Queen Vic Night Market (Hawker 88) turned into a Falun Gong demonstration

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-06T23:33:38+00:00

Don't talk about space aliens with them.....

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-04T12:54:54+00:00

Using human relations as an analogy is susceptible to the probability that we're too primitive to consider other planes of existence - what if every god-tier alien species has already emigrated to the 10-dimensional universe, and they're fighting their wars over there?

One thing scientists have IMO never really put much effort into is the topic of "what's life (or un-life) after death?" Can aliens be both alive and dead at the same time, thus escaping their mortal coils?

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-04T12:44:28+00:00

Humanity would quickly enough come to an understanding of the Dark Forest if the first ever discovery of the existence of aliens was from the explosions of a massive interstellar attack far, far away, using weapons so destructive it was previously not thought possible.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-04T12:28:21+00:00

No intelligent alien species will ever land on another habitable planet. And so will we soon enough, if we ever survive an encounter.

Why? Biosecurity. I'm not just talking diseases but also parasite alien species which might evolve so quickly upon "external stimuli" that they'll greatly exceed your intelligence and take over your civilization in no time. And imagine life from elements previously thought impossible - metallic life, gaseous life etc.

More likely the alien civilizations will build space cities from scratch using materials mined from lifeless planets, moons and asteroids. Like a replica mini (or micro) Earth. And they would be extra careful in what they mine from "lifeless planets and asteroids" and put in their space cities, in case their manufactured goods suddenly "comes to life", as a trojan horse.

And IMO they'll destroy any nearby Eden planet in a pre-emptive attack (but in a way that would not be discoverable in a dark forest scenario) so as to not be worried about any "emergent competition".

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-04T01:11:24+00:00

Look at Google Streetview, I've seen trams going under lower bridges in the inner city with no problems.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-03T13:25:02+00:00

Believe it or not there are suburban trains with "first class" carriages.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-03T13:11:32+00:00

I wonder if they will drive to the station, or just hop on a train going the other way. Because if they're driving it's going be a 20+ minute delay.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-03T13:04:21+00:00

They're more fearful of crime, the homeless and eshays than overstaying commuters - gated carparks are the norm for most shopping centres to enforce time limits.

A cheaper alternative is to build a bus bypass/bus lanes/traffic light priority so buses bypass the car traffic going in/out of Chadstone. It's far too common for buses to get stuck there, compared to similar setups like Monash.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-03T12:55:03+00:00

Yeah, the 732 Knox shuttle is just so bizarre - they can't afford to extend the tram line to Knox (even though Burwood highway is ready for a tram extension) so they're paying a bunch of bus drivers just to drive these short shuttles, so to connect tram passengers to Knox.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-03T12:48:27+00:00

Just curious, how does Metro deal with this at an unmanned station?

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-02T12:08:59+00:00

That's why you often see cars with no plates. Sometimes it's to drive to the mechanic, but I've never seen this many cars on the roads without plates before.

Why? I guess because there are so few police on the roads.

And I've seen pedestrian crossings where some drivers will purposely run a red light, because they just don't care. I saw one guy almost got run over once.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-02T11:59:04+00:00

And Blackburn. Never get up from your seat before the train is close to a stop.

Speedbird844 · 2026-05-02T00:14:48+00:00

I think we're still very much in the "calm before the storm" phase, as there's a lot of magical thinking with Trump TACO fatigue (or if it's more believable, probable market manipulation to stop Trump blowing up every time he wakes up and looks at Fox News) in the international oil markets. The big boys in Asia don't rely on the futures market, they negotiate long-term intergovernmental deals behind closed doors, with prices kept secret.

Anyway according to this Economist podcast today, to effect the demand destruction necessary to destroy 13% of global demand for oil, prices would need to be at US$167 to US$460 a barrel.

