My Clanker Buddy

How many hours per day do we think Egghead Andreessen spends talking to his computer God?

"Competing Claims"

 Determining the truth, or close to it, is an exercise for you, dear reader, as so much journalism is today.

The United States and Iran made competing claims over which side controlled the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, adding pressure to their shaky cease-fire after the U.S. Navy launched an effort to protect vessels through the vital oil shipping route.

The strait itself remains effectively closed: Only two ships were known to have passed through the waterway on Monday, and none had made the trip on Tuesday. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the U.S. effort to free trapped vessels is ongoing, adding “We’re ensuring that we have control of that strait, which we do.” Iran’s state broadcaster dismissed the U.S. effort as a failure and said Iranian control over the strait had “intensified.”

We Will Always Be 2 Weeks Away From The End Of The War

I don't know when the supply chains snap.

 

US President Donald Trump indicates that if he decides to return to war against Iran, it would take 2-3 weeks to achieve his goals in the war.

“We’ve taken out much of what we’d have to do, probably another two weeks, two weeks, maybe three weeks,” he tells conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt.

“We either make the right deal, or we win very easily from the military standpoint,” says Trump.

Our Tech Overlords

Much can be said, but I think this shows that he both wants to believe spicy chatbot is God, and that he can control God.

That's The Way

A lot of the problems with political journalism are a bit subtle and hard to quantify, so you can sound like a bit of a crank if you complain about them. 

One example is whether the adjectives "unpopular" or "scandal-plagued" are regularly adjacent to Trump's name, or not. More generally, whether he is talked about as if he is unpopular, or whether the focus is on whether the people who love Trump love Trump, which is often the case.

Trump is historically unpopular! More than that, he was never historically popular, though you would not have known that from the press coverage/beat sweeteners from the beginning of his second term.

President Donald Trump appears to be more unpopular than he’s ever been – including after the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

In fact, his 35% average approval rating in the CNN Poll of Polls means he’s now flirting with George W. Bush territory. Bush is the only president since Jimmy Carter to spend a sustained period of time in the mid-30s or lower.

Again, it was hard to quantify, but it took a long time for the press to talk about George Bush as if he was unpopular. 

Morning

Nacho Tuesday. 

Happy Hour

 Get happy 

But I Thought He Was So Competent

A problem with insider stories about Hegseth is that, as with Kash Patel, nothing would be surprising.  Yah he's a stupid racist asshole who sucks.

Since Trump returned to office in January last year, Pete Hegseth, the rumbustious defense secretary who has made it his mission to remake a military ethos he denounced as “woke”, has fired or forcibly retired 24 generals and senior commanders, with no performance-related reason given.

About 60% have been Black or female, an approach seemingly driven by the administration’s proclaimed onslaught against “DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) hires”.

OK this, from the self-proclaimed Alpha Male, is funny though:

Pentagon staff have been surprised to see him accompanied to official meetings by his wife, Jennifer, a former Fox News producer who frequently sits at the back during such encounters.

Somewhere After Midnight In My Wildest Fantasy

Rudy Giuliani is in critical condition.

It will probably be illegal to say mean things about him when he dies, so now is a good moment to remember that not only was he one of the most loathsome individuals in public life at the time, but all of the details of that were fully known to every relevant American journalist then.

But after 9/11, they needed a hero, so they created the character of Rudy 9/11, something which required deliberately ignoring all of his 9/11-related unheroic deeds.  Great job, everybody.

Oh No The Capital Allocation System Allocated Capital Badly Again

You can hear the sound of chanting growing:

Banks are hunting for new ways to offload risks tied to a glut of data centre debt as the race to build AI infrastructure stretches financing limits among the largest global lenders. 

Groups including JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and SMBC are trying to find ways to distribute portions of data centre-related deals to a broader range of investors, according to people familiar with the matter. 

bailout Bailout BAILOUT BAILOUT

Just put wafer thin bits of shit in with the good stuff and no one will notice.

