Monique Farantzos

@Brett1231 @realKunalAShah @nfergus Trump has to deal with the Iranians while managing the markets and domestic politics. Why do you think it's a mistake to blend 1) bombs 2) hard power blockade during a ceasefire and 3) talks while keeping all options open? Why should we corner ourselves into a single strategy?

@farantzos @realKunalAShah @nfergus And Trump is begging them for a deal. Go figure.

Let me walk you through the events of the war so far: 1. The United States and Israel tried regime change; it didn’t work. Or rather, they got regime change—Iran became an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps–led military dictatorship. That was not an improvement. 2. The U.S. won an overwhelming military victory with air and naval power and scarcely a boot on the ground. But it destroyed less of Iran’s missile- and drone-launching capabilities than at first appeared. 3. Then there was a hostage crisis. Iran took both the Gulfies and the Strait of Hormuz hostage. The result was a massive economic shock for the world that required a rapid resolution. 4. The choice was between 1) military escalation (boots on the ground or strikes on Iranian infrastructure), and 2) a diplomatic deal. Trump chose 2. 5. In Islamabad, the U.S proposed big economic concessions in return for some kind of change in the status of Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile, as well as the reopening of the strait. Contrary to the president’s social media feed, the Iranians did not accept. 6. In any case, the devil of any deal will be in the details, not the Truth headline. (When the small print finally comes out, every former Obama and Biden official will be ready to tell The New York Times that it’s worse than the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.) 7. Meanwhile, the Iranians have survived regime change and discovered that closing the strait is just as powerful a lever in economic warfare as they had always hoped. It’s not, despite the Russian quip, an “economic nuke,” because unlike a nuclear weapon you can use it. 8. Where we go from here is fairly predictable. I would be surprised if Trump now deploys ground forces. There will be more negotiation, so Islamabad, here we come. There may have to be more bombing, if the Iranians dust down the North Vietnamese playbook of stringing the U.S. negotiators along. And the final compromise will take longer to be agreed upon than Mr. Market currently believes. The consensus in prediction markets is this will be over by the end of May, but remember: It took Henry Kissinger more than four months to get the 1973–1974 oil embargo lifted.

@Brett1231 @realKunalAShah @nfergus US conducting the mother of all bombing campaigns followed by naval blockade while sending astronauts to the moon and showing 🇨🇳 we can block oil flow. The other has trouble keeping the lights on but keeps on sounding tough like those little dogs that bark a lot behind the gate.

@farantzos @realKunalAShah @nfergus We look weak. We're negotiating with Iran as equals.

@Brett1231 @realKunalAShah @nfergus We're re-establishing deterrence and proving US can inflict severe and sustained pain on an adversary on the other side of the planet. We're also using the knowledge acquired to recalibrate our armed forces to modern threats (drones, ballistic missiles, etc). It is a *great* ROI.

@farantzos @realKunalAShah @nfergus We're spending a billion dollars a day and depleting our military. We better GAF.

@anasalhajji Interestingly Bessent just announced/reminded us Treasury is the 2nd pilar of the US strategy 😀 Looks like one half of the strategy is the physical US Navy blockade and the other half is the "virtual" Treasury blockade. x.com/SecScottBessen…

@anasalhajji Good point. It’s possible they want to purposely maintain a certain level of unpredictability for tactical reasons or perhaps there are unspoken political considerations for certain destinations. It’s also possible that both my theory and your thesis are simultaneously correct!

[st 🔥🔥🔥This isn't about boarding an Iranian tanker. It's about creating such a vast high-risk zone that war-risk insurance premiums will continue to be prohibitive, effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz to routine commercial traffic. That's the endgame, the way it started!

@Brett1231 @realKunalAShah @nfergus Wars are about asymmetrical cost and the United States can continue the naval blockade of Iran until Iranian leadership becomes sufficiently divided to either internally collapse or otherwise incentivized to do a deal. Cost to US is minimal so we really don’t gaf.

@farantzos @realKunalAShah @nfergus I wouldn't base a war strategy on Iran caving to economic pressure in an acceptable amount of time.

@Brett1231 @realKunalAShah @nfergus Tell us what happened to Hamas. You think the Iranians that were used to a comfy lifestyle in Tehran, with a significantly higher standard of living than Palestinians, want to see their country reduced to rubble just to show they’re tough? If so I have a bridge in Tehran for you.

@farantzos @realKunalAShah @nfergus Hamas held out for two years in tunnels. There is no reason to believe Iran won't last months. We're flushing tax payer money down a rat hole. We should pull out now. No deal. No nothing.

@Brett1231 @realKunalAShah @nfergus The IRGC have wives and children too and families are not fed with regime slogans. They require actual food, working schools, medical care and a functional economy and society. Losing these things when you used to have them just weeks ago = extremely unhappy wives & daughters.

