Around the Traps 19/6/26

 It is time for Around the Traps again.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Sam McLure on hard-to-think-of-a-more-wasteful-project-economist-slams-bloody-minded-afl-over-stadium Thanks Nick
• Robert Breunig and Peter Varela on how-simple-changes-to-australias-skilled-migration-program-could-add-billions-a-year-to-the-economy
• Mick Ryan on russia-s-slow-defeat-and-australia-s-hard-lesson
• Stella Huangfu on the-rba-holds-interest-rates-steady-but-warns-another-hike-is-possible-if-inflation-stays-high
• Fadi Maayah on after-a-coaching-masterclass-against-turkey-can-the-socceroos-shock-the-us-and-paraguay
• Mark the Graph on a-cruel-irony-in-housing-target
• Antony Green on the-financial-reviews-inaccurate-preference-analysis
• Mark the Ballot on polling-update , betting-market-update
• Adrian Beaumont on latest-polls-still-have-one-nation-leading-on-primary-votes-but-not-gaining

OZ Climate

• Adam Morton on climate-denial-in-vogue-pauline-hanson-australia-cop31
• Kimberly Reid on the-weather-bureau-has-just-declared-an-el-nino-what-could-this-mean-for-australia
• new-records-for-wind-and-battery-output-in-last-month-of-autumn-taking-big-bite-out-of-coal-and-gas
  
• plans-for-australias-biggest-wind-farm-scaled-back-with-solar-and-big-battery-added-to-create-huge-hybrid
  
• plans-to-resurrect-2km-buffer-zone-will-make-new-renewable-projects-unviable-cec-warns
  
• chart-of-the-day-farewell-king-coal-long-live-king-solar-and-wind-and-batteries
  
• data-centres-could-unblock-renewables-bottlenecks-if-they-dont-hit-barriers-of-their-own
  
• too-complex-too-hard-too-often-unfair-plan-to-reform-electricity-pricing-backs-contentious-tariff-changes
  
• frequency-penalties-are-costing-some-solar-farms-millions-but-this-is-the-market-working
  

Northern America

• institutional economics on nowhere-to-hide
• Brad De Long on the-health-gap-between-conservative-and-liberal-america-can-be-seen-in-the-mortality-data , bonds-and-equities-have-not-recently-hedged-each-other
• Kruggers on meet-the-new-bosses-worse-than-the-old-bosses , the-theory-of-the-vulgar-class, unlocked-repost-curing-us-healthcare-part111: the-future
• Christian Paz on southern-baptist-convention-right-wing-drift-religious-influencers-content-creator-populist-christianity-catholic-protestant
• Ruth Marcus on why-todd-blanche-should-not-be-attorney-general
• Jonathan Lemire on trump-defeat-iran-war
• noahpinion  on iran-is-trumps-katrina
• the conversable economist on dairy-supply-and-demand-stories
• Tom Nicholls on trump-g7-comments-misunderstsand-middle-east

Europe

• Felix Martin on how-eu-can-respond-second-china-shock Thanks Nick 
• Paul Reilly on belfast-unrest-shows-the-power-of-social-media-as-far-right-views-on-immigration-enter-the-mainstream
• noahpinion on degrowth-would-make-europeans-into-europoor
• Lisa Given on australia-has-already-banned-social-media-for-under-16s-heres-what-the-uk-can-learn-from-the-experience
• Mark Edele on putin-wanted-to-make-russia-great-again-instead-ukraine-is-the-new-rising-power-in-europe
• Anastaysia Byesyedina on russias-strike-on-centuries-old-ukrainian-monastery-complex-reveals-its-growing-desperation
• Khalid Khoser on voters-weigh-the-real-cost-of-less-migration
• Iryna Skubii on the-world-has-stopped-seeing-ukraine
• mainly macro on the-consequences-of-tolerating-far-right

