Tim Williams

Keep the TMO for foul play and dirty stuff. No argument there, get it out of our game. But outside of that? I actually love the drama. “Have they got it right? Was there even anything in it?” That tension is the theatre. Two sets of fans, two sets of views, and everyone leaning in waiting for the call. You can’t manufacture that. What I don’t love is refs glued to the big screen watching slow-mo. Slow it down or speed it up and any rugby incident looks like a crime scene. It’s not the real-time event anymore, it’s a reconstruction. And the second a ref looks up at that screen, the home crowd’s roaring or groaning in his ear. Good luck staying neutral through that. No clean fix for it, mind. But the drama? The TMO theatre? I reckon the media, the sponsors and most fans secretly love it too. Just bin the jobsworth TMO. Keep the drama. 🏉

After over a decade of Orbán, the European anthem “Ode to Joy” was sung again during the constitution of the Hungarian Parliament. What a powerful day for Europe. Hungary’s time as Putin’s Trojan horse in the EU is finally over.

Henry Pollock is taking being a dick to spectacular new heights.

There are lots of questions I want to ask Reform people, mostly starting "about that five million quid", but it would be a shame to let this moment from Robert Jenrick slip past unnoticed. thecritic.co.uk/today-havering…

@LauraLoomer Oh give over.

Why is Barack Hussein Obama meeting with world leaders while President Trump is in office? This is a coup.

Diolch Cymru 💚

Bob Dylan 1965-66 was impossibly cool.

Ah the old classic "regain the momentum by doing nothing different" trick

David Attenborough is officially too old to play with Lego.

Hilarious video that shows none of the Reform voters know any of Reform's policies.

Well fancy that.

The pilot that was shot down in Iran and "rescued"

🇪🇪 FM Tsahkna: For the first time in 20 years, Putin is not planning to hold full-scale May 9 parade. He's afraid of Ukrainian drone attacks. That’s the reason Putin is proposing ceasefire. He's afraid of Ukraine, and it’s clear he is weaker than most of the world thinks he is.

Can reporters stop using the word deal? It’s an agreement, a settlement, a treaty, an understanding, an MOU etc. Using the word deal is accepting his simple-minded TV game-show framing and contributes to the bogus drama he is trying to create.

🌟 Great to see our boys in the mix for #URCAwards, with 2️⃣ rounds to go 🚀✨ #WeAreGwentRugby

🎯

There is intense diplomacy, exchange of amendments on a potential MOU between Iran and the US. The entire process is a damning indictment of the fact that this was a war of choice by the US. A deal could have been reached in February or much earlier. Trump will try to manufacture a claim of victory for putting out parts of a raging fire he started, but the fact is Iran inflicted a level of damage and displayed a resolve that stunned Trump's administration and they have flailed to find a way out. Despite the assassination of its senior leadership, Iran engaged in organized, sustained retaliatory strikes and its government remained intact and in power. The promised uprisings or "regime collapse" never materialized. Iran used asymmetric tactics to create a severe crisis in the Strait of Hormuz that the U.S. could not defeat, culminating with the failed "Project Freedom" farce. Nothing is guaranteed and the U.S. twice bombed Iran while claiming to be negotiating. That could happen again. But time is not on Trump's side. The U.S. will have to make concessions that Trump swore he would not. This is not going to end with Iran's "unconditional surrender."

At this point, it is irrefutable that the blockade has failed. Not from failed enforcement (although that certainly has happened), but due to it being built on a fundamentally flawed premise. This is something that can clearly be drawn from Trump’s own “3 days until Iran’s oil infrastructure explodes”. CLEARLY, he was operating on a very specific piece of data that indicated this would take place. It did not. Eight days later, a full 21 days into the U.S. blockade, Trump is now stating it will be “two weeks”… 35 days in total. Here’s the problem: He’s wrong. Data published by Bloomberg via Kpler indicates that Iran had 12-22 days of onshore storage available, that was 8 days ago. 4-14 days. Other experts are putting that number ~13 days. So 13 days of onshore oil still remains, but there are other factors we need to consider. Within the perimeter of the U.S. blockade line, Iran has enough vessels to hold ~35M barrels. This will extend the timeline by approximately 28-42 days. Then, Iran is unmothballing old tankers, old storage, trucking into neighboring countries, utilizing rail. None of these things taken along are substantial, but each of them add to the timeline. Plus 7 days. But Iran can also manipulate output from their oil wells. They don’t need to be ripping at 100% day after day. The output can be lowered. And this is where it becomes catastrophic. When we factor this in, we go from an aforementioned timeline ~69-83 days, to something that could run well into the triple digits. How the Secretary of Treasury, who is spearheading “Operation Economic Fury”, and the PRESIDENT of the United States is unable to put this together, or even come to the same conclusion between one another, is beyond me. What I DO know, is that this blockade has horrendously failed, and for the sake of the global economy, I sure as hell hope Washington still has the cards they say they do.

1891 South Africa vs Britain Newlands Stadium (0-4) The British Isles team toured for the first time, winning all 20 matches and playing the first-ever Test match against South Africa. They also brought along the Currie Cup, which remains SA's top domestic trophy today