
Khamanei, who is old anyway, resignes in favour of a younger figure chosen by current leadership.
That way they would fool internal and external enemies.
They would frigthen also Russia and China that will come closer to help Iran, fearing to be excluded by the new leadership.
Then Iran should show be open for talks, but not with IAEA.
Actually Russia, China and North Korea should help Iran in their action to exclude IAEA, because it is by now just a den of spies, who just work for US and Israel.
I think that if Russia and China will not help Iran, slowly but surely, they will be the next ones in the list.
Globalists will be reinforced by an Iranian defeat and will go on in a stronger way.
According to Zerohedge, some think that the closure will be targeted, rather than complete.
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/supertankers-u-turn-hormuz-world-braces-iranian-retaliation
Supertankers U-Turn In Hormuz As World Braces For Iranian Retaliation
My expectation is that any slowdown in international trade will tend to reduce world GDP. If the world is headed for recession, low oil prices are the correct direction. So far, oil prices aren’t going up in response to current problems. Low prices can be expected to adversely affect oil extraction, worldwide.
Inflationary Hormuz geopolitics compensates for deflationary barrel prices from tariffs which themselves are compensations for oil supply collapse. Rapid downward spiral.
I can believe rapid downward spiral of both oil prices and oil supply. But perhaps we are wrong. We can hope.
“rapid downward spiral” is very rare for something global.
oil supply will probably continue with its very small decline rate.
oil price will probably continue to stay in the range it’s been in for the past decade.
it’s nothing to worry about.
Guess: Insurance costs will be the problem.
Dennis L.
remember
mid 2020s
just sayin
yup the UK seems to be really shaky now in the mid 2020s.
I doubt it will collapse before 2040 though.
(many readers might be interested in what you are experiencing from your inside view, but I suppose your psyche doesn’t want to go there.)
Fancy position swap by Trump. From President of Peace to war monger/regime change…in 6 months.
He then attempts to say MAGA is behind him. They are not….wholly.
Me thinks Trump just lost the 2026 house and Vance his chance to be president in 2028.
Yes, he and Netanyahu just cooked the Republican party. I only protest-vote 3rd party candidates on the rare occasion that I vote at all.
Now there is no Republican party or Democrat party. Both got run off the cliff…
“Yes, the US needs to import a lot of heavy oil and yes, it is mostly from Arabia and Russia.”
I thought the data was that the 4 mbpd of US imports from Canada are the majority of the heavy oil imports.
Right.
Really funny stuff.
to the stars!
Sun and water is needed for the deposition of carbon in the soil. We have just passed summer solstice in the Northern Hemisphere, which means that the carbon deposition on the biggest landmass on the Earth declines. And that is why the Northern Hemisphere sets the rhythm of the life of humans on the Earth.
Days are getting shorter now. In Atlanta, we have had a less warm than usual spring. We get a thunderstorm practically every day, which cools things off.
Here in Slovakia we have serious drought, a storm is forecasted for this night, which is eagerly awaited.
As regards mushroom hunting, this spring was s total failure. A lot of ticks everywhere as and added “bonus”.
Why is Indonesia saying nothing about the unprovoked attack on Muslims? Turkey? Egypt?
What to they have to gain by getting involved? Get missiles aimed at their countries, as well?
I suppose if a country is doing poorly enough, it wants a war to give its economy a boost. But perhaps these countries are not doing poorly enough. Yemen, however, could use a war to boost its economy.
It is not all about war. Sometimes it is about God.
That basically no one and no nation is able to say unprovoked murder is bad/evil/ungodly/sinful/wrong is sad.
I expect the largest Muslim nation on Earth to respond early/first. Not because they triangulate that it will get them money, fame, power. Rather because they have heart felt love for their coreligionists.
Ed, have you asked all 242 million Indonesian Muslims about their views on this?
Iran is well known to have a huge majority of Shiites—over 90% of the population. Meanwhile, Indonesia’s Muslims are divided between 99.5% Sunni and 0.5% Shiite.
Do Sunnis and Shiites feel any particular love for their coreligionists?
Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland are both nominally Christian groups, and yet they get on like cats and dogs. Starmer is the first British PM to successfully unite the two groups and, notably, he did this by opening shelters for immigrants from far-away countries in their communities.
So, I guess stranger things can happen than antagonistic sects coming together in the face of a common adversary. But I wouldn’t bet on it.
Iran styles itself as revolutionary. Maybe that is not considered respectable by those other states, which tend towards more conservative attitudes.
Iran is a theocracy, but the other main theocracy in the region is Saudi Arabia, a monarchy. The Gulf state monarchies do not make natural bedfellows with revolutionaries.
As Tim says, you expect too much. Mexicans will not care if christian Finland is attacked by Russia.
The Ten Commandments are about how a person should treat kinsmen. It was always understood that resource wars were necessary. It was assumed that wars against neighboring groups would be necessary, to obtain adequate resources.
2 Samuel 11:1 (NIV)
Religions seemed to be a good way to differentiate among groups. But race will work, as well. Or members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) [which I have called “Advanced Nations”] or not.
Jesus came and offered a narrative superseding the legalistic ways of Judah. Simply go and bring a miracle. Accept what ever they offer you to eat. Radical giving, radically egalitarian.
If you are saying Muslims do not honor and support fellow Muslims we will have to wait and see.
Because we would not say anything in particular if US bombed another Christian country.
Did we (West) say anything about our involvement in ex Yugoslavia?
Yet, it is full of Christians, but we bombed them anyway..
In Gaza (and also West Bank) and Syria there are also Christians, but about Palestine we are letting Israeli bombing them or killing them without any problem and about Syria, after Assad, we are letting current leadership to kill them.
satellite photos of Fordow before and after seem to show the tunnel entrances were reduced to rubble.
can’t see underground of course.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/satellite-images-show-damage-irans-131404846.html
How many humans suffocated to death by the pressure wave ripping their lungs to shreds? 1000? Yes, a nothing burger.
If it was just the tunnel entrances that were damaged, there was little real damage. We can’t know yet.
I posted a YT video with Scott Ritter who said that little damage was done and it was basically the entrances that were damaged. He also says that the Iranians moved all the uranium to another location when they feared they were going to be attacked by the US. Others are saying the same thing that little was accomplished by the US bombs. Here’s the 30min video in case you want to watch it.
Judge is looking sorta scary. Needs to eat something.
Mr Halloween 🎃
“There are various reports going around that through the usual Swiss back channels Trump’s administration essentially informed Iran of the strikes, implying that as long as Iran does not respond it will be a ‘one-off’ attack. If true, this would be clear indication that the proposed back-channel agreement would require Iran to allow the US strike package to pass unharmed, and give the US its face-saving off-ramp from the conflict.”?
