Sure Elon

One depressing thing has been feeling like it was necessary - starting with HYPERLOOP specifically - to swat away Elon's fantasies because they should be understood to be ridiculous without refutation.

You might think about rockets as powerful vehicles that blast astronaut crews and robotic missions off into space. But what if they could be used to send cargo from one side of the Earth to the other, in a fraction of the time it would take a plane? The company SpaceX recently announced a project that aims to use its rockets to do just that.

Most goods, at scale, don't be be need to shipped across the globe quickly. Things spoil. Some time-sensitive specialty production inputs. That's about it. Those that do have plenty of plane-based freight options that can get from airport to airport in under 24 hours.

We have a large number of airports in close proximity to population.  We are unlikely to have a large number of launchpads. Even as a niche product, even if it works it doesn't actually work unless your time sensitive goods can get to and from the departure/arrival points quickly.

Space cargo transport likely will not replace conventional transportation methods, such as sea shipping or air freight. Instead, it offers a new option: ultrafast emergency transport. This type of transport could deliver critical medical products, deploy emergency disaster relief, or supply urgent defense support within a few hours.

The only way to have broad launch coverage is if it operates at scale. If you don't have a launchpad near you, it isn't fast.

Sure we might have 25th century technology eventually, but rockets as we currently have them are not going to provide useful freight transport.

[oops typos fixed]

They Are Begging Me, With Tears In Their Eyes, "Please, Sir, Show Mercy"

I am wondering if there are ever conversations in newsrooms with journalists considering whether they should tone down criticism of Trump (and increase the praise) in order to encourage him to do the right thing.

WASHINGTON, Aug 6 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump ​on Thursday told reporters that he believed ‌the war with Iran would be over soon and said the armed forces were experiencing issues ​with supplies of some weapons.

"I think ​it's going to end pretty soon. I ⁠don't think they can go much ​longer," Trump said in the Oval Office ​in a reference to Iran.

I'm not saying this is happening, but it is the case that the probability of ending the war is more likely the more we all pretend Iran has surrendered unconditionally and Trump has managed to get the best deal in human history.

Extra points for "Barack Obama started the war, which President Trump ended."

Gotta have full team effort to create the pretend world for the president.

Jobs

I'm sure others will have more detailed analysis, but the headline number for the monthly jobs report is -23,000.

Morning

Firkin Friday.

Happy Hour

Get happy

Growing Up Trump

I regularly ponder what it must like to grow be be an older child/teen with President Trump. Your sense of what authority figures are supposed to be like must get a bit warped.

Fees

Funny to remember that when Trump briefly declared that the US would run the Hormuz toll both, he came up with 20%.

According to the senior Iranian official, Iran is seeking fees of between 5% and 7% of the price of cargoes from ships using the strait. Oman is discussing fees of around 3%, while Washington wants no fees at all.

Funding Secured

Amazing:

CNBC’s Jim Cramer said Wednesday investors looking at Elon Musk’s SpaceX should stop thinking in quarters and start thinking in decades.

“SpaceX could be a 100-year piece of paper,” the “Mad Money” host said, arguing that SpaceX should be viewed much like the century-long railroad bonds that ultimately rewarded patient investors. “Maybe you put some away for the next generation or even the one after that.”

...

Cramer acknowledged the stock could face additional near-term pressure with roughly 911 million previously locked-up shares becoming eligible for trading Thursday.

Could be! Or not!

“One day this stock could be a huge winner,” he said. “I just don’t know when that day will come.”

Happy share unlocking (first round) day! 

Treasonous Statements

A mildly amusing thing is that aside from the ridiculousness of all of this, any decent judge (I know many are not decent) would determine that no one could possibly get a fair trial after being called treasonous by the president.

Running On Empty

I've long been mildly curious about just how well our military is actually capable of defending the country. We do have a global military empire, of sorts, but do we actually have plans to stop the Canadian invasion and occupation of Buffalo?

I get that we have many tools for punishing anybody who would do such a thing, or at least we did until recently, but do we have a mobilization plan?

