Iran

You do not win a war by bombing the clappers out of the country. By simply staying on their feet Iran wins the war and the USA and therefore Trump looks impotent.

As I said before if you wish to destroy the nuclear program, reduce its missile and drone capacity, have regime change and have it withdraw from financing various terrorist groups then you have to have boots on the ground. Even then the results would be problematic. There would be lots of well armed people willing to kill US soldiers. The politics is also against it. It is already a very unpopular war. This would make it more so. Why were they killed would be a devastating question.

Thus we we have trump and his incompetent defence secretary having overreached themselves. However it gets worse. Iran now have done so.

We live in uncertain times and i have no idea of how this mess gets solved.

Some TV Shows

 The Capture

I will simply say watch it. There are three seasons and they are all brilliant. It is on Iview so binge it if you haven't seen it. Highly recommended.

Watson

A modern day version of Sherlock and Watson but with little of Sherlock. Watson is a highly trained medical specialist not the bumbling butt of jokes in the novels and he is black and it is based in the USA. He does have a beautiful ex-wife. After an episode you will like it or not. It is more of a medical drama rather than a crime drama.

Boston Blue

This is an offshoot of Blue Bloods one of the best us crime series and this does does not disappoint. In a word if you like blue bloods then you will like boston blue. A couple of minor criticisms. Sean is different and not as good and the writing on religion ( christianity and judaism) lacks knowledge.

Cooper and Fry

Another series on the ABC. Short seasons but interesting. You will either like it or not after the first episode.

The Odyssey

 I watched the odyssey last night with my two sons. It is three hours I wil never get back.

Given my greek background ( I have always enjoyed greek mythology even as a schoolboy)and given the rotten tomatoes rating of 98 I went full of hope.

It was in vain. The film is three hours and way too long and to be honest I thought it to a load of old cobblers.

My eldest son thought it too long but thought he needed to watch it. My youngest said it was soso but again you needed to watch it and the audience actually clapped at the end of the movie so yes I could be just one of the 2%!

There was quite a few black people in the film which would have been unheard of in greek society two of the wives and one was helen of troy/sparta. very inclusive!

I was surprised he didn't use the story to show the remnants of troy started rome!

Spain wins the world cup

Spain deservedly won the world cup. They started slow , like most champions of the past, but finished with a wet sail.

I really do not know what the Argentine tactics were, Perhaps playing for a penalty shoot out! Whatever but it was a one-sided contest. Clearly the previous games took a lot out of their players. Messi did very little. ( yamal had a quiet game as well.)

It will probably go down as the world cup where good coaches made inexplicable substitutions ,tuchel at the top of the heap. Overall there was only one game which was truly one-sided and therefore a blow out occurred. We do not know however whether this was a  one-off or a regular thing. blow-outs will reduce the credibility of the word cup. consistency on red cards are also important and thus the FIFA president needs to go.

The world cup now is so large few countries can host it. ( We cannot because of stadiums).

We await what occurs in four years.

Around the Traps 17/7/26

 It is time again for Around the Traps.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Kimberlee Weatherall on australias-government-has-woken-up-to-the-risks-of-ai-more-ambition-is-needed
• Anam Bilgrami on one-nation-says-photo-id-will-help-stop-medicare-rorts-heres-why-thats-wrong
• Peter Breadon et al on unfair-fees-and-low-competition-why-the-pharmacy-sector-needs-a-shake-up
• Kevin Bonham on demosau-could-hare-clark-help-one-nation-shift-tasmania-to-the-right
• Rita Matulionyte on australia-wants-to-manage-ai-what-will-that-look-like
• Peter Greste on its-the-abcs-job-to-be-accurate-and-fair-not-to-chase-the-dangerous-fallacy-of-balance
• Greg Jericho on one-nation-australian-economy-peoples-bank
• Becky Freeman and Michelle Jongenelis on despite-claims-smoking-has-made-a-comeback-just-5-6-of-australians-now-smoke-daily

OZ Climate

• its-nuts-wind-developer-forced-to-truck-giant-transformer-thousands-of-kilometres-after-port-refusal
  
• states-stand-alone-solar-fail-the-energy-transition-should-deliver-more-than-a-new-landlord
  
• starting-from-scratch-on-nuclear-in-australia-would-take-longer-cost-more-than-first-time-offshore-wind
  
• solar-and-wind-remain-backbone-of-least-cost-future-grid-as-batteries-squeeze-gas-to-a-fraction-of-the-mix
  
• we-cannot-wait-changes-made-to-renewable-tenders-to-ensure-wind-and-solar-projects-actually-get-built
  
• solar-and-wind-remain-backbone-of-least-cost-future-grid-as-batteries-squeeze-gas-to-a-fraction-of-the-mix
  
• coal-closure-plan-urgently-needed-as-unreliable-clunkers-push-power-prices-through-roof
  