Asia

• Jessica Genauer on are-the-us-and-iran-back-at-war-or-negotiating-why-bombing-your-way-to-peace-wont-work , whats-in-the-us-iran-peace-deal-a-lot-of-concessions-and-empty-promises-from-trump-in-return-for-little
• Shruti Pandalai on beijing-s-ban-on-nz-mps-is-a-calibration-test-will-democracies-pass-it
• Amin Saikal on a-peace-deal-may-bring-an-end-to-the-iran-war-but-what-did-the-us-and-israel-truly-achieve
• Joshua Keating on iran-ceasefire-trump
• Fred Kaplan on trump-iran-deal-war-news-hormuz , trump-iran-deal-war-news-hormuz-mou
• Tom Nicholls on trump-iran-deal
• noahpinion on will-china-inc-be-zombified
• Francis Fukuyama on the-art-of-the-non-deal Thanks Brad
• Rodger Shanahan on trump-boasts-about-the-art-of-the-deal-he-knows-nothing-about-the-art-of-war
• Kevin Morrison on us-iran-deal-should-see-oil-and-lng-begin-to-flow-again-slowly
• Shadi Rouhshahbaz on the-iran-peace-deal-must-demand-the-release-of-narges-mohammadi-and-other-prisoners-of-conscience
• Andrew Arsan on unmaking-the-middle-east-what-really-went-wrong
• Jing Je on china-is-turning-the-waters-east-of-taiwan-grey
• home and away on defeat
• Graham Wood on iran-trump-war-defeat-deal
• Ishaan Tharoor on the-spectacular-failure-and-ruinous-costs-of-the-iran-war

Wonk

• Heidi Blake on andrew-tates-empire-of-abuse Thanks Nick
• global inequality on defeated-by-the-real-world  Thanks Nick
• Michael Pettis on how-are-global-imbalances-transmitted  Thanks Nick 
• David Pinsof et al on strange bedfellows Thanks Nick
• the conversable economist on homo-experiens-the-biology-of-decision-making-and-behavioral-economics
• Tyler Cowen on sometimes-it-is-hard-to-solve-for-the-equilibrium
• Kruggers on technology-and-social-change , power-and-geopolitics-after-trump
• Brad De Long on ask-not-for-whom-the-schumpeterian-creative-destruction-bells-tolls-this-time
• Holly Seale et al on ebola-hantavirus-diphtheria-how-distrust-in-health-care-is-fuelling-multiple-outbreaks-across-the-globe
• Mark the Graph on weekly-energy-update , mmt-in-three-layers

General

• Johann Fourie on a-football-is-not-enough thanks tyler
• Carol Oliver on aliens-might-exist-but-there-are-three-reasons-why-theyre-not-visiting-us
• Charlie Huveneers on do-shark-culls-keep-people-safe-in-the-ocean-heres-what-the-science-says

Climate

• David Appell on warming-up-to-2025-137c
• skeptical science on plateauing-co2-slowed-growth , new_research
• ocean acidification on sea-to-shining-sea-noaa-launches-dual-coastwide-ocean-acidification-research-missions
• Fionagh Thomson on one-of-the-worlds-most-important-climate-threats-has-an-image-problem
• Kripa Anand and Anuttama Banerji on climate-change-is-coming-for-asia-s-cities-delhi-s-heat-is-just-a-taste

Andrew Gelman (mainly stats)

• to-what-extent-is-it-true-that-all-intelligence-human-or-artificial-must-extract-structure-from-correlational-data
  
• are-prediction-markets-causing-more-harm-than-good 
  
• capitalism-on-its-last-legs-or-healthy-enough-to-be-milked
  
• the-new-york-knicks-and-the-martingale-property-of-calibrated-probability-forecasts
  
• survey-statistics-using-mrp-in-later-analyses-pride-edition
  
• https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2026/06/18/llm-case-study-galilelo-inclined-plane/
  
• Tim Harford on data-you-dont-know-what-youve-got-till-its-gone
• Kaiser Fung on confirmation-bias-on-display , the-greatest-nations-on-earth

Dianne Coyle ( quirky + book reviews)

• Brad De Long on reading-gunnar-myrdal-challenge-to-affluence
• Andrew Gelman on elmore-leonard

Vox Wonk

• unequal-burden-oil-shocks-labour-markets-and-monetary-policy 
  
• regulation-and-growth-reloaded-lessons-25-years-retail-trade-and-professional 
  
• not-all-reserves-are-born-equal-why-source-matters-sovereign-risk
  
• reciprocal-sovereignty-third-constitutional-tradition-europe
  
• taking-the-pulse-of-global-trade-policy
  
• fiscal-rules-compliance-and-sovereign-borrowing-costs-some-evidence-euro-area
  
• design-and-effect-tariff-retaliation-evidence-eu
  
• impact-trade-wars-firms-third-countries
  
• trade-restrictions-trade-policy-uncertainty-and-fdi-flows 
  
• prevention-birth-birthright-citizenship-reduces-youth-crime
  

Pauline Hanson did not impress

 Pauline Hanson delivered a very long address at the national press club. She then avoided most of the questions asked and showed a clear glass jaw.

Just a few examples.

She believes employees have too much power and are lazy. holy Theory Y Theory Z batman. Douglas McGregor wrote the book in 1957. the theory is almost as old as I am!!  I can see ALP stalwarts making an ad of this remark.