“In sum – My theory from last night is, I believe, vindicated. I think this was a low-risk, low-impact attack with standoff munitions that had minimal effect on Iranian nuclear capabilities, but may open some political space for conflict deescalation or at least lessen political pressure on Trump from the Israel lobby to do something to bail out Netanyahu. “?
https://x.com/ArmchairW/status/1936849301617152103
https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/shayrat-redux-trumps-invisible-fleet
Sure looks like the anaesthetist enforced agreement capabilities on the patient so that the good doctor can insert one of those fancy new wireless pacemakers you can feather. Surgery complete. Heart failure however comes with dramatically increased risk of constricted arteries because the intelligent body releases hormones that constrict arteries in order to reduce blood flow and therefore reduce the heart’s workload.
Deserted thoughts are still willing: but I was just about to raise production! War on shale 2.0 clearly a confidence play to cover for peak oil ahead of the pacemaker surgery which itself is the other layer of covering up of the terminal reality.
Ol Jesse boy’s latest:
https://youtube.com/shorts/ItMgGkoEf3E?si=_Ad8ZbLwZI4S9dQo
Go bomb Iran; it is part of God’s plan, set to music.
Scott Ritter says the attack on Iran’s nuclear program, accomplished little to nothing of value. It was a political act.
No surprise: “Iran to shut down Strait of Hormuz & Arab Countries Shutting Down”
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/international-news/iran/iran-to-shut-down-strait-of-hormuz-arab-countries-shutting-down/
IF they do it, and apparently China does not want them to, then the little itty-bitty war over there will get slightly bigger.
time will tell.
they can selectively close. Or China can donate 10,000 ballistic missiles.
Maybe in a month? 🥳
Maybe but I’m sure that China and Russia would love to see the U.S get stuck in a protracted war. Russia has been greatly weakened and humiliated by Ukraine. Hard to tell what’s going to happen when fist fly.. but I’m with David I think this will calm down by the end of the summer.
>> Russia has been greatly weakened and humiliated by Ukraine.
I guess it’s all in the eye of the beholder. Some think it is the USA, NATO, and EU that have been humiliated as supporters whose equipment and training is insufficient.
The media of each country seems to portray its own country as the victor.
“Russia’s gross domestic product grew by 1.4% in the first quarter of 2025, a significant slowdown from the 4.3% annual expansion in the earlier quarter and in line with the preliminary estimate. This represented the slowest pace of growth since the economy resumed expansion in second quarter of 2023, showing that the immediate rebound from the crash stemmed by Western sanctions has waned.”?
https://tradingeconomics.com/russia/gdp-growth-annual
yes Russia seems to be doing well.
any growth is impressive in light of the fact that the world is heading into an irreversible decline in surplus energy flowing through IC.
I’ve read that one political body approved it, but some smaller security council still makes the ultimate decision. I’m guessing they don’t do it.
Looks like they’re already doing it selectively, with the single and double u-turns the ships are being told told make, with the first u-turn presumably giving the irgc time to decide. They let in a tanker that was picking up crude for China, in UAE, but not another tanker flagged Marshall Islands, a former US territory.
The article says,
But I have a hard time believing that any shutdown will be more than temporary. Iran needs to use the Strait of Hormuz, too.
Short Comment on Shipping in Hormuz Strait
Despite bullish factors, bearish factors remain strong. What’s the net outcome
Iran cannot close the Hormuz Strait, which is wide, shared with Oman, and protected by the US, UK, French, and Indian navies, along with a 34-country coalition ensuring the security of regional navigation.
Iran has no interest in disrupting the Hormuz Strait, as most of its imports and exports pass through it, with 83% of Gulf oil and 87% of LNG going to Asia, with tiny amount going to the US and nothing to Israel.
—Anas Analji
All analysis that does not acknowledge peak oil is fiat analysis devoid of systems theory.
This article is behind a paywall.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2025/06/22/business/trump-iran-atomic-sites-satellite-images/
Satellite images undermine Trump’s claim the Iran’s atomic sites were destroyed
Four days ago, Bloomberg reported:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-06-18/iran-nuclear-infrastructure-location-of-enriched-uranium-stocks-uncertain?sref=eWpk04kZ
UN Says It Has Lost Track of Iran’s Near-Bomb-Grade Uranium
unpaywalled versions:
https://archive.is/aVcf3
https://archive.is/BZtMg
‘It didn’t work, we need a tactical nuke to finish the job’
WSJ is now saying:
https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/iran-israel-us-latest-news
Russia’s view of the US bombing of Iran, today, according to Medvedev.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/medvedev-reacts-number-countries-now-ready-supply-iran-their-own-nuclear-warheads
I don’t yet buy into #5 and #8.
these could happen, or the USA could pull back from further actions.
time will tell.
but the USevilEmpire will surely continue to be the USevilEmpire for a long time unfortunately.
and Medvedev is not selling you an opinion; 5 and 8 are both objectively true. Note Trump’s Make Iran Great Again regime change post this evening for additional obviousness, which completely undermined Vance’s and Hegseth’s statements earlier in the day.The Trump clown show has now exceeded the Biden clown show. Obviously he’s been told to dig his own grave like only he can. Bananas, as Rogan would say. 25th amendment material.
your opinion is merely your opinion, and 5 and 8 are not entirely and precisely “objectively true” just because you label it that.
5 and 8 are Medvedev’s opinions.
you should know the difference between opinion and objectivity.
If you do not think that the US is now entangled in a conflict with Iran then all that you really do have is opinions, david. Vance saying the US “is only at war with Iran’s nuclear program” is a euphemistic prevarication. Then there’s Trump’s post about regime change. Then there’s the IRGC’s declaration of war. Get real.
in your opinion.
you intentionally left off the rest of Medvedev’s opinion “… with prospects of a ground operation looming on the horizon”.
the Eye and the Ear are in conflict, the layers are distributed unevenly, the path forward will be winding unless it is straight.
in my opinion.
It converted the democrats from NO KING to loyalty to lord Trump who kills Muslims?, enemies of rich Jews? All hail the war lord
Oh n9, not again
An unknown bacteria on Earth has developed in the Chinese space station: astronauts are faced with a situation straight out of a science fiction movie
https://farmingdale-observer.com/2025/06/19/an-unknown-bacteria-on-earth-has-developed-in-the-chinese-space-station-astronauts-are-faced-with-a-situation-straight-out-of-a-science-fiction-movie/
In May 2023, during a routine mission carried out by the Shenzhou-15 crew, samples taken from a habitation module on the Chinese space station Tiangong revealed the presence of a bacterium previously unknown on Earth. Named Niallia tiangongensis, after the station where it was born, this species intrigues scientists because of its unique characteristics and its adaptation to the space environment.
