Author: sauer@technologists.com

curated news excerpts & citations

Paul Krugman: Trump Is Losing a Second War

The Iran debacle is accelerating the shift away from fossil fuels

Last month, out of more than 11,000 new passenger vehicles registered in Norway, only around 150 had internal consumption engines. The rest were fully electric. In mainland Europe as a whole, EV sales are up 51 percent from a year ago.

The global energy transition — the shift from fossil fuels to electrotech, which uses solar, wind and batteries to power an electrified economy — is accelerating. It’s now clear that the closure of the Strait of Hormuz marks an inflection point: the global green energy curve, which was already on a rapidly rising trajectory, has suddenly become even steeper. “Investors,” reports the Financial Times, “are piling into clean energy funds.”

This acceleration isn’t just a consequence of soaring fossil fuel prices. It is also the result of the worldwide realization that, with the end of Pax Americana, depending on imported hydrocarbons is a risk not worth taking. …

Howard Yu: Western automakers just destroyed 73 billion dollars in EV writedowns this year

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Western governments pushed automakers toward electrification. Companies committed 330 billion dollars in EV investments between 2021 and 2024. Then the policy reversed. The 7,500 dollar tax credit was killed. CAFE standards were gutted. So automakers went back to gas trucks.

And now every canceled EV program in Detroit is a market BYD walks into unopposed. BYD exported 120,000 vehicles in March alone, up 65 percent year over year. It just raised its 2026 export target to 1.5 million units. A BYD dealership in Manila booked a month’s worth of orders in just two weeks.

Hans Christensen: Yerevan Summit

James Eagle: Africa is being left behind in the electricity race

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Thom Hartmann: Trump Is Making Khrushchev’s “We Will Bury You” Real for Putin. Why?

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Putin called Trump last Wednesday and they talked for almost two hours; fewer than three days later, America announced we’re pulling 5,000 US troops out of the NATO forces in Germany, accomplishing a 60-year-long Russian goal. Trump also ended sanctions on Russian oil, handing the Putin regime billions in revenue, while continuing to block US weapons delivery to Ukraine.

Meanwhile, …

This list is an operational blueprint, the kind of document a hostile foreign intelligence service might draw up if it had been handed unlimited access to the executive branch and told to dismantle the American republic from inside without firing a single shot:

• Hollow out the public health system so disease can do its work,
• Demoralize the officer corps and burn through munitions in unconstitutional wars,
• Terminate the diplomats and intelligence professionals who keep allies aligned,
• Replace independent journalism with state propaganda at Voice of America,
• Defund the agencies Congress created,
• Abandon the clean energy transition that would have weakened OPEC and Russia simultaneously,
• Politicize the FBI and DOJ so they target dissenters instead of crooks, and
• Turn armed, masked ICE thugs loose to terrorize immigrant communities while training the rest of us to accept anonymous federal agents disappearing our neighbors into massive concentration camps.

Every line item that would appear on such a plan has been checked off in the last 14 months, executed by a cabinet of grifters, ideologues, and 13 billionaires whose loyalty runs to Trump and the morbidly rich rather than to the nation whose Constitution they swore an oath to defend.
(Thom Hartmann more…)

WSJ: How to Make Vladimir Putin’s Year

Germany’s Merz was insulting, but that’s no reason for Trump to undermine NATO.

Dariia Mykhailenko @ United24: Putin Retreats to Bunkers as Coup Fears and Drone Threats Shake Moscow

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Priyanka Shankar
@ Al Jazeera:
What’s Iran’s 14-point proposal to end the war? And will Trump accept it?

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The new proposal calls for guarantees against future attacks, a withdrawal of US forces from around Iran, the release of frozen Iranian assets worth billions of dollars and the lifting of sanctions, war reparations, ending all hostilities, including in Lebanon, and “a new mechanism for the Strait of Hormuz”.
…

Tehran also wants its right to uranium enrichment guaranteed as a signatory to the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), but Trump has made the nuclear issue a “red line”. Iran wants decades of sanctions, which have devastated its economy, to be lifted as part of any deal. The navigation through the strait and demands for war reparations are other sticking points in the talks.
…

Musgrave said on the two biggest issues – enrichment of uranium and transferring its highly enriched uranium – the US and Iran remain “far apart”.

“President Trump has been unyielding that Iran must surrender its nuclear capability,” he said.

Kenneth Katzman, a senior fellow at New York-based nonprofit Soufan Center, said Iran’s mistrust of Trump remains a bigger obstacle.

Jaroslav Lukiv, Bernd Debusmann Jr @ BBC: Iran says US has responded to its latest peace proposal

Daniel Dale @ CNN: Fact check: Trump denied he made this remark about Iran. He made it on camera one day earlier

… a reporter reminded Trump that he had said the previous night that the US might be better off not making a deal with Iran.