She believes net zero is a myth and renewables is the reason power costs have risen. She wants to stop all renewables and build coal and a nuclear power station.  Wow a lot of ignorance there. lots of ad material her as well.

She did not react well to a question from Sarah Martin who asked about he daughter who is employed by a NSW senator but LIVES in Tasmania. She apparently wants to be a senator there.

In short she thrived on the grievances but has few solutions. She has never had the concentration of the press on her during an election. Next time she will and on this evidence she will not react well.

Just remember given her hostility to immigration ( non-white) she has probably reached her peak in votes. Her aim is to keep those people who have migrated ( pun intended) from the LNP and the ALP.

Her lack of policies, hostility to the press, hostility to workers, hostility to the environment will all hurt her in that aim.

Just remember in 1996 she said asians would take over Australia. About a decade later she changed that to muslims. None of those predictions have come within coo-ee of being right.

home battery

 An update on how our battery is going.

The last bill was around $110 which is very low for a four person household. however it was that high because my wife had the air conditioning on quite a lot.

A battery is very good at telling you indirectly how much various items use electricity. Thus washing machines, dishwashers etc use little but ovens,stoves, mico-waves, air fryers use a lot.

We have only had our battery full on a day once since the ending of daylight saving. This is because my boys had friends over and used a lot of electricity cooking up a treat.

The problem is if you start the day with nothing in the battery then it aint going to get full on the day. The KWs just don't have the same gusto behind them in winter.

Thus we are using electricity during the night when it is off-peak and in the morning when it isn't.

the 'peace'deal

 First a couple of informed comments

• Amin Saikal
• Fred Kaplan
• Tom Nicholls

There were a whole host of reasons given for this illegal war started by the USA. Lets go through them

1. Regime Change. Never occurred never looked like occurring and trump gave up on it very quickly.
2. No Nukes. How Iran could be sooo close to a nuke after the USA 'obliterated' their capacity was never addressed. This issue has been pushed down the road
3. Iran's support of terrorist groups. nothing has occurred on this front either. Indeed Iran has made it clear they want Israel to back off Hizbullah
4. Iran's missiles and drones. No-one but no-one has talked about this!

The only issue Trump has talked about is the freeing up of the strait of homuz. This was free of any trouble before trump started his disastrous war.

The Magnificent Socceroos

 That was easily the best performance I have seen from australia  playing football.

There was not a bad player on the field. The defence was tight with Soutar again showing his best performances are at the world cup. The midfield was hardworking and the attack always threatened on the breakaway. Bos showed absolute class on a number of occasions.

Almost all of Poppa's choices worked out well. Beach was superb, Okon strong with a brilliant through pass ( I confess I would not have had him in my squad!). His first substitution was mystifying and he was lucky turkey didn't score from his mistake.

Playing toure and Irankunda from the start paid off when the big I scored a very good goal.

I suspect neither will start against the USA but come on as subs.

I cannot wait for 5am on saturday.

Whoopsy I forgot to mention ONLY Harry Soutar had played in the world cup before!!

Around the Traps 12/6/26

 It is time again for Around the Traps.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• inflection points on against-affordable-housing thanks nick
• Sam Roggeveen on sub-text thanks nick
• Jennifer Parker on why-is-australia-buying-used-submarines-a-naval-expert-answers-key-aukus-questions
• Chris Wallace on reform-is-hard-albanese-and-chalmers-need-to-stay-the-course
• Mark the Graph on capital-gains-tax-good-reform-or-bad , a-tour-of-microeconomics-of-housing
• Greg Jericho on australia-housing-house-prices-falling-data
• Kevin Bonham on independent-australia-worst-website-in-australian-politics

OZ Climate

• significant-milestone-off-grid-mine-runs-155-consecutive-hours-on-100-pct-renewables-and-engines-off 
  
• anatomy-of-a-renewable-finance-deal-developer-lands-equity-for-states-largest-solar-battery-hybrid
  
• solar-projects-to-be-hit-by-big-increase-in-costs-due-to-new-australian-anti-dumping-decision
  
• batteries-and-wind-are-crushing-evening-peak-prices-and-there-is-more-pain-to-come-for-gas-and-coal
  
• global-wind-giant-plans-to-plug-battery-storage-into-turbines-at-all-new-australian-projects-starting-in-nsw
  
• not-easy-australias-biggest-transmission-project-energised-after-delays-and-cost-overruns
  
• passive-home-batteries-deliver-enormous-benefit-to-the-grid-says-aemo-even-if-not-orchestrated-in-vpps
  
• big-and-small-batteries-fundamentally-changing-the-grid-and-its-planning-blueprint-says-aemo-boss
  