…..What sets it apart, however, is its unprecedented ability to break down gelatin to extract nitrogen and carbon, a precious asset for building a protective biofilm and withstanding the hostile conditions of space.
On the other hand, it seems to have lost the ability to use other sources of energy, demonstrating the astonishing plasticity of living organisms when faced with a new environment. This capacity for rapid adaptation is a reminder of the extent to which space is a natural laboratory for microbial evolution.
While it is not yet known whether Niallia tiangongensis poses a direct threat to the health of astronauts, its similarity to bacteria capable of causing severe infections in immunocompromised people means that caution is advised. Especially as the accumulation of mutations and the growing resistance to antibiotics observed in the station could complicate the management of any contamination.
Oh no, another unknown known we have to deal with in Starship
But the bacteria will not reproduce on earth, so the problem ends there.
But that us an unknown possible..it may mutate with the Chinese DNA lab engineering…stay tuned for more surprising black swans..wear your mask in outer space until then
enough is enough.
I am cancelling my trip to Mars!
You don’t have to Davie, just get their latest designer vaccination. The Chinese are leading innovations in all fields now. We need to adapt to the new makeup of the world today.
It is just a bacteria looking for lunch. It has no malevolent intent.
You were just available, like a pick up for a one night stand at a bar…the randomness of the cosmos..per Henry Miller author
We make ourselves available. Or not. Because we have have life-affirming agency. I choose not to make myself available to becoming lunch to saprophytes. Not before it’s my time anyway.
I expect life affirming agency ability varies a lot with the person. We live in a world of “survival of the best adapted.” We may think we are best adapted, but we may not be.
Old Testament writers understood that our abilities are passed on through our children. Perhaps this is part of the issue, as well. None of us lives very long.
All true Gail. The key is optimization. Maximizing potential. Making the most of our respective situations. Even a young plant or animal that does not get off to a good start in life can and will surprise us by ending up having a good, solid outcome given adequate care. A truly healthy organism, however, never collapses. There is always a seamless series of warning signs on the road to collapse, as we, as collapseniks, know too well. Most people just don’t pay attention to the warning signs out of willful ignorance. That’s the dominant culture of fundamental irresponsibility.
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the usa will break apart when there is insufficient energy to hold it together
the breakup is happening now, but it might take 50 years to be complete
You are right. The timing is hard to know. It could take quite a while; we don’t know.
I agree with you both.
and the breakup of the UK appears to be far ahead of the USA.
one generation at least.
perhaps Norm agrees, though he is almost totally silent about things happening where he lives.
“The SCO’s main goals include maintaining peace, security, and stability in the region, promoting cooperation in various fields like trade and culture, and establishing a new international political and economic order, according to the SCO website.”
What happened to the SCO?
Presumably they will have to pony up the missiles and AD at the very least. Iran is right to try and be as self sufficient as possible, but they can always reverse engineer what is donated to them. I am starting to suspect that so far the US strikes have been a nothingburger.
“I am starting to suspect that so far the US strikes have been a nothingburger.”
interesting comment.
I hope you will update this when you get beyond “starting to suspect”.
ok.
An article about the October 2024 meeting says:
https://www.nation.com.pk/16-Oct-2024/sco-summit-concludes-with-eight-key-agreements-focus-on-regional-cooperation-and-development
SCO Summit concludes with eight key agreements, focus on regional cooperation and development
It also says:
With respect to the 2025 conference, the latest I saw note of it was in March.
https://www.mfa.gov.cn/eng/wjbzhd/202503/t20250307_11570199.html
Wang Yi: China will host the SCO summit in Tianjin
But this doesn’t correspond to the earlier plan to have the meeting in Russia. Tianjin is southeast of Beijing, on the coast.
I mean, if they are in an existential war against Persia, why the Persian TV and phones still working?
Massive cyberattacks and emp attacks would have disabled all Persian grid and it would quickly revert back to stone age.
I thought they had such techs; when would they use it?
The whole thing increasingly looks like it was staged.
because an EMP attack means using a nuke.
So much these days seems fake. Where is Fast Eddy when you need him?
I greatly influenced him to sell his NZ doomstead and move to more prosperous Australia.
he finally figured out he was too “Fast” of a doomer.
He has his own blog, still having fun
maybe he is still thinking collapse by 2020.
Remember Fast with his CEP and all that got vaxxed were going to die a horrible death with turbo cancer lol or heart failure? Yeah. I do miss his steadfast ranting on how we all were idiots and he was the gifted one that was revealing the truth…something like we wouldn’t even be able to buy a toothbrush….
Yeah, didn’t he relocate (again) to Perth Australia?
How’s that working out for him
Temperature records broken across WA as thousands lose power in Perth and sinkhole emerges near Kununurra
By Mya Kordic
Oh yeah..forgot about that other issue..LOL
I wonder if he’s learned how to spell moron yet
or swear using letters and not numbers
Insurance Companies Are Suing Customers After Going Broke
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=W6h8sX1XcNk&t=185s
From the video comment
@jayneweaver8695
1 year ago
Tree fell through dad’s roof he was 85 and he’d paid that insurance company for over 40 years, $900 annual premium and they nickeled and dimed him the entire time. EVEN after we got involved, helping with photos, estimates, DIY, they were awful. Orlando is right, 100% on the insurance companies, they are predators in some cases.
Yeah, live here in Florida and went bare, without insurance, because it’s a scam now.
I’m “lucky”, moving out of this craziness and it’s going to get worse.
Our company was not renewing policies and leaving the State and getting a new company was impossible and Citizens, the state of last resort, don’t pay out..it’s bankrupt…tic, tic, a time bomb ready to explode….
Now with hurricane season …God help us
When I looked up stories about People’s Trust Insurance Company, it was a rapidly growing insurance company that was affiliated with a group of companies that did home repair.
This is the wikipedia article about the company.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Trust_Insurance_Company
An article I saw suggested the company had financial problems and was trying to correct them. The insurance department wants people to be able to find insurance at affordable rates. It may not be proving great supervision over what is going on.
Collecting outrageously exorbitant premiums and then denying claims is no longer enough for them.
According to Alexander Mercouris who has been following the events, the US bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities did not accomplish what they intended to do. No surprise, really. Plan D
Alexander feels that the attack failed on its own terms, without Iran even attempting to counter it. He feels that there are difference of opinion, in the US. He thinks Trump wants out now, but this will be on Iran’s terms.
