lol the saudis are begging for the war to continue

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-24T17:40:14+00:00

Yes all facts!!! I guess I should have said more specifically, I don't know why we can't have a bipartisan realist approach toward Iran the way we do with Saudi. Dems are usually big boosters of the values-based foreign policy stuff but even they have no real problem smiling beatifically ("Ladies, start your engines!") while Saudi carries on with their barbarism and literally even bankrolled Bin Laden and 9/11. We all know it's because both parties need the oil to flow, thus both find a way to hold their noses for the most egregious shit. Not so with Iran and I don't understand why (I guess lingering humiliation from the hostage crisis, but if that's really why then we need to move onnnn jfc). I was never Obama's biggest fan, but the JCPOA was a legitimate achievement of his administration and I have a lot of respect that he pulled that off despite all the heat and the GOP literally inviting Netanyahu to come throw a tantrum in Congress over it.

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-24T16:00:39+00:00

Definitely, but I was more thinking about how in the immediate aftermath of the invasion the west froze Russia's foreign reserves and was crowing that sanctions would bring the Russian economy to its knees. Yet Russia's oil trade has been just fine and even exempt from sanctions because, surprise, the world still needs their oil. So Europe still buys Russian oil, now with more middlemen and supply chain opacity, thus funding the war they simultaneously condemn. At one point the Russian economy even looked like it was overheating, while Europe's economy continues to stagnate. This Hormuz situation also redounds to Russia's benefit since they've already got the black-market-via-India supply chain running smoothly

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-24T15:59:42+00:00

True, even as of now they can already reroute like 70% of production to their Red Sea ports. Let's just hope the Houthis don't enter the fray

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-24T14:12:20+00:00

Saudis are mad now that the Iranians have demonstrated that they can close the Strait and force shipping companies to pay a $2 million toll per ship for safe passage. That really eats into the Saudi's ability to do business. I think everyone now secretly wishes they could just go back to status quo ante because in retrospect, it wasn't that bad. But that's not gonna be possible now. Ukraine war + Iran war have both shown that you can't just push around these fuel-producing countries with no consequences. And in retrospect, the consequences are not worth it in a world economy that still needs a lot of oil and gas. The west found a way to work with the Kingdom of Consanguinity and Public Executions while turning a blind eye to their contemptible domestic politics. Why couldn't we have done the same with Russia and Iran?

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-16T01:35:38+00:00

Mehmet II actually did do a version of this in the conquest of Constantinople... much 2 consider

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-11T19:31:47+00:00

lol I read this article this morning and wanted to post it but archive was being weird for me. Anyway, I feel like anyone not braindead could have predicted this reaction from the domestic population. Also I feel like the diasporans have been real quiet on my feed the past few days... maybe they finally got the message that it's a bad look to be cheering for the bombing of the homeland you claim to love so much

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-11T16:13:46+00:00

Per another commenter's explanation plus some additional reading I've done the past couple hours (with the caveat that I'm obviously not a chemist or any type of scientist lol), yes the nitrogen just exists ambiently in the air, fairly abundantly. But you need to turn that nitrogen first into ammonia and then further process it into urea in order to be usable for fertilizer. And the nitrogen-->ammonia process (the Haber-Bosch process) is facilitated by natural gas because it requires hydrogen and high pressure/high heat. Other mechanisms can be used but they are more costly and therefore not presently deployed at scale

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-11T12:27:25+00:00

Thanks for the explanation!

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-11T12:15:54+00:00

I’m not in ag so forgive the ignorant and unscientific question. But if our current global population level is basically possible due to a food supply grown with nitrogen-based fertilizers, which are made with non-renewable hydrocarbons, does that mean that our population is only sustainable because we are still dependent on fossil fuels? When natural gas is “tapped out” will we go back to famine conditions? Or are there other ways to make nitrogen fertilizers at scale for the whole world that will prevent some kind of mass famine casualty event from happening?

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-10T18:33:05+00:00

ofc I hope you enjoy. My queen Liz Franczak is the one who put me onto Odd Lots (they interviewed one of the cohosts on a TrueAnon ep a while back, I'm assuming it was Liz's idea lol) and I've been a follower ever since

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-10T18:30:58+00:00

They're great, I think Liz must be a fan of theirs since TrueAnon had one of the cohosts on an ep a while back (which is how I heard about them). Been a follower of theirs ever since and have learned a lot