• i-would-like-to-see-a-change-in-behaviour-rule-maker-wants-retailers-to-act-before-it-has-to-intervene
  
• depleted-batteries-and-very-expensive-gas-how-a-two-day-heatwave-caused-near-doubling-of-quarterly-prices
  
• golden-moment-australias-biggest-wind-farm-becomes-first-to-reach-1-gw-of-output
  
• the-quiet-battery-what-household-batteries-reveal-about-flexibility-before-full-orchestration
  
• Chris Brack on are-australias-carbon-farming-schemes-just-hot-air-hardly-forests-are-regrowing-almost-everywhere
• Donna Lu on australia-rooftop-solar-panels-households-business
• Nick Toscano and Mike Foley on green-energy-is-shielding-australia-from-a-global-power-price-shock
• Timothy Neal and Ben Newell on climate-change-has-already-made-australians-in-one-state-much-poorer-and-mores-to-come
• Graham Readfearn on climate-crisis-science-emissions-good-news-corp-misrepresentation 
• Dennis Muller on a-right-mess-how-mining-media-and-politics-interests-are-combining-to-influence-public-debate-in-australia
• Alberto Meucci et al on good-news-for-renewables-southern-australias-offshore-winds-will-stay-strong-even-as-the-climate-changes

Northern America

• kruggers on comments-on-a-freaky-friday , a-gesture-of-contempt , money-and-machismo-are-undermining-america , breaking-the-heart-of-the-heartland , social-security-is-facing-a-political-crisis , elon-musk-human-ponzi-scheme
• David Frum on democrats-have-choose-between-character-and-power
• Hayes Brown on trump-irs-audit-ban-family-profits 
• Joshua Keating on trump-netanyahu-iran-war
• Fred Kaplan on trump-iran-israel-ukraine-war-foreign-policy , trump-iran-war-news-strikes-venezuela-oil
• the conversable economist on chair-jerome-powell-an-early-retrospective
• Michael Angeloni and Beau Tremitiere on year-later-military-personnel-police-american-streets
• Justin Glawe on trump-cognitive-impairment
• Noah Berlatsky on todd-blanche
• Stephen Robinson on trump-madness
• Dahlia Lithwick on todd-blanche-news-republicans-attorney-general-senate-hearing
• Clint Smith on black-military-patriots-hegseth
• John Quiggin on final-five-and-u-s-competitiveness
• dead for tax reasons on same-recession-opposite-jerseys
• Brad De Long on crosspost-renee-diresta-red-mirage-blue-shift-online-cope , so-far-inflations-return-limited-to-energy
• Ian Millhiser on supreme-court-callais-trump-doj-disparate-impact
• noahpinion on insurers-arent-the-main-villain-of-the-US-healthcare-system
• Brad De Long on earnings-sentiment-or-this-is-nuts , crosspost-arindrajit-dube-a-minimum-wage-experiment-has-beeb-happening-for-over-a-decade
• Dahlia Lithwick and Mark Stern on supreme-court-analysis-kbj-amy-coney-barrett-congress
• Quinta Jurecic on trump-doj-judges-lawfare
• Alex Tabarrok on here-comes-the-sunscreen

Europe

• Charles Lane on oosterhoff-netherlands-teen-euthanasia thanks nick
• Ian Hill on armenia-the-next-ukraine
• noahpinion on why-europe-should-put-up-trade-barriers
• Anne Applebaum on ukraine-war-momentum-shift
• mainly macro on trends-in-uk-inequality-and-poverty
• Indrees Kahloon on uk-productivity-economy-reform-party
• Chris Dillow on what-bond-market-constraint

Asia

• Brad De Long on hormuz-trump-and-the-140bbl-question
• Mehdi Hasan on uk-us-champion-free-speech-war-palestine
• Amin Saikal on iran-dragged-out-the-1979-hostage-crisis-to-humiliate-the-us-it-may-try-to-do-the-same-to-trump-now
• Peter Chai on as-japans-popularity-booms-a-new-survey-shows-strong-anti-foreigner-sentiment
• Seong-Hyon Lee on xi-s-visit-to-pyongyang-did-not-revive-denuclearisation-diplomacy-it-buried-it
• Henry Storey on china-s-industrial-policy-confronts-fiscal-reality
• Andrew Arsan on unmaking-the-middle-east-what-really-went-wrong
• Khang Vu on xi-draws-a-line-on-north-korea-s-alliance-demands