US wasn’t able to accomplish regime change in Iran, US now wants to focus its involvement on the issue on the nuclear enrichment facilities.
The statements Trump is saying are simply untrue. And Israel is increasingly running out of missiles. Iran was prepared for this attack.
Will Iran attack US back? Iran is winning the war of attrition against Israel. Israel will run out of ammunition within two weeks. A person would think that Trump would lose all credibility.
—-
This is only first 15 minutes.
“Trump bombed three empty sites in Iran. Why?”?
Please don’t say…”Fake Bombing”
Holographic bombs? Like the 9/11 planes?
we need to recall the chief fakemeister over this….
Holographic B-2s would explain why the Iranians were unable to shoot any of them down.
They should make a movie about this heroic raid.
In fact, they already have.
The orange man is turning into Elaine of Seinfeld. Fake, fake, fake, fake. Specially the overall concept of MAGA, but also victory against the Houthis, the cleanup of DC via DOGE, various victories in world trade, and now this. The problem is that faking it with the zi*nists can have tragic consequences.
I am even beginning to suspect the orange tan is fake!
I’ve always said that the Hand’s Big Nuclear Scare would have to be very carefully orchestrated. Even though/if Iran is not under the thumb of the Hand, its existence as a State is obviously still co-dependent with the Hand’s and, of course Iran has been fully briefed on the ultimate objective of the Non-Public Degrowth Agenda, which is the safe decommissioning of a nuclear powered civilization on the brink of structural collapse. A Kabuki bombing that facilitates the closing of Hormuz is the very definition of a trust-building exercise, and of carefully orchestrated laying of the foundation for another engineered massive global demand destruction and eventual climax to the Scare. Note the thematic foreshadowing that is the US’s targeting of nuclear power infrastructure…
What I have been saying here for years — that almost everyone here has believed absurdly farfetched and too good to be true, is materializing before everyone’s eyes. Whatever you do, don’t believe your lying eyes now!
Gail , Patrick Raymond has a thing or two to add to your article . French– use translator .
https://lachute.over-blog.com/2025/06/annotations-sur-le-dernier-article-de-gail-tverberg.html
This is a bit of the translation:
Also
Also
Thanks for be interested enough in my post to offer your thoughts.
Trump, & Tulsi supporters tonight.
“I drank your MAGA SHAKE!”
I will say one thing about the orange idiot and his female minion. it is possible that they have been threatened by stronger people, and generally these threats involve killing all the children one might have. the idiot never solved the problem of his personal security, which incidentally was the first problem Putin solved. from a reality point of view, it makes no difference of course. and here we are, completely in the hands of some death cult.
Netanyahu-Mileikowsky giving Trump a golden pager certainly seemed to me like an overt threat.
Tulsi wouldn’t be where she is if she didn’t know the score. But she also knows that if she were to become president then she could preside on her political terms because she has always pursued politics on her terms and that has only gotten her closer to the presidency, and at a meteoric pace.
Understand that she is not operating in a political capacity when fulfilling the obligations of her DNI position. She has no choice but to present the cumulative findings of the Intel community at face value because that is the oath she took and she is a constitutionalist. The Intel concludes that Iran could quickly build a bomb if it chose to.
When she said that her and Trump agree that Iran cannot have a bomb, that is in accordance with the nonproliferation treaty. It is not her caving or endorsing military intervention. Her absence from the situation room last night speaks volumes, as does the magnitude of her public rift with Trump in the MSM. As a private citizen she really did show him up with her nuclear warning video., but that’s her political MO – she don’t back down from anybody because she doesn’t have to – because of her superior politics. That superior politics that the Hand requires in order to prevent chaotic collapse for as long as possible.
Let the Old GOAT enjoy his bagel and loxs
Lox, derived from the Yiddish word for salmon, is traditionally salmon that has been cured in a salt brine but not smoked. This curing process helps to preserve the fish and gives it a distinct salty flavor. Traditionally, lox was made from the salmon belly, considered the fattiest and most flavorful part.
Dating for dinner
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/tiktoks-latest-budget-hack-is-dating-for-dinner-which-says-a-lot-about-love-and-money-right-now-951a6aea
Complexity trap: a man from Czech Republic built an ecovillage in Slovakia, now he is selling it.
https://youtu.be/ETQ41liahuk?si=TwLvtEhPX9U-RwSr
Nice one..reac the comments with translation in English
Why is he selling.?
He says he has to care for all this alone and his sons need social life, so he would like to move down into the village.
I would say it is just a fancy eco life. You are dependent on the state anyway.
Thank you, yes, watching the grass grow can be boring and cabin fever is an issue out in the country rural regions. When I was staying at an ecovillage we did go into town to blow off steam…
He is an example of a bored high schooler causing a train to derail so he could video it for YouTube…
He even helped the train investigator solve the case by pointing out the rail switch was changed..brilliant
The teen, who had reported the derailment, asked the investigator what had happened. When the investigator said that the cause was undetermined, he said, “Obviously a switch was flipped the wrong way,” according to the warrant.
He also told the investigator that he was a train enthusiast and showed the video he had taken of the derailment. The teen denied trespassing in the area and tampering with the switch, but the investigator wrote that he knew where the switch was and how it worked.
Authorities later went through surveillance video from the area and discovered a vehicle and a lone driver traveling around the area just before the derailment.
The warrant shows that the 17-year-old was seen in a 1996 Buick Park Avenue before setting up his camera. A tripod was set up near the crossing just four minutes before the train derailed, investigators wrote.
https://www.foxcarolina.com/2024/07/29/teen-accused-causing-train-derail-then-filmed-derailment-investigators-say/
For many after modern life boredom will be a burden
We need flexibility, we do no like limits. Nature tamed by eco village fancy buildings or by rails that guide flawlessly is limiting.
I want to be FREE
Okay, Trump is back in the running for a Nobel Peace Prize. He now wants Peace.
This is what who wrote on Truth Social:
“Congratulations to our great American Warriors. There is not another military in the World that could have done this. NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”
That did not age well
I hear Trump is in the running for another Nobel Prize—Literature.
The judges all agree he’s so good at making up stories.
LOL!
“We have completed our very successful attack on the three Nuclear sites in Iran, including Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan,”
You mean Trump wasn’t the Peace candidate? Is starting unnecessary wars some type of fetish with Republican presidents?
There goes 🤡 Trump’s 🤡 Nobel Peace Prize.
“Meet the new boss, same as the old boss”
I don’t see where this bombing is “starting” a war.
ooo ooo ooo, maybe it will be WW3!!!