Mary Geddry: Schrödinger’s War Comes Due

Trump’s Iran conflict is somehow over, ongoing, not responsible, and wildly expensive, while the bill shows up in polling, prices, supply chains, the Pentagon, and everyone’s grocery cart.
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Karen Attiah: America is giving dying mall vibes

On the dangers of social and political nostalgia.
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Many times, we have to fight nostalgia in order to pursue justice. It’s worth overcoming our wistful memories of bopping to Diddy in the 90s so that we can hold him accountable for terrorizing the women in his life. We are already seeing White Political Nostalgia play out in our politics. The roll-back of affirmative action, the purging of Black voices from education and journalism, and now the Supreme Court’s gutting of the Voting Rights Act are all fueled by white nostalgia for an America where Black people were kept from power and authority. It is nostalgia for a time when the only socially permissible roles for Black people in America were under the foot of White people. While billionaires outsource jobs overseas, or to AI, white people are being sold the idea that they can return to power, to a carefree time with more opportunities, as long as they get rid of the Blacks and immigrants first.
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Shane Shifflett, Hannah Critchfield @ WSJ: ‘We Know You Live Right Here’: No Secrets in America’s New Surveillance Dragnet

Technical wizardry used to combat illegal immigration also funnels the personal data and whereabouts of U.S. citizens to federal agents

Liz McLellan spent a morning in January witnessing the work of federal agents who had arrived in Maine to pursue the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

Like other community activists, protesters and passersby around the U.S., McLellan took photos, including of an arrest. Then she followed a federal officer driving an unmarked vehicle to see where the agent was headed next.

McLellan was surprised when the agent led her to her own house and blocked her driveway. Other federal officers quickly arrived, boxing in her car with their own vehicles.

“This is a warning,” an agent told her, according to court records and a video recording. “We know you live right here.”

Cindy Cohn @ MIT Press: The Whistleblower Who Uncovered the NSA’s ‘Big Brother Machine’

Alex Braithwaite, Rachel D. Van Nostrand @ Conversation: When immigration detention becomes a system of concentration: Lessons from research on 150 historical cases

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Harriet Torry @ WSJ: AI Investment Boosted Economic Growth, While Consumers Tapped the Brakes

GDP grew at a 2% rate in the first quarter, improving after shutdown-induced slowdown

U.S. economic growth picked up in the first quarter as businesses invested heavily in artificial intelligence, rebounding from a fourth quarter dented by a government shutdown.

At the same time, the economy didn’t expand as fast as economists expected, weighed down by softer consumer spending growth.

Paul Krugman: The Logic of NACHO

On Wall Street, TACO — Trump Always Chickens Out — has abruptly been replaced as a favorite meme by NACHO — Not a Chance Hormuz Opens. As a result, oil futures have soared.

Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – April 30, 2026

Today G. Elliott Morris of Strength in Numbers noted that Trump has hit a new low in overall job performance and in his handling of the economy, at -22.2 and -40.3, respectively. Those numbers reflect the percentage of people who approve of his handling of an issue minus those who disapprove. Indeed, Morris noted that Trump’s approval rating on the economy is so low it “literally broke the scale of this graph on my data portal.”
…

The upcoming elections are definitely on Trump’s mind. He called in to NewsMax today, saying: “It is a problem I’m not on the ballot. And I have to convince—Everyone says if I was on the ballot we’d win in a landslide. I have the best, I have some of the best poll numbers I’ve ever had.”
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)
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Naomi RaineyandEmer Moreau @ BBC: Oil price jumps to $115 after reports of ‘extended’ Iran blockade

Oil prices have climbed sharply following reports that the US is preparing for an ‘extended’ blockade of Iran.

Brent crude rose to around $115 (£85) a barrel on Wednesday, having closed at just over $110 (£81) on Tuesday evening. The price had fallen slightly to $114.37 (£84.68) just before midday BST.

It follows reports from the Wall Street Journal that US President Donald Trump has instructed aides to prepare to extend obstruction of Iran’s ports, in an effort to squeeze the country’s economy.

Iran has said it will continue to disrupt traffic travelling through the Strait of Hormuz in response to the US blockade.

Al Jazeera: Trump vows to maintain Iran blockade, Tehran threatens ‘practical’ action

US president says Washington’s naval siege on Iranian ports is ‘more effective than the bombing’ as oil price soars.

Lucian K. Truscott IV: Trump has ideas about how to end the Iran war. You won’t believe what they are.

