In fairness, the claim is that all the Iranians are offering their own lives for the poster's goals.
Of course, that only brings us to, "It's easy to claim others are offering their lives for your goals."
I guess it's probably best to just realize everything you see on the subject of any given war is probably propaganda. And judge the value of it through that lens.
Where are you getting this idea that anyone is paying Iran? Genuinely confused about this. The only thing that has happened is that the US made Iran open the Straight up for two weeks in exchange for a pause in bombing. Nothing else has been agreed to. What source are you looking at that says anyone is paying them and that is has been agreed to?
-Complete cessation of the war on Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen
-Complete and permanent cessation of the war on Iran with no time limit
-Ending all conflicts in the region in their entirety
-Reopening the Strait of Hormuz
-Establishing a protocol and conditions to ensure freedom and security of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz
-Full payment of compensation for reconstruction costs to Iran (via reparations in the form of USD2 Million per ship Hormuz fee to be shared with Oman[?] for some reason? Again, I don't understand why anyone is paying anything to anyone else?)
-Full commitment to lifting sanctions on Iran
-Release of Iranian funds and frozen assets held by the United States (Also to be used as reparations to Iran. Again, why?)
-Iran fully commits to not seeking possession of any nuclear weapons (More on this below. And it's a doozy.)
-Immediate ceasefire takes effect on all fronts immediately upon approval of the above conditions
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OK. Now that is the english language version. The Farsi version, which is not being reported in the media, contains the following language as well: "acceptance of enrichment". (Which again, to me, seems like it would be a non-starter.) The idea being that enrichment is a dual use technology I assume?
The full version isn't being reported in English language media, but the Administration has it. When asked about what's in the plan, the White House will only confirm that "yes", it is 15 points and not just the 10 we know about. So that answer at least confirms there are additional points. Which, again, even if there weren't added points, the 10 we know about mean that everyone still pays Iran for passage through the straits.
I'm gonna be honest here, this seems totally unworkable. I'll even go further, and characterize this as Iran giving us a list of conditions for our surrender. This is not acceptable. This is materially worse than the status quo that existed 2 months ago.
This isn't answering what I asked though. This is a statement of Iranian talking points but there is no agreement, the US hasn't "capitulated", nor have further talks taken place. Nobody has agreed to pay Iran anything. It doesn't matter what they say.
When you write things like this:
> Which, again, even if there weren't added points, the 10 we know about mean that everyone still pays Iran for passage through the straits.
It's like who cares what they wrote in these 10 points? They can demand the moon be made of cheese too. There will be no paying to use the Strait because like other points in these 10 demands the US and Gulf States won't agree to it.
When Iran wrote this did you like, think that they made these demands and then other countries are trying to comply with them or something? It doesn't matter what Iran writes. It only matters what the US says will happen as we see fit.
> Doing nothing would have been better than this.
Doing nothing means the following:
- Iran continues to stock pile missiles
- Iran gets to a point where they have so many missiles that it becomes untenable for the US to stop them from buying and building more missiles because the destruction they would create for Gulf States and others that they hold hostage aren't worth the risk
- Because Iran can't be stopped they would continue their pursuit of a nuclear weapon
Then Iran can enact whatever toll they want on the Straight and there's nothing anyone can do about it and we're right here where we are now except the US has pulled out of the region and Iran's crazy regime is making billions from Gulf States and the international community by taxing trade. That's why the US struck now instead of waiting - if we wait there's nothing we can reasonably do!
Sit down and think this through for yourself. Of course you can argue "Iran wouldn't do that" but you have to take them at their word and through their activities which indicate that is indeed what they planned on doing. Doing nothing means we have a much, much bigger problem down the line. Doing something now means we can likely prevent that bigger problem from occurring in the first place.
Maybe I should have been more clear? These are the points in the proposal that the Iranians/pakistanis sent to Trump that Trump said formed the basis for the ceasefire. Which it doesn’t. There is nothing there for us.
It doesn’t matter anymore in any case as Israel just launched a massive barrage. So there will be no ceasefire now anyway.
No worries, sorry if I wasn't clear as well. To your point, I didn't really think a ceasefire would last long anyway because neither side has any interest in changing their perspective and at the end of the day the US holds the upper hand and the folks they are "negotiating" with are, well, rather delusional.
I'm likely misunderstanding what you're trying to say.
Can you elaborate on how, exactly, ships would be able to evade the toll booth, if they have to pay the toll in any case?
Because on the surface of it, it sounds to me like Iran is tolling the straits. Which is fine. The fee is small enough that I'm not opposed to paying it given the alternative. I understand why the world is willing to pay. Ok. I get it.
But it's hard for me to view this as a win for us. So I'm probably missing something? (Or at least, I hope I'm missing something.)
Not really worried about the Chinese. As was pointed out, they just hang a sword of damocles over the head of every entrepreneur and engineer who even thinks about doing something like that.
What about power banks from India? Vietnam? Malaysia? Korea?
That's what I'm saying. If there are nations where you can get away with it, then those power banks can end up in Western, African or South American markets.
(I'm counting getting a fine, or paying a bribe, as getting away with it. I don't really consider those punishments that will provide sufficient deterrent.)