You knew this was coming when CNN and other liberal sites were talking about it in a positive way. Trumpy is put there by the deep state.. this has all been planed again if you go back to my comments 6 months ago I said this was going to happen and was mocked for it….
were you mocked for saying WW3 would begin in 2025?
I see a minor war between Israel and Iran.
what do you see?
I see you didn’t carefully read what I wrote. I have said all along that Trumpy would attack and start a war with Iran because Isreal wanted it and they elected Trumpy. Nothing about WW3. Russia is completely bogged down with the inferior force of Ukraine so there is not much they can do and China is falling apart as well. So no WW3 and yes the U.S does have enough bombs, ammo etc…
“I see you didn’t carefully read what I wrote. I have said all along that Trumpy would attack and start a war with Iran because Isreal wanted it and they elected Trumpy. Nothing about WW3.”
okay then, you’re on record.
I doubt you will be correct about a USA vs Iran war, though I suppose some will consider this little Israel vs Iran war to be a USA proxy war.
in my opinion, this will end as a one-day operation.
though it could be considered an “act of war”.
I don’t think we’ll see USA in war against Iran this year or the next few years.
time will tell, no big deal whose opinion is right or wrong.
Events are clearly making David uncomfortable and when David gets uncomfortable he…
such psychological projection from you!!
my life is good, not great, I doubt that events many thousands of miles away will affect me at all.
my irregular heartbeat keeps getting my attention, though docs keep saying “it’s nothing to worry about”.
good thing I don’t care if I’m right or wrong.
bummer for you that you are obsessed about being right.
I schooled you on the reality of inflation adjusted oil prices, you should appreciate that.
I keep reading your comments, looking for “value”, not easy to find any, but I do take your efforts seriously.
Yeah very funny David, Gail refused to publish my response on your silly inflation gotcha which I know you’re not serious about anyway but just hamming it up because you think I want to be right so badly that I’ll even try and correct your inanities. And I did. As you yourself admitted, you’re a careless fellow. Something happened.
Near-obsession. Not actual obsession. Greatness requires near-obsession, so I welcome it in pursuit of greatness. There’s nothing wrong with pursuing greatness however realistic the pursuit because maximizing one’s potential is what counts. An older friend once advised me to pick something no one else does and be the best at it, better than anyone else, and the Non-Public Degrowth Agenda was born.
I would think that you would also want to be great at including clarity of expression when writing about your pet topic.
so really what’s up?
your writing about your pet topic is very obscure.
surely you are smart enough to know that.
why?
lack of confidence in your great pet topic?
psychologically too fragile for any criticissm so you write obscurely?
I know I’m not the only one who finds your writing often to be obscure.
surely you can’t possibly have such a lack of self-awareness?
and now, I don’t expect any open and honest answers, because you are you.
That’s what happens when you take large sums of money from the Israeli lobby. You become beholden to them. Miriam Adelson was looking for her return on her investment to Trump.
I read on ZH that a shipping vessel sunk with cargo, so that looks highly suspicious because of the timing of events. The MAGA crowd are not going to be happy with gas prices increasing/
I work for a major energy company in France, and it’s hitting me hard: many of our maintenance stuff ecosystem is built on imported tech.
When supply chains crumble (and they will), I don’t see how we’ll keep these systems alive. We’ve lost the ability to fix things “old-school.” My fellow engineers? Totally dependent on digital crutches. CAD, multiphysics sims — all hostage to bloated software. Now even junior staff use AI to automate grunt work.
Here’s the ugly truth
We can’t draft on paper anymore.
Can’t run calcs without software.
Physics is becoming folklore -> People just follow procedures like robots. No one *understands* why and don’t have a global vision on the things works. Furthermore i will add that some engineer do the minimum because the complexity of bureaucracy remove any desire to make a good job.
The real knowledge is retiring. When the last old-timer leaves, it’s over.
We’re building a house of cards with no backup plan. If the grid flickers, we’re not fixing turbines with ChatGPT. We’re screwed…
And top of the top I see now big project on the table for maybe 2040 or 2050 ? No doubt we will have serious trouble to get access to the raw materials and well qualified engineer to build that in collapse period .
I don’t understand our elite , are they concern about imminent collapse or are they completely blind ?
To sum up if global conflict or the collapse will consume or damage important infrastructure like datacenter , acess to raw materials no doubt engineer will enconter a negative feed back loop we can’t stop or damage controle
brilliant comment Entropie
One of the best I’ve read on OFW for a long time–worthy of reprinting everywhere.
Cuts through the fantasy and wishful thinking.
I agree with Norman, for once.
dont make a habit of it…
people will star to talk..
Try as I might to find fault with everything Norman says, I also have to agree with him on this.
Or, as my old grandad would have said, “You’re right there, Norman.”
I’m also seeing the signs of Entropie’s ugly truth in my part of the world. Too much dependence on the smartphone, the computer, the digitalized and computerized supply chains and corporate operating systems, and most recently on AI. Deprived of these gadgets, people working in all sots of fields would find it almost impossible to function.
Talk about “for want of a nail.”
This happens in many other fields, as well.
My father was a general practice physician. He would complain that younger doctors had only been used to use high tech approaches, when there were low tech approaches that worked almost as well. He was able to notice symptoms, better than most. He even did some home delivery of babies, way back when. (He did not recommend home delivery of babies.) He learned to use hypnosis for pain management. Needless to say, this was not a technique pharmaceutical companies recommended.
What your dad did is very hard to learn. Using a stethoscope is an art form. Learning to hear “clicks” is always fun.
When I was a resident in a large county hospital we had many sick patients which was always helpful especially on rounds. Stressful for the residents when questioned by faculty members.
Dennis L.
It’s like the cartoon Simpsons
a genius thinks up nuclear power, a few other really smartie eggheads design it., have a group of ivy league get it built, hire mbas to manage it along with phds to supervise ops and then hire A Homer Simpson to man the controls
It’s very concerning that the reliance on computers and shortcuts is affecting the hard STEM fields.
I’ve found that education or “training” is geared towards what was called “teaching to the test” in the 2000s. This term is a disparaging term that
referred to the effects of George W. Bush ‘s No Child Left Behind policy.
It is begins in grade school….
By the time someone graduates college, they
” just follow procedures like robots. No one *understands* why and don’t have a global vision on the things works.” The workers are robots because it is “efficient”.
In the arts, they call these people “button pushers”. They have mastered software but have no theory that informs their decisions. These people are very productive but the quality of their work is questionable.
What is another term for someone who seems like they are competent but probably have huge blind spots?
“looks good on paper”
It’s a term that shows how much people depend on “personal branding” to assess whether someone can perform a task well.
