Racing Lexicon
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@RacingLexicon
Occasional thoughts on National Hunt racing, especially its language
A group of county supporters is protesting the BBC's decision to end the employment of Leicestershire commentator Richard Rae. thecricketer.com/Topics/county-…
"Ramble On" is 56 years old and Robert Plant just walked onto The Late Show and made it sound like he wrote it this morning.
In the last 24 hours, Israel struck Iran’s largest petrochemical complex at Asaluyeh, killed the head of IRGC intelligence in a separate dawn strike, while Iranian missiles hit a residential building in Haifa killing two people, and Pakistan delivered a ceasefire framework that the White House called “one of many ideas” the President has not signed off on and Iran called “illogical.” All of this happened on the same day. None of it produced a deal. The Tuesday deadline is now 30 hours away. The sequence matters. At 8:03 AM on Sunday, Trump posted: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell.” Ninety minutes later he told Fox there was a “very good chance” of a deal by Monday. The White House told NBC the 45-day ceasefire was “one of many things being discussed” and that the President had “not signed off.” Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said Iran had “formulated its response” to all proposals and would announce it “at the appropriate time,” adding that negotiations were “in no way compatible with ultimatum, crime, or threats.” The IRGC Naval Command posted that the Strait of Hormuz “will never return to its former state” and that preparations for a “new Persian Gulf order” were being finalised. Three positions. The American: threat plus offer plus non-commitment. The Iranian: rejection plus formulated-but-unreleased response plus permanent Hormuz control. The mediators, stated to Axios: chances of even a partial deal in 48 hours are “slim.” The people carrying the messages are the ones saying it will not work. The strikes did not pause for negotiations. Katz announced the Asaluyeh hit had taken 85 percent of Iran’s petrochemical production offline. Netanyahu confirmed the assassination of Majid Khademi of IRGC Intelligence and Atef Bakri of Quds Force Unit 840. Iranian media reported at least 25 killed in Tehran-area strikes. Saudi Aramco set its May Official Selling Price for Arab Light to Asia at a record $19.50 premium, up from $2.50, the highest in the company’s history, while physical Dubai crude trades at $157 and paper Brent says $109. The financial press reports “oil prices stable.” The refiner in Ulsan paying $157 per barrel for the molecule that transits the toll booth knows the terminal is lying. European markets reopen Tuesday morning into whatever Monday produces. London, Frankfurt, Paris, four days blind. The NATO allies who denied basing, the governments who called the strikes “a dangerous trend outside international law,” the central banks managing inflation around a Brent price that does not reflect what refiners pay, all process Power Plant Day from exchanges that last traded Thursday. Iran has formulated its response but will not reveal it. The White House has not signed off. The IRGC says the strait will never return. The mediators say slim. Aramco says $19.50. And the President says that if no deal is reached by Tuesday evening, he will destroy Iran’s electrical grid and its bridges in a campaign he has already named. Between the threat and the offer, between the assassination and the accord, between the paper price and the physical price, the war enters its final hours before the next phase begins or the killing stops. Everything converges on Tuesday. Nothing has converged yet. open.substack.com/pub/shanakaans…
“Recriminations forgotten, the players swap shirts,” so intoned the commentator at the end of what’s been called “the dirtiest game in English football history”. Chelsea v Leeds in the FA Cup final replay of 1970, the most watched club game in English TV history... 1/2
