Quote from: K-Dog on Apr 25, 2026, 10:17 PM

TASNIMNEWS.IR • 2026-04-25

US Warned of Iran’s Severe Response to Piracy

The Khatam al-Anbia Central Headquarters of Iran warned that continued acts of blockade and maritime piracy by the United States will trigger a strong response from the Iranian Armed Forces.

The link doesn't load on my computer.

One wonders what a "strong" response to the blockade & piracy would be?  Will they attempt an attack on an FSoA Navy boat?  That would seem to be pretty hard to succeed at, given they are hanging out well outside the straight in International Waters in the Gulf of Oman.  Failing at the attack would make them look weak & give Trumpolini opportunity to boast about his powerful navy and Poseidon like omnipotence over the sea.

So, either they have to be pretty certain they can succeed with such an attack, or choose something pretty  substantial that at least makes impressive video to substitute.    Blowing up a major Saudi or Kuwaiti refinery or storage facility would make pretty spectacular video if they could manage that, but also pretty tough I imagine.  Maybe the Houthis could manage an attack on an LNG transport of their coast?  One of those blowing up would really make good video.

How about a big terror bombing in Europe or in the FSoA?  That could backfire with negative PR if a lot of civilians get waxed.  It needs to be something that attacks infrastructure, not people.  A cyber attack on the FSoA electrical grid or the banking system could work, if they have hackers good enough to pull it off.

Just have to wait & see I guess.

RE

Nothing like a 'shooting' to muddy the Persian gulf waters.








Torrence California is a long way from DC.  I am sure there is a logical explanation.  Perhaps there are a lot of logical explanations.  Perhaps there is a plethora of logical explanations.  So many logical explanations that you can't count them all.  And there may actually be a few happy little accidents.  Accidents hardly worth mentioning that put Cole at the Washington Hilton tonight too.  I wonder how long it will be before Cole figures it out.  Some of that ammo was too easy for him to get perhaps?  But not now, not tonight.  Too much is happening in his life tonight for the scales to fall from his eyes now.




The lady doth protest too much, methinks

It seems her 'apathy' generated 1000 words.




An engineer, with a Masters in Computer Science.  As mine is in Software Engineering, I am able to say :

I understand !

Some of my best friends were trannies.  They just shouldn't compete with cissies because they have different physiology.  Not a level playing field.

Far as Mao and Pol Pot are concerned, they had good ideas and bad ones.  Collective ownership of the means of production and abolishment of private property is a pretty good idea.  Purging the society of the rich and privileged elite also a pretty good idea.  Abolishment of capitalism also good.  Purging Universities of intellectuals not so good.

Suburb dwellers going back to farming is a pretty good idea, it's certainly a more sustainable form of living than shopping at the mall and commuting 50 miles a day in traffic to work in a 100 story tall air conditioned skyscraper.  Starting now would be a good idea also, since such a massive transition of lifestyle and relocation of people isn't going to happen overnight.

Never claimed to not have an interest in Peak Oil, just that it's not what led me to become interested in collapse.  Economics did that.  I've never been married to any particular time line on it, just that the dependence on a finite resource was bound to cause disruption when the resource became hard to come by.  It doesn't take much to disrupt a complex system, as evidenced by the fact is all it takes to completely screw up the global economy is a few towel heads with speed boats and shoulder fired missiles and RPGs.

Anyhow, whether PO occured in 2008, 2018 or sometime in the future, we're definitely in the deep doo doo now as the shortages begin migrating from Asia to ports all over the world.  Farmers in the Northern Hemisphere are planting their crops, and we'll see what the yields are like at the end of summer.  Where it goes from here is anybody's guess, mine would be that next year will be worse than this year, which was already pretty bad.

RE

Quote from: RE on Apr 25, 2026, 12:09 PMThe really smart people never bother with this and understand that the real value of a college education are the parties, the girls, the drugs and the endlessly flowing booze. 😁 

Now THAT is pretty funny, and probably true based on my experience with frat boys and whatnot. I was married, never did drugs and whatnot, and don't drink. I guess I just learned stuff that later came in handy when showing up the PhD and true believer types who jsut went to school for booze and the girls. 

Quote from: REAnother truth is that really smart people, like everyone else all have a price.  Offer them enough money and they'll make a very convincing case for just about any insane notion you care to promote, like for instance that smoking promotes longer lasting, harder erections and stronger orgasms.

Really? So you don't believe in folks being ethical, the certainly of proven science without regard to someone paying you to play make believe?