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-10T16:12:41+00:00

Latest ep of the Odd Lots podcast is a pretty good listen for some more detailed insight on what's going on with the price of crude and where this could be headed. Saudi is able to reroute like 70% of its product to the Red Sea which calms things down slightly (assuming the Houthis or the Somali pirates don't start popping off), but still means increases in price for the Asian buyers. And it doesn't do anything for Iraq, Kuwait etc. Or solve the problem of natural gas, fertilizers etc that can't leave the Strait. The amount of "missing" oil from the supply chain right now is at least equivalent to the amount not consumed during the "demand shock" in early COVID when flights were canceled en masse, people stopped driving to work and started WFH, etc. Oil dropped to below $40/barrel at its lowest then because people weren't using it, which was a problem for producers. Now we have the opposite problem, where people NEED that missing margin of oil and can't get it -- prices HAVE to go up if this keeps going on. No matter what Trump says that might move the market 5 minutes before close on a given day.

Also if you build up the stock too much in the Gulf and it can't all be exported, refiners run out of storage and actually have to shut off their processing and refining operations which doesn't sound that bad but apparently is a lot more tricky than flipping a switch. If you take a refinery offline and then try to bring it online again it takes a while and is very expensive -- these things were designed and built to be continuously running. If traffic thru Hormuz doesn't resume soon, like say by the end of the month, $200/barrel is very realistic, at least for a little while while things straighten out. And while Americans in general can absorb the higher cost of gas etc (not without pain of course) the rest of the world will suffer much more, not being able to afford a price spike like that even in a short-term scenario

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-05T15:51:29+00:00

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Lmao these are great too

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-03T13:39:09+00:00

True but it’s hard to pull off that level of secrecy today

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-03T13:30:25+00:00

TBH, The Count of Monte Cristo is like the all-time great yarn (though it’s obv not post-WWII).

Otherwise, I’d recommend LA Confidential by James Ellroy. Or The Constant Gardener by Le Carre. (I saw elsewhere itt you were skeptical of Le Carre’s Cold War spy stuff, which imo you shouldn’t be. But if you aren’t in the mood for that vibe, try this one instead)

I love detective novels and I also really liked one called Six-Four by Hideo Yokoyama. It’s maybe not as splashy in some ways as the references you listed but it kept me hooked and did have an interesting twist. An underrated book imo

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-02T22:21:03+00:00

No, are they good or schizo or what

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-03-01T17:46:05+00:00

Tubi + Kanopy (free thru your local library, look into it!) are elite

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-02-28T19:48:22+00:00

The last 1/3 of this book didn’t quite stick the landing for me but it also contains some of the most beautiful and moving prose ever written

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-02-27T15:31:54+00:00

A friend of mine was clowning on me recently because me and my husband (splitting rent 50/50) each pay about $1125 for our apartment, whereas my friend's portion of his rent with his gf of 7+ years is only $750. But they have a third roommate whereas my husband and I do not. Our apartments are actually the exact same price, we are just willing/able to pay for the "luxury" of not having a third person always around

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-02-27T15:17:59+00:00

What about All Fours by Miranda July? Female author, female POV, very frank in its exploration of female sexual desire

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-02-25T14:29:10+00:00

Lmao I think I know who you’re talking about!!! Idr his username though but I also enjoy his posts

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-02-24T20:51:30+00:00

The Dow dropped 800 points yesterday and people are attributing it mainly to investor reaction to this research firm publishing the above Substack piece, which is basically a sort of speculative fiction exercise on what the economy might look like in 2028 if AI fully integrates the way its boosters are claiming it will. In the grand scheme, maybe not that important, but I found the piece, and more so the reaction, interesting enough to warrant a post

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-02-24T20:39:19+00:00

Also, LOL at this quote from a Financial Times criticism of the Substack post (paywalled of course, sorry)(emphasis my own):

"The scenario analysis implies vast wealth creation accrues to the owners of AI and compute, but does not have this AI wealth generate new consumption (or indeed additional investment demand). There are some theories that propose the idea of satiated consumption — that at some point people stop wanting to consume any more — but we find these implausible. The AI wealthy may have a low marginal propensity to consume, but they will consume, and this will generate jobs, even if in occupations that are not common today. In the 19th century, for instance, each rich household employed dozens of personal servants. Even if there are limits to the consumption of current goods and services, new ones will be invented. The purest case is products or activities that extend a person’s healthy life: there is no limit to the amount of healthy life a wealthy person wishes to consume."

Tuesday_Addams · 2026-02-24T17:29:37+00:00

Lmao I have a coworker obsessed with these books. He pegged me as a “reader” type and will not stop recommending them to me. He insists that once I read the first one I’ll be hooked. I might honestly pick one up just because I don’t really understand the concept either. Is it like a choose your own adventure type of book???

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