The Democrats don't need to destroy Dilbert Stark, he's got perfect aim with his rocket-firing foot-gun!
-
The Democrats don't need to destroy Dilbert Stark, he's got perfect aim with his rocket-firing foot-gun!
(The immigration service will be side-eyeing him by now, and USSF/USAF/NSA must be jittery about trusting their classified payloads to a Putin fanboy: I suspect his security clearance is Going Bye-Bye soon. No need to take his money, just make him delegate control then ship him off to a compound in South Africa where he can prep for the apocalypse in peace without annoying the neighbours.)
-
Elmo's one smart move was tro bring in Gwynne Shotwell to run SpaceX. She, in her turn, built Elmo a little Potemkin Village to manage, a treehouse out in the back where he can stomp around and act like he's in charge.
Stop worrying about those NSA payloads, Elmo's nowhere near them.
-
@tuban_muzuru I invite you to contemplate the geopolitical implications of Russia deploying Iranian-manufactured drones with Starlink terminals in the Ukraine war. Elmo—as a private citizen—is playing a very dangerous game.
-
I, in my turn, invite you to consider the nature of geopolitics and commerce. For all these milquetoast embargoes we have placed upon Russia, their economy is firing on all cylinders. Those embargoes are a pitiful sop: as with Iran (and with their connivance may I add), Russia has worked around them al, especially oil - and the West has done nothing.
Yes Elmo is not supposed to sell to Russia - he's not. Those Starlink units were shipped through Dubai and sold along via proxies
-
@tuban_muzuru Russia is running a resource extraction economy (with a sideline in artillery shells). They're a petrostate that's failed to modernize even as much as Saudi Arabia and Iran. Meanwhile the rest of the world is in the middle of the biggest energy transition since the early 1900s and the move to oil. That's what's causing all the instability: existing energy cartels fighting back against their inevitable demise.
(The geopolitics of a solar-powered world will look rather different.)
-
Token Sane Personreplied to Charlie Stross last edited by
@cstross @tuban_muzuru
> The geopolitics of a solar-powered world will look rather differentThat sounds like a very interesting question. Those desert dictatorships won't have the oil wealth, but they will still have lots of sunshine. So will big bits of the southern USA and Mexico. We may see energy-intensive industries relocating equatorwards. Or if better ways of shipping energy around get developed, maybe not.
-
Charlie Strossreplied to Token Sane Person last edited by
@tokensane @tuban_muzuru The obvious thing about photovoltaic and wind power is that they're harder to ship around—you can do it with a supergrid, but it's expensive and connects stationary end-points. (Unlike gas/liquid fuels.) So the obvious first step is that energy intensive industries may migrate towards energy rich regions. Which, with PV, will eventually mean Equatorial Africa and Central America/northern South America.
-
Michael Ormsbyreplied to Charlie Stross last edited by
@cstross @tokensane @tuban_muzuru Solar and wind change the economics (besides being environmentally beneficial). Once you amortize the initial investment the power itself is almost free at the point of origin. So the trick is to put power origination as close to the consumer as possible so you’re not shipping power hundreds of miles.
-
Token Sane Personreplied to Michael Ormsby last edited by
@michaelormsby @cstross @tuban_muzuru
The Economist had an extended essay on this a few months ago. I've found a non pay walled version here. Interesting read.
https://archive.is/ak34k