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Jennifer Rubin: We haven’t “taken out” anything except free navigation

Donald Trump keeps telling us he has wiped out the Iranian regime. “We’ve taken out their navy, we’ve taken out their air force, we’ve taken out their leaders,” he said last week. At various times he has insisted, “Their entire Navy is at the bottom of the Sea,” or claimed, “They have no navy, it’s been knocked out.” As CNN recounted:

The president has said for weeks that Iran had “no navy,” “no military,” “no air force” and “no anti-aircraft systems.” …

“They have no anti-aircraft equipment. Their radar is 100% annihilated,” Trump said. “We are unstoppable as a military force.”

And yet somehow this “sunk” navy last week was able to fire on three vessels, seize two, and maintain the blockade on the Strait of Hormuz. It seems — shocker! — “taken out” does not mean, as the dictionary tells us, “to extract or remove,” it means to leave the enemy potent military assets. And “no” does not mean “none,” but rather “some powerful military equipment able to inflict real harm.” Even the Pentagon has let on that Trump was lying.

Janna Brancolini @ Daily Beast: Trump Aides Leak Fears of Toxic Stalemate

Kyle Stock and Lili Pike @ Bloomberg: From the UK to South Korea, Consumers Turn to EVs as Oil Prices Spike

Borowitz: Iranians Catch Jared Kushner Trying to Set Up Own Tollbooth in Strait of Hormuz

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Harriet Barber @ Guardian: ‘We were terrified they were going to kill us’: fishers who survived US boat strike speak out

An Ecuadorian fishing crew describe their ordeal as victims of Trump’s purported war on ‘narcoterrorists’
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“We were just working, waiting for the last trawler to return,” said Jhonny Sebastián Palacios, one of the fishers. “Everything was perfectly fine.”

From nowhere, an explosion ripped through the boat. “There was a sudden crash – boom! It came from a drone,” he said.

The blast tore through the vessel, shattering glass, and injuring several crew members. …

Landon Mion @ Fox News: US military conducts strike on another boat carrying alleged narco-traffickers, killing 3

The Pentagon has refused to provide evidence of drugs on board the ships it has targeted since last fall in the Caribbean and the Eastern Pacific
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Heather Delaney Reese: The problem is, we can’t trust a word they say

Hugh Dougherty @ Daily Beast: I Slept Next Door to the Assassin in Hilton Room 10235. This Is a Security Fiasco

The Daily Beast’s Executive Editor witnessed a jaw-dropping security breach. And then it got worse.
…

It does not take a security expert to unravel the layers of failure that happened at a Washington, D.C. hotel on Saturday night.

How on earth could someone with a disassembled long gun check into a room at a hotel where the president was going to speak? I can answer that: Nobody even looked at my luggage on Friday afternoon. Worse, my colleague arrived on Saturday at 5 p.m. Nobody looked at his luggage either: No magnometers, no hand checks, no I.D. checks. Nothing.

How on earth could that person get downstairs and assemble a long gun? I can answer that too. I moved up and down from Floor 10 all day. Nobody ever stopped me and asked me anything. I have never shown my I.D., except to the clerk who checked me in; I have never been searched or frisked when I checked in, or moved in and out of the hotel. To get down from my room to the dinner, I simply flashed my ticket. It could have been a photocopy.

The only time I went past a checkpoint was at the same magnetometers that Cole Allen, 31, sprinted past with his gun.

Another colleague was outside; I texted them a copy of their ticket. That allowed them to get into the hotel as far as those same magnetometers, entirely unchecked.

How on earth could that be considered safe?

Jennifer Rubin: Lessons From the Correspondents’ Dinner

Chris Geidner: DOJ jumps into action — to defend Trump’s ballroom plan and attack those challenging it

Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – April 26, 2026

Today Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate of the Department of Justice Civil Division wrote to the lawyer for the National Trust for Historic Preservation demanding that the organization drop its lawsuit against Trump’s planned ballroom on the site where the East Wing of the White House used to be.
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Shumate said last night’s incident “proves, yet again, that the White House ballroom is essential for the safety and security of the President, his family, his cabinet, and his staff. …

This is an odd angle to take, since, as Bluesky user Tom Shafer pointed out, the Hilton ballroom seats 2,945 people and Trump says his proposed ballroom will seat only 999. And to be clear, a judge has permitted the construction of the secure facility under the ballroom to continue despite the lawsuit; it’s just the ballroom itself that’s currently at issue.

Attending the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is not an official requirement; this is actually the first time Trump has chosen to go as president. As Emily Davies, Isaac Arnsdorf, Jeremy Roebuck, and Joe Heim of the Washington Post reported today, the Trump administration could have provided a higher level of security last night as it has for other gatherings of high-ranking officials, but it did not designate the dinner as a “National Special Security Event.” …

The focus on last night’s event has obscured this upcoming week’s big story.
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)
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