Quote from: REOr that trannie women should be allowed to compete with cis women in a boxing ring.

Not sure what that has to do with anything. Had problems with trannys in the past or something?

Quote from: REOr that burning fossil fuels has nothing to do with climate change.  Or that the war with Iran was a good idea because they are all Muslim towel head terrorists stuck in the middle ages.

Oh now I get it. You are just doing the reheased littany of anti "party you don't like" stuff. Good thing I'm  not a Republican either. Not a dumbass Democrat either. I have reserved the right to be independent since 1992. 

Quote from: REAll of which explains why I don't put any more value on what World Class Experts in any field have to say than anyone else.

Understandable. After all, if you can't be one, then bash them. Quite a common reaction.

Quote from: REAppeal to Authority is a logical fallacy that does nothing to demonstrate the truth of an argument.

Quite true. But those who demonstrated the validity of their understanding by nothing more than the passage of some time, well, now we aren't talking about logical fallacies at all. Just prescience. Like....say...the opposite of what Ehrlich did. Or Campbell, McPherson, Hirsch, etc etc. Bu what did they know, getting those rubber stamped PhD's. 

Quote from: RERichard Heinberg's work was pretty good, and i've found good information from both Resilience.org & the Post Carbon Institute.
RE

Richard Heinberg? The amateur violin player who claimed that peak oil happened around 2008, and advocated that the government should immediately send/move suburbanites to the fields to grow food, as otherwise everyone was going to starve? He speaks well. As far as technical understanding...well....they say he is a good amateur violin player.

So you like college dropouts (he claimed he dropped out because he liked to smoke weed more, and played in a rock band (according to his interview on TOD) who more closely resembles the ideas of Pol Pot and Mao? Post Carbon in general (excluding Hughes of course....tell me....did North America run out of natural gas reserves by 2016 as he claimed?) isn't bad...as long as the topic has nothing to do with oil, and sticks with just making the world and environment better. Without blaming it on oil disappearing anyway. A decent environmental angle.

When you claimed you never had a major interest in peak oil, but more the overall doomer perspective across many topics, it makes sense you wouldn't know a decent geoscience based peak oil opinion from Joe Bob the nose picker at the local bar.

Quote from: K-Dog on Apr 25, 2026, 11:47 AMI too am an excellent driver.

Really? Do you mean that like a good or safe street driver? Or someone with extensive track time?

Quote from: TDoS on Apr 25, 2026, 10:50 AMPeople of all IQ's make a decision to BELIEVE. If they have low IQs, they stop there. If they have PhD's, they weave a tale, mixing in facts, history, supposition and "what-ifs", with a hint of "and I've got a PhD" and presto!  Dr Colin Campbell...global peak oil...1990. ASPO in Europe with Colin and Ugo. And others. IQ had nothing to do with how they talked themselves into drawing a conclusion so easily known to be a crock.

We are in agreement on this point certainly.  Also true is that having a Ph.D. doesn't necessarily mean you're very smart.  On just about any subject, if you have at least average intelligence and spend 4-6 years plodding through the subject and then slavishly follow your advisor's directions in the lab and get his order for coffee correct every morning, pay your bills on time at the bursar's office, they'll hand you your sheepskin at the end of it.  The really smart people never bother with this and understand that the real value of a college education are the parties, the girls, the drugs and the endlessly flowing booze. 😁  Another truth is that really smart people, like everyone else all have a price.  Offer them enough money and they'll make a very convincing case for just about any insane notion you care to promote, like for instance that smoking promotes longer lasting, harder erections and stronger orgasms.  Or that trannie women should be allowed to compete with cis women in a boxing ring. Or that burning fossil fuels has nothing to do with climate change.  Or that the war with Iran was a good idea because they are all Muslim towel head terrorists stuck in the middle ages.

All of which explains why I don't put any more value on what World Class Experts in any field have to say than anyone else.  Appeal to Authority is a logical fallacy that does nothing to demonstrate the truth of an argument.  Far as the various people who had a variety of Peak Oil theories are concerned, some were better than others, some were astoundingly bad, some were quite good.  Guy McStinksion was a clown of course, he had us all dead by 2016.  I've never been a fan of Ugo's belief that Solar can replace fossil fuels in time and maintain the current FSoA standard of living or population size.  Richard Heinberg's work was pretty good, and i've found good information from both Resilience.org & the Post Carbon Institute.  There's good and bad information out there, as in all things.  You have to separate the wheat from the chaff.

RE