> What about power banks from India? Vietnam? Malaysia? Korea?
90% of powerbanks made are from mainland china. Worrying about powerbanks made outside of China is like worrying about guns made outside of the USA, theoretically possible, but those countries are so dominant and efficient in those fields that it is more of a "what if" rather than a real concern.
To be fair, we don't really have the capacity to run satellite surveillance on each and every target we select to engage in a sneak attack.
I think sometimes people watch hollywood movies and get the impression that it represents a kind of cataloging of our military capabilities. A demonstration of what we can do to our enemies. With the underlying subtext being "don't mess with us."
I just want to gently suggest that not everything we see in movies is factual with respect to military or intelligence capabilities.
I'm an old timer. I got off the bus at Quantico in 1991. But even though I'm not in right now, I'd feel confident in betting that we don't have the capacity to surveil that many targets via satellite for, say, 1 week, prior to our attack.
(Of course, when I got off the bus at Quantico in '91 I also would have been just as confident in betting that the US would never engage in a first strike. So what do I know?)
That is true for an active war but I don't believe it is true if you have literally months and months to plan an attack. Unless of course there was no plan until just a few days before and you stupidly threw a ton of your advantage right into the trash.
>Like it or not, there really isn't any other company at this scale capable of doing the sort of work Palantir
That’s only making European entrepreneurs salivate at all of that sweet EU funding they can suck up to replicate PLTR in service of their sovereignty initiatives.
Europe is currently lagging on the cloud front, the AI front and even the SaaS front. They can't even wean themselves off of MS Office ffs, after all the shenanigans Microsoft and the US have pulled against them. I have no hopes of the EU building anything that can replicate even 25% of Palantir.
They only have to replicate Palantir marketing and garnish it with a bit of nationalism. Not like the government is good at getting its money's worth in the end.
And not forget hardware. All they have is meaningless leaders with zero vision. My dumb AI claw tool has better view of the world than they do. They might as well be replaced by those AI agents. Probably better outcome that current
No one is invading China. Coupled or de-coupled is a completely irrelevant consideration. People think MAGA are crazy, but no one is suicidal. A war with China would be over in a matter of hours. And anyone who did not manage to get to Africa or extreme South America before the outbreak of hostilities would have a great chance of dying. The only question is will death be quick in a blast, or slow as you try to walk out of the US.
>Social safety nets and such are probably set up by the time the robots come for the last jobs.
What makes you think "Social safety nets" will be the solution the élites land on?
If we were to wargame out different scenarios, we'd likely find there are a lot of potential solutions to the problem of large masses of people who are not useful to the cause of productivity in your society.
Giving non-élites a social safety net is actually one of the most resource intensive solutions. Not saying our oligarchs would not choose that solution. Just pointing out that it would severely impact their bottom lines. More than almost any other solution in fact.
If elites do not provide a social safety net why would the masses respect their elite status and resource endowments anyway?
Unless you are suggesting billionaires build private armies in some sort of neo feudalism, there are no elites who are not dependant on the existing social structure.
On the upside they'll all generationally churn out of life, acting as a forcing function on future decisions.
Time isn't linear. No guarantees we march right along handing batons to the next age group. Which generation will be future elites making the choices come from?
Millennials and GenZ (despite a blip towards Trump in 2024, they blipped hard away from him as his policies of 2025 hit them hardest) are trending progressive as they age.
And Millennials and GenZ outnumber a GenX population that is the only cohort to not sour on Trump. GenX influence will rapidly shrink as Boomers churn out.
No linear time. No single clock all living things tick to. Meaning the population composition is not guaranteed to exist such that the old ways are the future. No guarantee 50 year middle managers waiting patiently end up elites in control. They might be too copy paste and conservative.
Number one, Trump won the presidency on the strength of his support from younger generations of Americans. It remains to be seen whether or not those younger generations will turn against Trumpism.
Number two, GenX. Not only is GenX is the generation that voted against Trumpism the most statistically speaking, they are also the smallest generation. ie - the least statistically relevant where votes are concerned. (Which is why it didn't really matter that they voted against Trump.)
I agree with your assertion that the Boomers will churn out. I disagree that it will matter that Boomers churn out. Mainly because support for Trump-like policies is, again, strongest among the younger generations. The younger generations are literally how the guy won the presidency and they will represent more of the populace in the future, not less. So until I actually see millennials and GenZ vote against Trump-like policies, I'm not really sure how things get better?
Polls of the last few weeks I have seen say the opposite.
Trumps pull with GenZ vanished through 2025 as his policies did nothing to help them. 2024 was a blip. Now they are at risk of being drafted into war and otherwise the drag on the economy.
GenX is career stable middle management. The most skin in the current economy game. Their support for Trump stayed stable while every other generation's support tanked.
GenZ support in 2024 was short-term 20-something "free from parents" blip. They ended up bag holders through 2025 and corrected course.
Of course, that only brings us to, "It's easy to claim others are offering their lives for your goals."
I guess it's probably best to just realize everything you see on the subject of any given war is probably propaganda. And judge the value of it through that lens.
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