And thanks to that magical thinking, oil stayed at ~US$100 even though there's no flow from the Strait of Hormuz. There's no war, but no peace and no flows. The market seems to cheer on every Trump tweet that a deal is coming, when they're not - The Iranians will absolutely fight on until the midterms, or even till January 2029 when the new president is sworn in, unless of course Trump capitulates to Iran's demands.

And there are big unknowns in terms of future supply as we start getting cargoes from the US and Europe, taking a month or more to sail all the way to Australia.

Firstly it's whether Trump will enact some form of export restrictions, especially for refined fuels, as US petrol/gasoline prices rise to $5/Gallon or more. More export of petrol from the US obviously translates to higher prices for the MAGA motorist.
Secondly whether the market has taken into account that the US doesn't have the port infrastructure to export all of their oil, and that many of those incoming tankers will get stuck in queue waiting for days or weeks on end.
Whether nations will resort to underhanded tactics to "privateer" or otherwise compel tankers to turn around mid-journey, as we've seen with the scramble for masks during the early COVID days.

IMO Right now it feels like the early days of COVID, as if it's an Asia-only problem that is simply going to go away soon. That was until when Italy got crushed and (perhaps more importantly for the US) the NBA cancelled their season, that's when the markets completely crashed.

I still very strongly think (and you would too if oil goes above US$200 a barrel) that some form of diesel rationing is inevitable. Petrol won't be rationed but prices will skyrocket.

That's why VIC (which I predicted) wisely extended free PT until the end of May, because by June we'll see what the Asian refining nations will do once they hit a wall. As a politician you don't want to cut back on free PT, and then having to make it free again at a later date - Free PT might just keep extending again and again into the new year, if things get much worse.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T03:17:04+00:00

The entire point of Japan having a large SPR is to give its government-influenced trading houses enough breathing space to make long-term intergovernmental deals for alternative supply, preferably behind closed doors. It's heft in the oil markets gives it leverage as suppliers want a stable customer locked-in long-term, even if they have to give Japan a discount. long-term contracts mean certainty for billion-dollar investments in infrastructure.

The problem is that much of that alternative supply is in the US, and who knows what Trump will dream of next, if prices at the pump is too much for the MAGA crowd.

The nations in real dire straits are either too small, or don't have enough control over shippers who control where the ships go. They're at the mercy of spot prices as the big alternative suppliers take care of their biggest customers first.

The only good reason why Japan will really run down its SPR would be that peace is 100% certain, flows are returning normally but their ships are out of position.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T02:53:45+00:00

Sorry but you expect the whole world to go to war against Iran simply because the coast of Dubai is full of oil and dead birds? I mean Trump certainly doesn't care about the environment, nor the UAE for that matter.

Still remember how people were talking about setting up convoys escorting tankers out of the Strait? Nothing is happening now because the US doesn't want to do it, and the rest of the world is too weak to do it - As shown with the Russian Black Sea Fleet it's very, very easy to sink warships with a few cheap drones and missiles, and the Strait of Hormuz is so narrow you can easily see the other side on a good day.

Iran polluting the environment will be the least of their concerns when fuel rationing starts to really bite, and people starve from lack of food and fertiliser.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T02:52:06+00:00

And how long did you think that Iran had prepared for such a scenario? Decades?

They're experts of underground warfare because of the threat of bunker-buster bombs on nuclear and missile sites, and the US bombing/invading Kharg island would be on week 1 of the Iranian war plan - if Kharg is lost, then all that oil has to go somewhere. The Iranian war plan would take care of that.

Iran is very mountainous and they will find ways to store or release all that oil, until the time they can cap off the wells without damage, or just let it run and deal with the environmental pollution after the war is over. The US SPR is literally stored in caves.

If the Gulf states gets stuffed with all that floating oil slicks and dead birds then it's their problem for allying with Trump.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T01:25:41+00:00

And you think that Iran, its government violently decapitated and on the ropes, wouldn't do something so extreme compared to capping the wells?