There was a term thrown about a few years ago. There were a few people talking about how recent software developments over ten years ago, allowed people with less training or skill to complete a task. Now, no one talks about deskilling. Thanks to relentless propaganda from the American I.T. sector, most people think automation is a good thing and think lost skills aren’t a problem.
“I don’t understand our elite , are they concern about imminent collapse or are they completely blind ?”
There was a study that came out a decade or two ago that revealed a lot of them were sociopaths. I would guess they are primarily concerned with power and control. Their answer to food insecurity is further concentration of farmland ownership, copyrighting certain kinds of crops so people need permission to grow certain crops.
They generally know what’s going on https://www.good.is/articles/why-are-silicon-valley-executives-sending-their-kids-to-a-tech-free-school
They are only concerned about friends and family. Employees, the public be damned. Electric cars are solutions for wealthy people. They know green energy will never scale. As long as it works for “their” people.
Think about the situation. The use of calculators didn’t really start until about 1970. Computers began a little earlier, but early ones were very limited in what they could do. Students learned how to use slide rules and printed log tables in books. We have gone through many different versions of hardware and software since 1970.
STEM subject have become very much different, with the addition of calculators and computers. If we lose calculators and computers, we will have a big problem. In fact, if we lose electricity frequently, we will have to go back to doing calculations by hand, even if we are out of practice.
I use copilot a great deal, it is very helpful and a very good tutor currently in both accounting and programming. If you are serious it is interactive learning. Also some of the techniques it uses in programming I would never see on my own. I am not a wizard, I am slow and organized, plodding would be a flattering description.
Dennis L.
I have a couple of Mech engineers in my group. They are 20s-30s age and neither of them can make a manual calculation. One of them just designed a new fixture with three supports and planned to run Ansys Finite Element Analysis on it to determine the stress in the supports and resulting safety factor. I asked why he could not have utliized very well developed equations to determine strength and stress in a common beam and you would have thought I was talking to a wall. They cannot even conceive of going to basic mechanical theory to do any engineering.
When I was in school in the 70s I had a prof that encouraged us to make complex scientific calculations in our head instead of relying on calculators. Even if not exact, your calculation can get you in the ballpark to let you know of say….feasibilty of some result. By taking complex formulas, running the variables to a power of ten and simplifying decimal fraction ie. reducing to significant digits,, then you can quickly work it out and get “close”.
Computer digital engineering is touted as making our design more efficient. Maybe, but it also results in dumber engineers and users.
For most countries, there are two options. The first is to do nothing and watch manufacturing get hollowed out, said Sonal Varma, the chief economist for Asia, with the exception of Japan, at Nomura, the Japanese bank.
The other option is to raise tariffs and use other protectionist measures in specific sectors, just as the United States has done with China. This risks the ire of China, which uses trade and investment as leverage in its diplomatic overtures, or the United States.
“Supply chains are getting bifurcated along geopolitical lines,” Ms. Varma said. “It has become a lot more difficult for countries to decide: Who do you align with
China Is Unleashing a New Export Shock on the World
As President Trump’s tariffs close off the U.S. market, Chinese goods are flooding countries from Southeast Asia to Europe to Latin America.
Alexandra Stevenson
Alexandra Stevenson, who covers business and economics from Hong Kong, reported from the Philippines, China and Vietnam.
Published June 17, 2025 Updated June 18, 2025
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/17/business/tariffs-china-exports.html
As President Trump’s tariffs start to shut China out of the United States, its biggest market, Chinese factories are sending their toys, cars and shoes to other countries at a pace that is reshaping economies and geopolitics.
This year so far, China’s trade surplus with the world is nearly $500 billion — a more than 40 percent increase from the same period last year.
As the world’s two superpowers duke it out over trade, the rest of the world is now bracing for an even bigger China shock.
Well now, seems to me the world of BAU is no longer the same….hold on
China’s own people can’t afford to buy all of the goods China is making. They need to send the goods elsewhere, even if they have to send them abroad at a too low price, relative to the cost of producing them.
Thought, your thoughts.
Assume China pays someone $1.00 for an item that can bring maximum revenue of $.90. Typical effort to make up losses with volume. The person employed has a sense of self worth and China has a “welfare” system which costs 10% of outright handouts. It doesn’t seem like a bad idea to me.
Dennis L.
I just watched a bunch of videos of Tel Aviv getting bombed. It is fairly clear that the incoming missiles are subsonic ballistic, so probably old. Iran is modernizing its equipment by consuming the older ones. I have also seen a video of a purported hypersonic and the apparent velocity was significantly larger.
anyway, even in a salvo, the Israeli AD system is able to intercept some. It is not 10% and it is not 90%, but some number in between. The WSJ reports that Israel has AD rockets only for 12 more days, after which one hopes that China will generously send some magnets. After today unusually large attack probably only ten days now. I am struck by how many people speak russian in the videos.
Video links?
You need to install Telegram. Channels include:
ResistanceTrench
War Monitor
Islamic World News
Redrum Novarm
/CIG/ TeleGram
Intel Slava
Eva Karene Bartlett
Eva, an excellent journalist, has been sharing quite a few videos. In each of the above, you can find links to additional channels.
Thank you for that.
Concur. I met her in Moscow. She made a name for herself in Syria several years ago and was blacklisted in the West. So she took a job at Russia Today, which a common friend says she hates, because, well, RT journalistic standards are not way way better than US or UK mainstream media. But you have to put food on the table and all that. Lots of integrity.
I found War Monitor (with 138,999 subscribers) on Telegram.
@warmonitors
This seems to be a link.
Thank you for that.
Urban living is dependent on refrigeration , air conditioning , elevators and waste disposal . A fragile thread .
https://energyskeptic.com/2025/refrigeration-uses-25-30-of-world-electricity/
Refrigeration allows people not to shop for food every day. This means that many more women can work outside the home. Grains keep well without refrigeration, but most grain will need milling to be palatable. This is likely a reason that “Peas porridge hot” was popular. It could be eaten with potatoes.
Air conditioning allows homes to have wooden floors. If there is a lot of humidity variation from day to day, the wooden flooring doesn’t stay nice.
Waste disposal, using trucks, is a big deal. It takes a lot of oil, today. Now, we call some of it “recycling,” but nearly all of it is used as landfill or ends up in the ocean.
Thanks for posting this. Very informative. Even though I can’t cook to save my life, I pressure cook jars of chicken cuttings and will be getting into vegetables this summer on a rotating basis using a pair of All America 921 21.5 Qt pressure cookers.