"Distributing":

“The sizes we’re talking about . . . they’re out of scale to anything we’ve thought about, ever,” said Matthew Moniot, co-head of credit risk sharing at Man Group. “Banks very quickly start choking.” Lenders, including JPMorgan and MUFG, have spent more than six months distributing $38bn of construction debt tied to a data centre project leased to Oracle in Texas and Wisconsin, people familiar with the matter said.

Lenders, including JPMorgan and MUFG, have spent more than six months distributing $38bn of construction debt tied to a data centre project leased to Oracle in Texas and Wisconsin, people familiar with the matter said. 

The First Casualty of War

No idea who is telling the truth, but we already know Hegseth's Pentagon is less trustworthy than usual.

The U.S. military on Monday rejected Iranian claims to have struck an American warship, as Tehran signaled an aggressive response to President Donald Trump's new mission to "guide" stranded vessels through the Strait of Hormuz.

🚫 CLAIM: Iranian state media claims that Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps hit a U.S. warship with two missiles.

✅ TRUTH: No U.S. Navy ships have been struck. U.S. forces are supporting Project Freedom and enforcing the naval blockade on Iranian ports. pic.twitter.com/VFxovxLU6G

— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) May 4, 2026

Though the Pentagon being not very concerned with telling the truth is not a Hegseth invention! 

 

Morning

boo local sports team

Sunday Happy Hour

get happy

America's Worst Democratic Governor

Josh Shapiro

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro secretly helped a Republican state treasurer's 2024 reelection bid after the official's Democratic opponent had criticized Shapiro as a potential VP pick, a close Shapiro ally said last week.

At Least The War Is Over

Iran's 14-point proposal reads like what conquering nation demands, not a surrendering one.

The new proposal calls for guarantees against future attacks, a withdrawal of US forces from around Iran, the release of frozen Iranian assets worth billions of dollars and the lifting of sanctions, war reparations, ending all hostilities, including in Lebanon, and “a new mechanism for the Strait of Hormuz”.

Iran, which was also attacked by the US and Israel last June, wants a guarantee against future aggression. Israel has previously targeted Iranian nuclear scientists and run campaigns to sabotage its nuclear sites.

Tehran also wants its right to uranium enrichment guaranteed as a signatory to the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), but Trump has made the nuclear issue a “red line”. Iran wants decades of sanctions, which have devastated its economy, to be lifted as part of any deal. The navigation through the strait and demands for war reparations are other sticking points in the talks.

Mommy He Punched Me Back

Trump just says a bit more crassly what is standard DC "foreign policy" thinking: civilian populations need to be slaughtered in order to redeem a county for not bending to our will.

Peace proposal: US President Donald Trump said he can’t imagine a new peace plan from Iran he will review “would be acceptable” adding they have not yet paid “a big enough price for what they have done.” Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said the room for US decision-making “has narrowed.”

Morning

Sunday funday.

Saturday Happy Hour

Get happy

Running On Empty

I know this just means we will increase the defense budget by another eleventy zillion dollars (some Dems will oppose, some will support with a frowny face), but that doesn't mean they can make new flying death machines especially quickly.

The Trump administration has authorized more than $8.6 billion in emergency arms sales to partners in the Middle East as negotiations to end the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran remained at an impasse.

It was unclear when the weapons would arrive in the region, since it takes years to build large quantities of defensive interceptors and other types of munitions. The slow pace of production has become an acute concern in Washington, and any such weapons that American arms companies make for other countries mean less for the United States. Some Pentagon officials have expressed anxiety about diminishing U.S. stockpiles.

Dead Malls

It might actually be a good indicator of Russia's economic problems, but it's still funny as "dead malls" have been a major US phenomenon since the Great Recession and before.

What a deserted mall in Moscow says about Russia’s economic woes

The piece even says other some other malls are fine!