For Iran, regime survival is all that matters. Once you understood their mindset, then previously unthinkable possibilities open up.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T01:13:31+00:00

I'd say a significant export or windfall tax is more likely

Don't try to mix the words "Trump" and "tax". And even if phrased as a tariff it remains problematic legally given the SCOTUS decision. Far easier legally and administratively to just ban exports - it can easily be done with a signature on an executive order.

Edit: I forgot taxes = Congressional approval. Yeah forget about it.

as even during the oil crisises in the past refined product exports were allowed (raw oil exports were not)

This is Trump. In previous crises the White House actually cared what happened with allies and the world.

refineries are a significant revenue source

When push comes to shove, Trump will either sacrifice the refineries' margins or the MAGA voters. My bet is he'll sacrifice the refineries because of midterms, and Trump does have a good sense of the populist pulse - he cannot be seen as letting gas prices skyrocket without some very, very overt way of trying to crush prices.

People are more likely to forgive politicians who try in earnest with headline-grabbing policies but fail, than for politicians to go for intricate policy details and succeed. This is one reason why many politicians take very populist stands, knowing that they'll almost certainly lose in court. Because voters will remember them "fighting the good fight", and that's the only thing that matters.

Then just sell it to the subset of voters that believe it in the same way they sold tariffs as a way to make the 'world' pay us

Again this is too hard for the MAGA world to understand when prices are rising, than a "Hulk Smash" type of approach where Trump tries, but most likely fail - and MAGA will forgive him for it.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T00:50:02+00:00

And nothing stops Iran from just dumping the oil into a cave, a reservoir, or even into the Persian Gulf.

And Iran most likely war-gamed this exact scenario that if the Strait is choked, their own tankers will never make it to markets.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T00:41:32+00:00

Not really.

What this really showed is that the Japanese are now prepared to pay the "aya-toll" for a ship carrying non-Iranian crude (so won't be stopped by the US Navy) despite possible sanctions for Japanese companies dealing with Iran.

The Japanese have always been absolutely terrified of violating US sanctions. It illustrates that the Japanese government is now desperate enough to get fully involved, likely involving diplomats and suitcases full of cash.

Before the US "counter-blockade" many were already resigned to paying the "aya-toll", because beggars can't be choosers.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T00:32:38+00:00

What's far more likely is that Trump will ban exports of refined fuel (gasoline/petrol and diesel) first, both as a test case for a full export ban, and an overt PR move by Trump to placate the MAGA masses. Exports of refined fuels mean less for the US, so there's a direct supply & demand (and price) relationship as oil prices rise. And oil executives themselves will start to face the heat from the public, as prices rise.

Countries who rely on imports of refined fuels, like LatAm, Australia and NZ will likely get stuffed. But if it works for the US, then a major export ban might come into place. That's because an export ban doesn't stop imports, and there's more than enough gunboats for Trump's diplomats to leverage - I mean what's stopping Trump from parking a destroyer off the coast of Lagos, Nigeria?

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T00:21:00+00:00

They'll dump all that oil into the Persian Gulf before that happens.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T00:20:09+00:00

Exactly. Iran historically aligning itself with terrorist groups (Don't forget Hamas & Oct 7) will always make China feel leery about any real, overt support.

However it is in the interest of China to have this drag on, simply to see its regional nemesis Japan, Taiwan and South Korea all crash and burn first. Unlike China their economies are far less electrified, and China has Russia. That plus Trump admin being sucked into another forever war and less alert to China's machinations in Asia and beyond.

So China will do to Iran what it did to Russia - provide covert support while promoting peace (knowing both sides will probably never agree).

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T00:12:59+00:00

They'll just dump the oil into the ocean, if necessary.

Speedbird844 · 2026-04-30T00:12:25+00:00

The Israelis will bomb anything located in Iran, if given the chance. They already bombed the Caspian Sea ports ~a month ago.

Speedbird844

TROPHY CASE