Wonk

• institutional economics on mind-the-gaps
• equality by lot on the-deliberative-transformation thanks nick
• Thomas Lambert on i-failed-as-a-novelist thanks nick
• Tim Harford on chatbots-make-stuff-up-why-do-we-believe-them-anyway
• Tyler Cowen on is-work-from-home-bad-for-your-mental-health
• Brad De Long on thoughts-springing-from-ronald-meek
• Marta Khomyn on as-spacex-openai-and-anthropic-plan-blockbuster-launches-will-it-make-ai-giants-more-accountable
• Al Hynes on actually-the-un-is-broken-and-that-s-exactly-why-reform-matters
• Francisco Trujillo on i-used-sound-waves-to-make-espresso-it-could-cut-coffee-brewing-energy-use-by-75
• Mick Ryan on modern-war-and-the-systemic-learning-deficit-in-western-military-institutions
• home and away on bombs-away
• noahpinion on are-you-finally-ready-to-admit-its-the-phones
• the conversable economist on geoeconomics-and-rethinking-the-logic-of-trade

General

• Anna Goldsworthy on love-sex-and-intimacy-in-the-time-of-ai

Climate

• David Appell on el-nino-is-coming-on-strong
• ocean acidification on assessing-recent-anthropogenic-carbon-dioxide-and-acidification-in-the-ross-sea-antarctica
• Javier Vide on a-very-strong-el-nino-may-be-approaching-heres-what-it-could-mean-for-the-worlds-weather
• open mind on acceleration-in-the-lower-troposphere
• Kareen McVeigh on un-world-ocean-assessment-severe-stress-sea-level-rise-doubles-pollution-fishing-climate
• Luke Bennetts et al on how-waves-ponds-and-green-algae-are-accelerating-sea-ice-melt-in-antarctica
• skeptical science on how-many-people-does-heat-kill
• Jonathan Watts on record-winter-temperatures-in-antarctic-raise-fears-over-speed-of-climate-breakdown
• Eva Plaganyi and Laura Blamey on climate-change-is-causing-fish-to-move-to-cooler-water-but-what-if-their-escape-route-is-blocked
• Moyhu on may-global-surface-templs-down-004-from-april
• open mind on co2-good-news-and-bad-news
• Graham Readfearn on antarcticas-west-coast-missing-an-area-of-sea-ice-the-size-of-france-as-temperatures-peak-20c-above-average

Andrew Gelman ( mainly stats)

• when-is-detecting-ai-generated-text-worthwhile
  
• scott-alexander-as-a-modern-day-edmund-wilson
  
• steins-method-learning-and-inference-or-how-to-really-monitor-convergence-and-thin-chains 
  
• naming-a-jail-after-a-convicted-criminal 
  
• survey-statistics-should-mrp-workflow-include-loco-cv
  
• from-a-message-i-sent-to-a-potential-co-blogger
  
• the-data-analysts-guide-to-cause-and-effect
  
• adjusting-for-nonrepresentativeness-in-continuous-norming-using-multilevel-regression-and-poststratification
  
• jazz-and-quantum-mechanics-eventually-dmitri-realized-that-they-are-kind-of-similar
  
• statschat on small-modular
• econometric sense on who-is-john-galt-second-handedness-ai
• Kaiser Fung on know-your-data-49-the-risk-of-story-telling-with-data

Dianne Coyle (quirky + book reviews)

• machines-are-not-the-enemy
  

Vox Wonk

• market-implied-inflation-expectations-during-iran-shock 
  
• us-consumer-savings-shale-gas 
  
• making-sense-conflicting-labour-market-signals
  
• why-some-digital-payment-systems-replace-cash-and-others-dont
  
• fighting-misinformation-truth-why-mainstream-news-matters-social-media
  
• pension-funds-unlisted-firms-and-europes-capital-markets-union 
  
• increasing-employment-pre-retirement-years-slows-cognitive-decline
  
• when-private-insurance-buys-faster-access-public-care
  

The next administration has a hellva job reforming the DOJ

 The DOJ has been severely degraded un Trump 2.0

 They have lost regularity and have been found to lie before judges and conduct grand juries in an unlawful way. Indeed it would not be uncommon for charged people to ask to see grand jury transcripts or ask that a magistrate judge examine them. Quite clearly the Lindsay Halligan incident was NOT a one-off.

Apparently the DOJ have lost around 10,000 in either sackings or resignations. Things have got so bad the DOJ have to offer financial incentives just to gain new graduates. The quality of people in the DOJ has naturally declined.

I could go on but I have no need to. The AG and DAG in the nest admisitration has a lot to do to get back experienced personnel back to the DOJ and political hacks out of the department. There has to be a concerted push to have people whose primary asset is what they know NOT who they know!