• australia-is-running-a-data-deficit-on-evs-and-the-energy-shit-and-everyone-pays-the-price
  
• the-great-gas-disconnect-why-australia-needs-a-managed-exit-strategy-for-stranded-gas-network
• Andrew Watkins on what-happened-to-australias-snow-season-a-climate-expert-explains
• Graham Readfearn on coalition-and-one-nations-plan-to-ditch-net-zero-would-not-lower-power-prices-csiro-report-finds
• Mehdi Sayedmahmdian on the-data-centre-boom-wont-mean-higher-power-prices-if-we-unlock-stalled-renewable-projects

Northern America

• institutional economics on can-us-exceptionalism-survive-demographic-decline 
• Samuel Rubinstein on jd-vances-convenient-catholicism Thanks Nick
• Andrew Kemp on an-australian-perspective-on-the-fourth-of-july Thanks Nick
• noahpinion on magas-attack-on-science-is-even-worse-than-it-looks , i-have-never-been-working-class , the-american-suburbs-are-better-than-you-think , why-i-didnt-sign-the-we-must-act-now
• Kruggers on ai-in-an-age-of-oligarchy , suddenly-hormuz-is-less-crucial-than-it-was , the-forever-war-gets-scary , democracy-in-an-age-of-powermaxxing , trump-cant-get-no-respect
• Menzie Chinn on the-sustainability-of-ai-investment , ppi-and-cpi-again
• Benji Sarlin on lindsey-graham-dead-donald-trump-legacy-senate-ukraine
• Anne Applebaum on lindsey-graham
• Dahlia Lithwick and Mark Stern on supreme-court-voting-tariffs-trump-shameless
• John Cassidy on donald-trumps-needless-war-with-iran-is-his-biggest-economic-blunder
• Brad De Long on crosspost-claudia-sahm-what-will-it-take-for-the-fed-to-hike
• David Rhode et al  on trump-classified-intelligence-midterm-elections-2026
• Hady Mawajdeh and Sean Rameswaram on ice-killing-houston-araujo
• Adam Serwer on the-see-no-evil-supreme-court
• Alexis Romero on supreme-court-justices-senate-barrett-kagan-ethics
• new deal democrat on june-cpi-never-look-a-gift-horse-in-the-mouth
• Liz Dye on todd-blanche-confirmation-hearing
• Greg Barton on backed-into-a-corner-by-iran-over-the-strait-of-hormuz-trump-may-resort-to-even-more-reckless-escalation
• Andrew Prokop on israel-democrats-polling-gaza-genocide
• Fred Kaplan on pete-hegseth-testosterone-testing-military
• the conversable economist on how-much-does-federal-rd-pay-off
• Tom Dannenbaum and Eliav Lieblich on international-law-response-rubio-icc
• Jeet Heer on lindsey-graham-obituary-trump , trump-election-fraud-speech-reaction-analysis

Europe

• Cory Alpert on the-alliance-trump-built-trying-to-break-it
• mainly macro on how-right-wing-populism-came-easily-to-the-conservative-party
• Simon Shuster on ukraine-denys-shtilerman-drone-missile

Asia

• Jessica Genauer on despite-trumps-wishes-iran-is-dragging-the-us-into-a-long-war
• Rodger Shanahan on how-an-assassination-by-trump-and-netanyahu-became-a-victory-for-their-enemy
• Gabriela Bernal on behind-pyongyang-s-boom
• Muhammed Rizwan on afghanistan-s-exportable-threat
• Andrew Prokop on trump-strait-hormuz-guardian-fees-iran
• Amin Saikal on the-us-and-iran-are-back-at-war-and-with-one-main-sticking-point-theres-no-end-in-sight
• home and away on special-edition-a-strategy-for-iran
• Henry Storey on can-china-create-the-next-apple-or-nvidia
• Menzie Chinn on china-macro-indicators-as-reported

Wonk

• Felix Martin on good-bad-ugly-ais-economic-impact Thanks Nick
• David Dayen on great-ai-repricing-isnt-going-well Thanks Nick
• Martha Nussbaum on the-professor-of-parody Thanks Nick
• Pete Buttegieg on a-terrible-thing-happened-to-my-family Thanks Nick
• Menzie Chinn on five-facts-about-the-uncovered-interest-parity-premium , kim-ruhl-rethinking-free-trade
• Alexander Howard on friday-essay-cultural-marxism-is-a-conspiracy-theory-for-our-time
• Christopher Pollard on antonio-gramsci-his-philosophy-explained
• Tyler Cowen on progress-against-dementia , markets-are-competitive-if-and-only-if-p-np
• Brad De Long on crosspost-art-goldhammer-the-unbearable-vacuity-of-the-moment
• Marina Zhang on when-tech-giants-exercise-state-power
• David Nellor on ai-regulation-answers-the-wrong-question
• Shannon Brincat on the-trump-administration-wants-to-dismantle-the-international-criminal-court-can-it
• Abhinandan Kumar on at-the-world-cup-as-in-life-football-nationalises-success-and-ethnicises-failure
• Sarah Diepstraten and John La Marca on no-evidence-mobile-phones-cause-brain-cancer-new-study
• David Pritchard on how-controlling-and-tolling-a-narrow-waterway-near-ancient-troy-changed-history

