Odds and Ends — 11 July 2026

preparedwombat(78)

Published in

#oddsandends

Words

0

Reading

0 min

Listen

Play

2026-07-11 14:49

Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, Business, AI, and Debt:

EU parliament passes ‘chat control,’ allowing private chat scans until 2028

https://x.com/davetroy/status/2075699550703010166

Circle Stock Jumps as Stablecoin Issuer Wins Final Federal Banking Charter Approval

Flash Fiction:

I was there when Walter put a sparkler in his ass.

It’s better to make bad decisions when you’re hungover (there’s at least a passing chance you’ll make a rational decision) than it is to make bad decisions when you’re drunk. But who doesn’t like drinking in the rain? And maybe he thought that the rain negated any risk he might be facing. But, yeah, he was drunk and might not have been capable of that level of thinking.

Written for this prompt.

Coronavirus and Public Health:

US Food and Drug Administration rejects petition to set Pfas limits in food

Environmental protection agency and independent studies have found food biggest source of chemical exposure

https://x.com/HQNewsNow/status/2075224714197213209

https://x.com/hiltzikm/status/2075636387207151719

Iran:

Iran, Not Trump, Is in Control of This War

If Donald Trump ever had any control over the war he started with Iran, he’s lost it. The Iranians are now setting the terms of this conflict and are routinely humiliating the American president. The ‘cease-fire’ Trump declared last month—a move probably meant to both soothe international markets and avert legislative action from the United States Congress—never really existed, because neither side ever ceased firing.”
The situation is now back to a kind of slow-motion punch-up: In the past few days, the Iranians struck three tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, the Americans attacked some 80 targets in Iran, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps now claims it hit some 85 U.S.-affiliated targets in Bahrain and Kuwait.

Fight Over Hormuz Boils Down to a Poorly Worded Clause

President Trump’s memorandum of understanding with Iran was supposed to open the Strait of Hormuz and relieve the pressure on the global economy. Instead, it set off a test of wills that has exploded into violence twice in the past two weeks.
The root of the dispute is Paragraph 5, which says Iran will make arrangements to restore shipping through the strategic waterway and then work with Oman to determine how to administer it in the future. But it also includes an Iranian pledge to ensure safe passage and remove military obstacles such as mines.
Trump administration officials saw that clause as unlocking the strait, the main accomplishment of the president’s deal. Iranian hard-liners, however, have used it to push a maximalist interpretation that gives the Islamic Republic exclusive control over the waterway as a key source of leverage.

https://x.com/NotHoodlum/status/2075572742473068944

Trump’s Options in Iran Are Now Both Limited and All Bad

…Donald Trump’s Iran entanglement is beginning to resemble a visual illusion known as the Penrose stairs, which endlessly climb and descend but always end up in the same place.
The predicament is of Trump’s own making after he launched a war that never promised a definitive exit and crafted a memorandum of understanding that failed to address the reasons for the conflict.
Does he escalate the war — at a potentially high human, economic and political cost — to try to shatter a new status quo that hands Iran the most leverage? Or does he try to revive a flawed ceasefire that pays Iran billions just to talk?

The Iran War’s Most Embarrassingly Wrong Pundits

Politics:

https://x.com/RonFilipkowski/status/2074982595889123437

Nebraska Republican met with boos when defending One Big Beautiful Bill Act

Trump seeks do-overs at a Supreme Court that rarely grants them

The three men who were arrested during an immigration operation that resulted in the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo said a federal officer fired at them almost immediately after exiting his vehicle and that at no point did the driver veer in his direction.
The migrants are disputing key elements of the Department of Homeland Security’s account of what transpired during a chaotic traffic stop in a predominantly Mexican American neighborhood in Houston on Tuesday.

https://x.com/snmrrw/status/2075640669217980427

https://x.com/Dan_Shaffer_17/status/2075346361981997514

https://x.com/MarkWarner/status/2075384278611824725

———— Blatant In-Your-Face Corruption ————

https://x.com/hissgoescobra/status/2075247492225286624

https://x.com/commons96055467/status/2075306653956841960

https://x.com/aintscarylarry/status/2075279021206896769

Just when you think the bribe plane story can’t get any worse:

https://x.com/kylegriffin1/status/2075797245715267880

https://x.com/jamepdx/status/2075619434077528131

———— Putin&Krasnov vs. Ukraine ————

https://x.com/JohannaNyman5/status/2075661625378406727

———— Melon Husk ————

https://x.com/jurgen_nauditt/status/2075276394179776524

———— Hegseth on the Rocks ————

Why Are America’s Generals So Cautious?

Deference to civilian power is part of the job but can go too far.

https://x.com/willmelvin/status/2075670365645242567

———— Mors Imperii ————

https://x.com/fuckyouiquit/status/2075414194409935132

Trump denies disaster aid to four blue states, after approving aid to six red states

A White House spokesperson said there is “no politicization to the president’s decisions on disaster relief.” There’s compelling evidence to the contrary.

https://x.com/JezziiB/status/2075170088546914350

https://x.com/thedreydossier/status/2075684463678517577

https://x.com/covie_93/status/2075324386836426819

Serendipity:

https://x.com/TheAtlantic/status/2074876167320928758

The Hollowing of the Shared Room

Radio, newspapers, TV, and record labels once gave Americans a shared culture. Then they chased scale, cut local trust, and made themselves easy to abandon. The internet didn’t destroy the commons. It moved into the ruins.
The internet did not kill a healthy cultural order.
It arrived after many of the old institutions had already spent years weakening the trust, texture, locality, and authority that made them powerful in the first place. The feeds did not break into a well-kept public square and burn it down. They moved into a room that had already been stripped for parts.