The problem with refrigeration is that you defer the cooking of your food. When the power goes out and you rely on electricity to cook and have no sustainable backup, you can’t salvage any of it. I hear stories about hunters who have hundreds of pounds of deer meat in the freezer and thaving lost it to spoilage during prolonged power outages because they didn’t plan for sufficient sustainable electrical backup.
With pressure cooking, you prepay and prepare for everything: the food, jars, lids, and the electricity to cook it.. You don’t want to be chopping firewood to cook when the grid goes down. Knock on wood, but my first 100 jars were still good after 3 years.
Here in the villages, preserved meat is autoclaved in glass jars with spices and lasts nearly forever (tushonka). I eat mostly tushonka or eggs since I have little time to cook. I have about 15 kg in the house right now.
Definitely don’t want to be chopping wood or carrying water during Collapse lol. That might mean you have your shit together.
My paternal great grandfather was a Teamster logging as far north as Tupper Lake in the early 1900’s. Uncle Clair buried next to him was said to be a bad influence and for “various reasons” as a boy my grandpa moved 13 times in 16 years including to a spot across the road from the Potter County Ice Mine. For when you have all the other boxes checked.. find Natural Refrigeration, Belgian Draughts and Horse Tack. Lol.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coudersport_Ice_Mine
You should also get a twig or “rocket” stove. You can cook with a handful of twigs due to much greater efficiency. I used one to cook beans and rice when the power went out after a hurricane. I did get tired of beans and rice but it does work well.
Everybody should have a rocket stove or two, or at least a stack of spare bricks you can quickly assemble into one anytime you want.
Food safety: https://news.az/news/food-poisoning-kills-20-in-madagascar
New Homes are Falling Apart!
Yak Motley
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LvNmc11yypw&t=249s
From the link
Intuitiveenergy
1 day ago
I was a project manager for a residential construction company and a foreman for a commercial construction company. It’s the speed, they hire illegal immigrants who don’t even like America to build homes cheap and fast. I’ve caught them missing studs while framing trying to work too fast all the time. I was an a ‘hole I would make them redo their work all the time and use new lumber too!
@jamesgullo8240
1 day ago
When the majority of the workforce comes from the Home Depot parkin
@brandonbrock2251
1 day ago
This is exactly what happens when corporations decide to flood their workforce with people who do not belong on worksites , these workers do not have legal documentation to be in carpentry. Company’s would rather pay someone who is not accustomed to their ways just so they can pay them a fractio
@kevinrotten8259
1 day ago
I was a framer in my early 20s in the 90s our jobs were perfect, I learned from the best old carpenters from the 70s
@OUFan2
17 hours ago
I am a retired Electrical Contractor. I was also an Electrical Inspector for a city after I retired. I could not believe that about 50% of the electricians only knew about 10% of the National Electric code and another 25% only knew about 35% of the code. There was only about 25% of all the electricians really knew the code well enough to really be called electricians. Think of all the electricians that are wiring houses and buildings that really don’t know what they are doing. The problem is that a lot of City Inspectors only learned how to inspect out of a book and never actually did the work. All inspectors should have to have worked in the Trade they are inspecting for at least 10 years before becoming an Inspector.
Some of these in the video are million dollar brand new houses…one assume they are built to the highest legal standards.
Think again
where is that link Mike
see above. it starts with https.
The decline in quality of homes reminds me of the decline in quality of homes in China before many of the big builders started to go into bankruptcy.
If companies cannot get a high enough selling price for their homes, they will cut corners however they can. They generally own quite a few lots that they need to build on. At the same time, they need to keep prices low. Prices of new homes are now cheaper than those of existing homes. This is partly because they are smaller, but it may represent corner cutting as well.
The billionaire want their money to make money the big firms have bought properties in hot markets D now building large cheap boxes to house people. They build them cheap and move on. They have also dumped investments into farm land and people wonder why houses and food are expensive!! But look out soon they will realize that energy is where it’s at. Yes energy will get expensive and the middle classes will just suffer more with less until they realize that they have been played by the politicians!!!
Okay, I lived in a 100 year old house, its use before my grandfather purchased it was as a whore house.
Floors were not close to level, plaster cracked(This was real lath and plaster, none of that plasterboard.) insulation in walls was old newspapers(that was how we dated the house). Heat was originally from a pot bellied stove(I screwed up and sold it when we disposed of the house). My grandfather was a yard foreman, wonder where the coal came from ?
Roof was added to with sloped roofs which had a low pitch and leaked when the water froze in the winter.
This was a railroad neighborhood(explains the whore house aspect) other houses were not much better. Across the alley(yup, dirt alley)was a horse barn with a loft for hay. House to the south had a manger for hay along with a stall for a horse. This neighborhood had real horsepower. Ah, photos of the outhouse showed it as it was in the early twentieth century.
Railroad yard( it was close) had real steam engines, cinders came out of the stacks.
Windows were true double pain, glass sealed with real window putty, small triangular “nails” held the pains in which were small, glass had very charming wavy appearance. The double pain feature was a storm window changed in the summer for a screen window. Pittsburg was advertising “float glass” in the early fifties, think it was floated on Hg, mmm good industrial process. Putty had to be regularly replaced and the frames scrapped of lead based paint prior to repainting. Sanding was an option, breath in the lead dust and have a cigarette to boot.
For winter, an octopus furnace, pipes wrapped in asbestos(when we re insulated them, soaked the asbestos tape in some sort of water paste mixture, hand wrapped on the pipes). Heat source was premium coke sourced from a coal yard two blocks from house adjacent to a park. Coke was stored in a bin in the basement, delivered through a small metal door. As it rattled into the basement, coal dust filtered through the house. Of course, there were ashes, good for the garden, hauled out in buckets.
When improved furnace, I demolished the old octopus furnace and pipes with a sledge hammer, recall asbestos. I am fine thank you.
Foundation, rocks placed on the ground, original basement was a crawl space, fun to play in the sand as a kid, cat liked to poop in that sand(problem or a feature). Supposedly during the depression my dad had a horse team come in with a draw device to pull out sand from the crawl space for a basement and space for the Octopus(sourced from a funeral home, used of course) and coal bin.
This was workingman’s living, rails as they were called but while we had a bar on almost every corner, there were two Catholic churches within two blocks, a German Lutheran, a Methodist, some odd ball Lutheran church as well as two convents associated with the Catholic Churches. Living was interesting, but we were saved one way of another and we could find a place for a beer.
Now, can someone please tell me how modern homes are so terrible. Building codes? Nah, dad was a cop, inspectors didn’t visit. Houses were cheaper because they were built cheaper.
