The Frog of War is Still Croaking
All sides share their own truth, but, still, no one knows where the Iranium went ... well, except the Iranians. Meanwhile economic truth is getting even foggier.
That recessionary GDP report for the first quarter just got revised down from -0.2% economic growth to -0.5% because consumer spending was worse than originally thought. At the same time, the president’s trade deficit also just got worse, instead of better, even though his tariffs were supposed to have narrowed the deficit. However, the US budget deficit is getting much worse as Big Beautiful Bill wends its way through congress.
Meanwhile, Federal Reserve chief, Jerome Powell, expressed—again—his worries about the continuing decline in government statistics that the Fed has to work from, particularly by the Bureau of Lying Statistics, which had a horrible track record when it comes to telling the truth to begin with. Right when we need good statistics in order to see clearly how the trade war is really impacting the balance of trade and how tariffs are impacting inflation and how DOGE is impacting unemployment lines, we have government agencies reporting that they are measuring statistics in fewer cities (having already downshifted the number of cities last month). In those cities they are still tracking, they are also now relying 30% on guesswork as the number of businesses reporting continues to diminish.
This should all work out very well for any leaders who like to create truth out of thin air with their mouths anyway. Speaking of which, Iran said today that the strikes on its nuclear plants were not all that consequential, but they, like Trump, have their own vested interest in creating truth that is favorable to them.
"The American president exaggerated events in unusual ways, and it turned out that he needed this exaggeration," Khamenei said, rejecting US claims Iran's nuclear programme had been set back by decades.
The strikes, he insisted, had done "nothing significant" to Iran's nuclear infrastructure.
The Trump administration is, of course, banging a different war drum with “War Secretary” (allowing for the president’s newly preferred department name) Hegseth focusing all his ammunition on shooting down the press for manufacturing what he claims are tall anti-Trump tales fabricated by twisting leaks that are in discord with the White House narrative.
More importantly, however, we are still in a situation where no one knows for sure where all the Iranium went. Well, except the Iranians, but they aren’t telling. So, maybe, with no one sure where the Iranium is, Trump actually didn’t strike a significant blow, because, if Iran still has enough enriched uranium to make ten bombs, as Trump originally claimed, and, if the administration did not attack that black-box of a bunker underneath Pickaxe Mtn. next to the Natanz nuclear enrichment site, which is buried deeper than US MOABs and MOPs can hit, then maybe Iran is already making all the bombs it needs in order to destroy Israel and a few big cities of the West, such as Rome or DC or NYC with a tanker nuke or some other disguised delivery device. (The US government, after all, still has not listed the bunker underneath Pickaxe Mtn. as a hit.)