General

• Anne-Sophie Levidis on what-the-annales-taught-me-at-the-kitchen-table Thanks Nick
• Bikesh Upreti et al on var-was-supposed-to-take-the-messy-human-element-out-of-refereeing-how-did-it-go-so-wrong
• Daryl Sparkes on remembering-the-quiet-genius-of-sam-neill
• Philip Almond on philistine-is-a-byword-for-boorish-ignorance-but-the-real-philistines-were-cultured-who-were-they
• Greta Hawes and R Scott Smith on the-odyssey-is-set-in-a-fantasy-world-but-the-ancient-greeks-mapped-it-onto-what-they-knew
• Anthony Macris on ive-been-reading-the-odyssey-my-whole-life-nolans-film-version-is-exhilarating-but-not-perfect

Climate

• David Appell on short-but-moving 
• ocean acidification on the-effects-of-single-and-multiple-climate-driven-stressors-exposures-on-the-seagrass-posidonia-oceanica-phenological-cellular-and-genetic-adaptations , climate-change-and-ocean-acidification-outweigh-local-stressors-in-mediterranean-mussels-a-multi-method-convergence-analysis
• Tim Harford on how-did-air-conditioning-become-a-heated-debate
• stochastic trend on long-run-benefits-of-electrification
• Kit Prendergast on big-bees-have-the-most-to-lose-as-global-co-levels-rise-new-research
• skeptical science on deadly-france-heatwave-future-risk , home-batteries-next-must-have
• open mind on historys-hottest-heat-n-hemisphere-extratropics-edition
• Menzie Chinn on june-temperature-anomaly

Andrew Gelman (mainly stats)

• more-bad-science-from-jama
  
• archaeology-cant-give-social-scientists-population-or-gdp-but-here-are-some-things-we-can-measure-that-might-be-useful-for-social-science
  
• archaeology-cant-give-social-scientists-population-or-gdp-but-here-are-some-things-we-can-measure-that-might-be-useful-for-social-science
  
• interesting-statistical-example-of-flaws-in-a-voter-impact-index
  
• making-statistics-work-information-theory-and-bayesian-inference 
  
• survey-statistics-quantifying-uncertainty-in-ranked-choice-voting-polls
  
• a-ranked-choice-election-in-maine-using-voting-data-to-understand-preferences
  
• reviews-of-our-bayesian-workflow-book-from-bin-yu-david-spiegelhalter-brad-efron-christian-robert-and-rohan-alexander
  
• Kaiser Fung on drowning-in-colors

Dianne Coyle ( quirky + book reviews)

• nuttin

vox wonk

• trapped-home-climate-stress-more-likely-immobilise-poor-move-them 
  
• innovation-without-borders 
  
• ned-phelps-and-modern-macroeconomics
  
• how-large-current-account-imbalances-unwind-evidence-historical-adjustment-episodes 
  
• climate-fairness-economic-development-and-europes-responsibility 
  
• macroeconomic-impact-recovery-and-resilience-facility-analysis-italy-spain-and-greece
  
• opening-black-box-europes-new-fiscal-rules 
  
• harmonising-access-and-reinventing-procurement-innovative-medicines-europe 
  
• higher-utilisation-explains-recent-surge-productivity-growth 
  
• after-credit-suisse-markets-find-bail-less-credible
  

It is Spain V Argentina

 The semi-finals are over and we know who the finalists are. Spain will start favourites. They have conceded only one goal, whilst they stated slow they have gotten better with each game and they know how to control the ball.

Whilst spain were very good against france we should acknowledge france were poor. It seemed they were unaware ( like when they played paraguay) of the tactics spain would use. everybody else knew. His substitutions made little sense. The left back was bad and should not have been selected.

argentine deservedly won the other semi-final. england had one chance and scored. argentina had plenty and hit the post twice! The english substitutions made little sense.He brought on defenders when up only 1-0. Strangle the defence got worse. Also despite an immense advantage in height argentina always looked dangerous when a cross came over and consequently won because of a messi cross. England's crosses were poor.

I favour Spain. Unlike england they can control the game if they score. Their defence is the best in the competition and they can attack quickly. Lastly Messi looks quite tired which is understandable given his age and the heat.

bring on monday morning ( 5am)

The strait of hormuz

 This will be very short.

You will not get any ships going through the strait until they get insurance. NO insurance company will write a policy at present because of uncertainty the the very high risks involved.

Thus the present imbroglio is helping Iran not the USA.