Update 3: Attacks continue on Lebanon and Iran, from Israel. Iran let two ships thru, then closed the Strait again. The original announcement from Pakistan said that Lebanon was part of the ceasefire, but then Israel said it didn’t, and now Trump says the same. As ceasefires go, this isn’t one. I’ll probably write a new […]
End of American Empire
Guest Post by Nat Wilson Turner Last Fall, I posited that the US and greater West are in the grips of an Interregnum of Unreality that began when Barack Obama successfully papered over the Great Financial Crisis while addressing none of the causes and leaving the very same banksters whose antics caused the crisis in […]
Not precisely a surprise, given they sent Kushner, Witkoff and Vance to negotiate. Apparently Vance talked to Trump six times and Iran says that the negotiations were going OK until Netanyahu called Vance, then suddenly it seemed like the American delegation was negotiating for Israel. More to the point, the US wanted the Strait open […]
Near the start of the war I noted that the real issue with petroleum shortages wasn’t gasoline, it was diesel, bunker fuel (ships) and jet fuel. Diesel is, despite what many say, feasible to get off of: even some of the massive machines used for mining are already being switched over, and China is moving […]
~by Sean Paul Kelley How does the way an individual perceives time affect the way they approach risk? And can the way individuals perceive time and risk be applied on a macro scale? Let’s take a look. Sociologist Phillip Zimbardo developed a five way typology of how individuals perceive time. People who inhabit certain zones […]
The core reason for America and Europe’s decline (and, in a way, Japan’s) was the belief by our elites that money was the only thing which mattered. Money is the ability command resources from anyone who will, or must, sell. People who need to sell their labor or starve—Marx’s famous “whip of hunger.” Countries who […]
This “issue” has flaired up again as Trump attacks Canada again. The short answer is that in the short term Canada is moderately dependent on the US and the long term it is hardly dependent on America at all. Right now we (Canada) have a lot of trade with the US. We buy mostly finished […]
I stand second to few in my admiration for how well China has done. But the super boosters are super tiresome. If China had been a small nation, the best they would have done is parallel Japan: do very well, then the US breaks your legs. Reminds me of Americans in 1950 or 95. They […]
The period around 1980 was pivotal to the fate of nations. In the West Thatcher and Reagan came to power and finished the destruction of the post-world War II order, setting the West on a new path. This process had been ongoing since 1968, but the form of the new consensus was not clear until […]
One of the most important things to understand about companies and countries both is the difference between sustainable prosperity and burning down the house. You’re probably aware that Boeing has serious problems. Those problems have been obviously “on the way” for a long time. When Boeing moved its headquarters from Seattle (where it makes most […]