@realKunalAShah @nfergus They don't care. Economics are not their primary motivation. You're thinking like a capitalist.

@thomasbsauer @willchamberlain Any Incredible Hulk type side effects? 💪

@willchamberlain The chem stuff is a little overblown. I got hit with anthrax one time at Dugway Proving grounds during the SOF Chem/Bio course. I was fine. Oh and one time at Idaho National Lab my UDR-15 radiation monitor rang off and said I took a lethal dose (410 REMs) but I was fine 🤷‍♂️

James is performing a public service by honeypotting various government officials to humiliate them Better than a foreign adversary honeypotting them and extracting secrets/blackmailing them into becoming spies

@bandog_gr @Cynaegeirus2 Το 2015 πίστευα ότι η δημιουργία Ειδικής Οικονομικής Ζώνης ήταν εφικτή 😂 x.com/farantzos/stat…

@Cynaegeirus2 Τελικα το οικονομικο κεντρο της ανατολικης μεσογειου που ελεγαν για το ελληνικο αντι να γινει εδρα επιχειρήσεων, τραπεζων, χρηματιστηριακων, πολυεθνικων ,ναυτιλιακων, start up κλπ θα γινει παρκα, βολτα, καφες 7€ ,σουβλακι 8€ , καζινο και σελφι ινφλουεσερς ?

Νέο «ελληνικό» κτήριο ίδιο με όλα τα άλλα στον πλανήτη Ναυτική παράδοση και 🍆🔵

@BangTheClose @adamscrabble Are they in the room with you now?

@adamscrabble Keep dreaming. Zios will continue to increase control until until every right you ever had to resist gets stripped away. You will pay taxes and fund zionism around the world.

There will 💯 be freedom cities in America. The legal frameworks are already being fleshed out.

@octal I’d be ok with legalization as long as we enforced death penalty for smoking weed in public spaces ☠️

I basically hate marijuana+stoners but it would probably be best for national security and other reasons to turn it into "somewhat worse form of alcohol" and focus on minimizing abuse rather than maintaining prohibition. Easy win for Trump + Congress.

@ictinus_x @vtchakarova Velina letting her personal feelings interfere with her judgement on this one. It's ludicrous to think that a country whose entire foreign policy & philosophy is built on "West is weak and we'll pick up the pieces", and firmly in Russia-China-Iran camp would somehow defend EU.

@vtchakarova Still pretending that a country which purchases Russian missiles and relies on Russia for its energy would fight Russia to defend Europe is absurd.

Ridiculous statement. Still pretending that the DragonBear isn‘t the greatest challenge to the European model while attacking EU candidate country Turkey, without which no credible NATO deterrence could be built along the Eastern Flank, not to speak of the drone collaborations.

@octal @robertgraham Plumbing specifically is a breeze with PEX expander tools nowadays

@robertgraham Realistically I'll just get an MVP living thing on-site as quickly as possible (maybe even a trailer) and then be my own GC but hire vendors for pouring concrete. I absolutely can do my own LV wiring, power generally, and plumbing, and I can spend more on easier-to-install etc.

I want to build a house but I don't want to have to micromanage every single detail/do much of it myself, but I also don't trust anyone I could realistically hire to handle it.

@datarade @CaitlinCloud9 It's true. There are no direct flights to the Congo. Austin sucks!

@CaitlinCloud9 Its lack of international flights to Asia, Africa, and Europe.

Austin's airport doesn't support international flights and as such you can't build a viable internationally relevant global HQ from there unless you have mega US gov't contracts.

@adamscrabble Makes me more bullish 👀

$OKLO bring down from my buys is annoying but meh, whatever. Huge bull $KTOS is the one that’s pissed me off - the atm is understandable but why have they taken so much time and price movement to place it?

@vtchakarova US is “holding up” weapons deliveries the same way a busy restaurant takes a while to sit, take orders and deliver food. They are not doing it for some nefarious reason and in fact if Europe had a stronger defense industrial base it would have been beneficial for the US as well.

May I politely ask why Europe hasn‘t managed to start producing weapon systems for Ukraine & itself after 4 years of the worst war on the continent? Or is this also the fault of the Americans? Are we Europeans that kind of infantile and with zero skin in the game? Embarrassing.

@parjanyudu @Cecrops26 Yes parjanyudu, keep on posting African drums and vocals and keep trying to sell them as Greek to the tourists here like a fake Tetradrachm. Maybe add some Persian rugs from India too.

@farantzos @Cecrops26 There is no language spoken today that resembles Homeric Greek Phonology. Pontic Greek preserved only some of the archaic features, not the entire phonology auntie.

Homer's Iliad Book 1 Lines 1-27 in Restored Ancient Greek Meter, Pitch Accents & Pronunciation with English translation.

@adamscrabble But Adam, we shouldn’t go to Space. There’s no Land Acknowledgement for it so how will we start our meetings and assemblies there?

Big if true