One last story. Immediately north of my aunt’s house, a policeman built a basement home for his family. The door exited on what would become the first floor of the main house when money permitted. The man saved his money and when he had enough, added the main floor living area with a real roof, not flat tar paper. There were several basement homes in my neighborhood as well, people lived in them all of my youth and there were no code satisfying basement escape windows.
How bad are modern homes?
Dennis L.
sounds an absolutely fantastic place Dennis—-you shouldve preserved it as a film set
In the Austrian valleys, space and food production was limited. If a baby was born and no old person had passed away, another person had to leave the village to avoid hunger. Food had already been scarce enough in some years.
If an unmarried maid got pregnant and had no child father to feed her, she used to die together with the baby because she had no time to sell her working power. Eventually, they killed the babies to survive.
I would never ever look bad on any of the girls who tried to feed their family as “whores”. It is a consequence of old men, who have failed to organise the world better, not a lack of character.
You can be proud to live in a house, where girls, that had no choice, once tried to survive, selling “love”. You might know, that most of the revenue of whores today comes from regular visitors, that feel good with “their” whore. It is not the worst one can work. Arms trades are worse.
Todays business is revisions of wrongly conducted electrical installastions…
https://www.youtube.com/@reviziebratislavaaokolie-j7578
I am not sure exactly what you are writing about, but I know when my husband and I visited Russia in 2012, we visited the home of a couple who had built a home, a room or two at a time, by themselves. Mortgage money was not available, so they needed to save up money and do nearly all the labor themselves.
The result didn’t turn out perfectly. I can imagine that these folks often had to redo the electrical wiring.
In fact, we had a handy man we do work on finishing the basement of the home we live in now. We later had to hire an electrician to redo the wiring because he didn’t do things correctly. I can see this would be a problem on homes where corners were cut.
Todays homes are full of complex electrical installation and there is a lack of qualified personnel, so there is a lot of failed projects.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGOQ8XcPhag
Jeffery Sachs says US foreign policy is made by Israel. Holy Cow!
Also says “malthus was wrong” and “we have plenty on the planet for everyone’s development” … clearly an economist.
“The long term is very good if we don’t blow ourselves up.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ffLqRTZppA
A good talk by Jeffery Sacks.
He says SARS-COV2 was made at the University of North Carolina!
He is on the edge of talking about limits to growth.
first term (?) Obama banned gain-of-function research in the USA, if I recall correctly.
Robert Baric was at the top of this research at UNC.
it seems Baric and Fauci and others arranged for the research to continue in Wuhan.
connect the dots.
A transcript is available. (The subtitles seem to be better, though.)
Sachs says, “The political world is no longer led by the US and Europe. This is not really bad. It is actually the end of a very long cycle that dates back to 1492 and onward.”
The world became a European led world with a lot of cruelty and domination, and with a lot of technological development that came along with it. The United States dominated the world for about half a century after 1945.
Now we are in a very different world, and the voices of other parts of the world are very important and growing. That means that there is a lot more anxiety in the Western world than there is in say China or India. The non-Western world feels that the world is changing in the right direction.
The US has had lots of land and cheap electrical power. We are in a fairness shortage. Climate upheavals are a concern. “Two weeks ago, the US declared itself out of the sustainability challenge; outside of WHO. It doesn’t get dumber than this.”
12:32: “I don’t buy into the inevitability of crisis.”
17:44 Start of passage talking about University of North Caroline concocting the virus SARS-CoV2 and starting the pandemic .
19:45 Talks about decarbonizing the energy system.
—
I am afraid I don’t have much hope for Jeffery Sachs pointing out the true energy issues.
Stay away from Jeffery Sacks. He talks well, but his ideas are mostly not right.
Looks like Tim Watkins has picked up on the issue and problems of where our complexity leads to faster decline…
https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2025/06/20/liebigs-law-applies/
Complexity bites us hard through Leibig’s law of the minimum. In something like a giant shovel/excavator used on huge mines, each with around a million separate parts, a small ‘widget’ that breaks and is unavailable will stop the entire machine from working.
Steve Keen correctly identifies that ‘technology’ without energy is a statue, but I’d add that technology without every single part constantly available also quickly becomes a statue.
the 2040s are going to be brutal.
I thought it was worthwhile that Watkins pointed out the connection to the financial system. (Falling prices of homes and commercial buildings would also cause huge problems to the financial system.)
$300-per-barrel is possible. But it is called hyperinflation.
I agrees. Everything else is equivalently high.
I agree also.
at $75, oil is now fairly low priced for this century, when inflation adjusted, and far lower than the 2011-2014 price plateau.
it’s unreasonable to “talk” about $300 oil, at least until it’s back over $100 which again even $100 is not a high oil price when correctly inflation adjusted.
“an already vulnerable banking and financial system”?
‘ . . . the banks have made giant loans to these private credit
29:39 companies and then the private credit companies are taking that money and loaning it to these risky firms that the
29:45 banks are not allowed to lend to the banks know where this money is going maybe they’re pretending not to know i
29:51 don’t know maybe they’re saying “Oh because this company is so big they’re magically diversified.” But at the end of the day the risk to the bank is the
29:59 same if all of these companies stop paying their their bills which we just went through several articles showing
30:05 these companies not paying bills then these loans are going to get defaulted on and if those loans get defaulted on
30:11 the private credit company could go belly up and if the private credit company goes belly up the bank ain’t getting paid back and look we’re right
30:16 back to bailing out the banks . . . ‘?
Does America the free people have any allies? Not the rouge killer in the Whitehouse serving the global Jews.
Since you asked.
Europe, and the numerous foreigners who have attended universities at America or Europe are probably America’s allies. Western schools teach their students to basically be pro-American, usually from a a progressive angle. Most American and European colleges more or less teach that America is good because it has the best track record of standing up for oppressed groups….that sort of thing.
Actually, I’m not sure if European colleges teach the students who attend them to be pro-American. I’ve been given the impression that European colleges are cheaper more vocationally orientated.
With the president acting beyond constitutional limits serving the global Jewish leadership. Will any part of the US break free? Defend the constitution.
Does America have any allies. America the free people not the rouge killer of Persia.
Martin Armstrong has a strong belief that the US will fracture into regions by 2032. The US is a classic case of it’s too big to properly serve the interest of its own citizens. As the saying goes, “a house divided against itself cannot not stand”. It’s no different when a company gets so big, that it becomes a lumbering behemoth and is overtaken by a smaller more agile company in its own market.
JHK also has written of that idea of the USA breaking into regions.
I agree, it looks certain.
but 2032 seems just far too early.
the 2nd half of this century looks reasonable.
in my opinion.