Locator: 51519PIPELINES.
Reminder: Philadelphia Fed Survey. We'll get that to a stand-alone blog.
Huge story: Trump has found a new way to take on the Fed. Bessent sends a warning shot in front of Warsh.
This year's PGA's penultimate tournament:
- Rory has just moved to tied for 4th place;
- Scottie is tied for 44th?
For investors, a ticker symbol with which I'm unfamiliar: PI (NASDAQ).
Hard to find but if you query ChatGPT with the "right" query you may find what you're looking for ... include Walmart in your query. PI? Impinj. RFID tags. Gemini couldn't find what I was looking for; ChatGPT found it. Just saying. There is a difference among chatbots.
Speaking of chatbots, apparently Grok is going a bit rogue. LOL.
Gradually this story is getting traction:
- the Strait of Hormuz is becoming, if not already, irrelevant (see below);
- huge number of pipelines being built;
- makes no sense to ship oil via tankers burning fuel.
- track here to see how big this story is getting.
- Iran is running out of time; the strait is nearing irrelevancy; link here.
- an idiot argues that pipelines are inappropriate in the Mideast; link here. The pivot to pipelines should have been done decades ago.
- Iran has said -- it was a senior Iranian spokesman -- said new pipelines are like missiles fired against Tehran. Link here.
Next big story: the coming kinetic diplomacy between Turkey and Israel. Track this story here.
- Turkey has formally asked Interpol to issue a Red Notice (to be arrested) for Netanyahu
- Turkey has formally asked Interpol to put Netanyahu on "a" wanted list
- must have missed the memo: arrest warrants were already issue in July
- at the same, Turkey is still providing cheap oil and gas to Israel
- are both sides speaking to their bases
- Turkey's leaders are not dummies; at a minimum they will wait until Trump is out of office.
What we'll be talking about over the weekend while watching golf:
And this:
The U.S. safety agency opened an investigation into nearly one million General Motors pickup trucks and SUVs due to reports of L87 6.2-liter V8 engine failures happening even after vehicles received a previous recall fix.
It's important to remember this when these engines suddenly stop running, this speaks volumes. It's interesting that the English automobile sector was known for a very similar problem decades ago:
General Motors is actively phasing out Apple CarPlay and Android Auto in favor of its own native infotainment software ecosystem and proprietary AI strategies. Rather than partnering with Apple, GM partnered with Google to use Android Automotive OS and integrate Google's Gemini AI, while also developing its own deeply integrated native in-vehicle AI assistants.
Query: England's automobile sector -- particularly MG brand -- was well known for electrical problems -- decades ago.
Reply:
British cars, especially classic MG models, gained a lasting reputation for electrical failures decades ago. The main culprit was Lucas Industries, the primary electrical parts supplier for the British motor industry during the mid-20th century.
Apple: Walmart announces it will now take ApplePay. Huge.
Reminder: Big Sky 1 and 2; Apollo Global Managment; Blackstone; Google TPUs and custom silicon co-designed by Broadcom and Alphabet -- for the AI lab Anthropic!
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The Movie Page
Barton Fink (1991 -- the Coen brothers).
Today, this link.
More than any other subject matter, writers writing about writing can veer off into navel-gazing irrelevance. The world doesn’t need more stories about 20-something Brooklynites trying to make it with only a pen and a dream, unless those stories are bold enough to throw some evil robots in at the halfway mark.
Barton Fink doesn’t quite do that, but when the Coen brothers’ black comedy came out 35 years ago today, it certainly veered in a direction that’s all but impossible for first-time viewers to predict.
And while a writer writing about writers writing about writing
threatens to become downright somnambulant, it’s a movie worth looking
back on now that so many self-proclaimed creators are trying to skip
past the writing process entirely.
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The Strait Becomes Irrelevant
If I had to guess, I would say it was Trump's decision to move one a/c out of the Persian Gulf but to replace it with a fresh set of jets and pilots, to make the Iranians realize Trump was here to stay.
In addition, most obviously by now, Saudi Arabia, et al, are finding other ways to ship oil, and the rest of the world is also looking for alternate sources.