President Donald Trump’s frustration over the Iran war boiled over at Camp David last week, where he demanded answers from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on why he had apparently been misled on extreme munitions shortages that now threaten to limit military options with Iran, two people familiar with the exchange told The Washington Post.

...

Back at Camp David, as he was confronted by Trump over the bare weapons stockpile, Hegseth defended himself and blamed his deputy, Stephen Feinberg, for the shortages and for not ensuring Trump was fully apprised of the issue, both persons familiar said. The exchange underscored Trump’s increasing frustration with his defense secretary, who was one of the biggest early advocates for taking military action against Iran, convincing Trump it would be a quick and relatively easy win, according to multiple officials.

But he came from central casting!

I always thought that last bit was funny. I mean I get that Pete was Trump's friend in the television set, and he always loves those people, but he's more "central casting for very low budget military action movie hero" not "central casting for Secretary of Defense."

The latter is more Gene Hackman than Temu Steven Seagal.

Feinberg is a billionaire so I suspect he will have his revenge one day.

Morning

Theremin Thursday

Happy Hour

get happy

Classy

 Let's see if the "Democratic Strategist" cable news/consultant crowd can behave.

Putting your hand up to participate in democracy is no easy thing. Thank you for running, Congresswoman. Looking forward to uniting this fall to beat Mike Rogers. Because what unites us is so much bigger than what divides us. https://t.co/JbWmLPPDGZ

— Dr. Abdul El-Sayed (@AbdulElSayed) August 5, 2026

Neoconned

It's a shame Lindsey Graham isn't alive to see what his life's work has come to.

Aug 5 (Reuters) - The United ​States has ‌removed counterterrorism ​sanctions ​from two aircraft ⁠and ​three airlines ​with links to ​Iran's ​Islamic Revolutionary Guard ‌Corps, ⁠according to details posted ​to ​the ⁠U.S. ​Treasury Department's ​website ⁠on Wednesday. 

The dream was always Iran, with Iraq being the starting place, and they got what they wanted!

Every Minute

Dunno why the market wasn't thrilled.

Ever the hype man, Musk suggested thinking of SpaceX’s satellites as robots, given that “they’re autonomous and don’t need servicing.” In the not-so-distant future, Musk mused, robots will be used to scale manufacturing on the moon. From there, moon-based robots will enable SpaceX to build a mass accelerator with solar production. Even Musk admitted it all sounded “totally nuts” but claimed that it could lead the company to scale to 1,000x the economy of Earth. From there, factories will be built and robots “will be helpful with that,” Musk added.

“It sounds super sci-fi right now, but it’s going to happen,” he said. 

At least reporting on Musk is a bit more skeptical than it used to be, even though his promises actually aren't more ridiculous! 

Maestro Musk

SpaceX went up about 10% yesterday in anticipation of the earnings call, and prompted crashed 10% again.

Elon's running out of bullshit.

Vote Blue No Matter Who

El-Sayed was much closer than recent polls had him  - perhaps (perhaps not!) because it was an open primary - but he does win.

I look forward (not really) to completely objective and normal coverage of his general election campaign. Anti-Arab and anti-Muslim bigotry runs deep in our political-media culture, as does strong opposition to anyone who doesn't recite the current approved lines about supporting Israel. 

I always hope to be positively surprised, but I expect some really nasty shit, including "friendly" fire.

Morning

Time to embrace Sharia Law.

Happy Hour

Get happy.

Donald Trump Is The Least Interesting Man In The World

Or at least we all ran out of insightful things to say about him about 9 years ago.  We can't always predict his next step, but we know exactly what motivates him.

The truth about all narcissists is that once you get beyond whatever surface charm they have  - and like many ageing narcissists, Trump has little of that left - they are extremely boring people.

W. was hardly a deep and complex person, but he had more layers than Trump. No I am not handing it to W. He was a fucking horrible president and I am mad "no one" remembers that. But he wasn't entirely empty.