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If the administration decides to end this stupid war just so they can cash out some profitable bets... I don't even know what I would think. The whole thing is

If the administration decides to end this stupid war just so they can cash out some profitable bets... I don't even know what I would think. The whole thing is so stupid it makes my head hurt.

delecti 7mo ago
I think the main reason is that they were all too incompetent to realize what the effects of the war would be on the global financial system. The bets were probably just a happy opportunity for corruption. > The whole thing is so stupid it makes my head hurt Look on the bright side, at least the malicious actors aren't able to competently implement their goals.
- huijzer 7mo ago
  When do we cross the barrier from incompetent to nefarious?
  - idle_zealot 7mo ago
    It's not an either-or question; they're very transparently both nefarious and incompetent.
    - edgyquant 7mo ago
      So what does that say about their opposition who lost all three branches of government to them?
      - Tarsul 7mo ago
        Not nefarious enough?
      - idle_zealot 7mo ago
        Populist evil polls better than technocratic evil.
      - bdangubic 7mo ago
        this is cyclical in america by design. see 2016 then 2018 than 2020 etc…
      - saulapremium 7mo ago
        it says that playing by the rules means losing work when the other party doesn't.
    - red-iron-pine 7mo ago
      they are incompetent at running a successful government and maintaining hegemonic domination for western interests. they're doing a fine job of screwing the world for their own gain, and/or working as sock puppets of foreign governments. at no point was there ever a true belief, except for the "idjit" demographic, that trump would ever do anything meaningful in a governance sense.
  - delecti 7mo ago
    They're orthogonal, so there's no barrier. They're all nefarious, and most are also incompetent.
    - huijzer 7mo ago
      And they are not nefarious and competent while pretending to be incompetent?
      - XorNot 7mo ago
        The Nazis were hilariously incompetent, but it didn't make them any less dangerous.
        deleted 7mo ago
        [deleted]
    - ragebol 7mo ago
      Getting yourself installed as president while knowing you are incompetent (I mean, look at all those bankrupt businesses, he should know) is nefarious in itself. His entourage is nefarious for supporting the incompetency for their own gain.
      - deleted 7mo ago
        [deleted]
      - jerlam 7mo ago
        If people are giving you money, are you truly incompetent? I think we're using different scales to measure competency.
        ragebol 7mo ago
        Competent enough to receive money, not competent enough to run a country well. But now we're getting into very subjective stuff, I'm sure his handlers are quite OK with what he's doing. It doesn't matter it all looks super suspicious, they are confident they won't face any consequences.
  - munk-a 7mo ago
    Probably January 6th 2021
- colechristensen 7mo ago
  The economic effects impact the rest of the world much more than the US, which may have been somebody's planning point, although on the surface they seem to be too stupid to come up with this idea. The US/North America is petroleum-product-independent-ish. We produce approximately as much hydrocarbons as we use. We also could produce a lot more but tar sands, shale oil, etc. are more expensive to produce and not very profitable at $60/bbl but it's there ready for the taking. When you're talking about how we aren't it's about how certain refineries are tuned for which type of oil and how we import unrefined and export the refined products, etc... but we're not RUNNING OUT of oil or energy. Many places in the rest of the world aren't like that and will suffer much greater losses while the US is relatively strong. Of course we're all linked, but a power hungry dictator might only really care who's on top in a relative sense even if everybody is dragged down.
- red-iron-pine 7mo ago
  their goal is to tank the market, make fast stacks of $$$, and then buy up everything. this isn't new, the techo-feudalism has been pretty clear since Thiel got his man (JD Vance) into the VP slot. the Israelis also figure he's probably not gonna last through the mid-terms, so they want the US to do their dirty work while they still have leverage over him via Epstein files. Russia wants the US to get into a similar long-slog war, and is desperate for high oil prices.
deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
jmyeet 7mo ago
It's not really up to the US and Israel when this war of choice ends anymore. It's up to Iran. And Iran, justifiably, is going to demand their pound of flesh. That could require some combination of ending the (criminal) sanctions, de-militarizing the Gulf and reining in Israel. The problem is all of these things are politically untenable. This is the only reason why I think this war could continue long term because Trump simply cannot back down. I think the recession from this could actually get so bad that there's now a nonzero (but still small) chance Trump gets removed from office, either by impeachment or by being 25A'ed. It is hard to adequately state what a geopolitical disaster this was and it is I think quite easily the biggest mistake by an administration in the entire history of the US. I'm not exaggerating.
- deleted 7mo ago
  [deleted]
- maxdo 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - beepbooptheory 7mo ago
    I never got how sanctions, which clearly only affect civilians in any real way, and in extremely life and death ways in that, are not considered "criminal" in a broad, moral sense. Does not Iran, which has been sanctioned for forever, demonstrate this particularly clearly? Why would it be in any state's interest to get to a situation where you would have mass revolt? Don't you think they'd want to prevent that if they could? No matter how evil they are?
  - triceratops 7mo ago
    > promised not to build advanced records Like Dark Side of the Moon or Ok Computer? (/s idk what "advanced records" was actually meant to be)
- pjc50 7mo ago
  Still nowhere near as bad as the Vietnam war. Arguably not even as big a mistake as the CIA coup against Mossadegh, which is the poisoned tree from which the present situation grows. I wonder how the coup in Cuba will turn out. That has to happen before the midterms, and he's unlikely to wait for Iran to resolve.
xg15 7mo ago
That would be darkly hilarious, but I think it could also be the opposite way around: That there is a ceasefire shaping up, and some of Trump's staffers couldn't hold it anymore and placed bets using their knowledge - therefore accidentally "leaking" the plans. At least I'm having my hopes up for this.
- lithocarpus 7mo ago
  Or further, the bets themselves could be an attempt at market manipulation.
parsimo2010 7mo ago
The article isn’t implying that Trump is going to seek a ceasefire because of some puny bets on Polymarket, it’s implying that someone (or multiple people) close to Trump heard he was considering a ceasefire and placed a bet before Trump posted about it and the odds went up. Or they at least knew that him posting about it would affect the ours enough to make money, whether he plans to negotiate a ceasefire for real.
irishcoffee 7mo ago
The amount of money to be made on these markets is in the tens of millions at best. This administration doesn’t care about that. I understand why you feel that way, the numbers are just too inconsequential to even move the needle. Bit players with knowledge that have been perennially underpaid by the us govt. however, mortgage-saving money. I don’t blame them. Do you? “I’m aware of a big decision and I can make 23k off of it, probably.” Do it up, congress has been living off insider trading for a century, let the little guy get theirs. Until gambling commercials are banned in the same way cigarette commercials were banned, we’re all just yelling at the wind.
- koolala 7mo ago
  This is just one market. The other bets are all across the stock market.
  - munk-a 7mo ago
    Or in paying a part of the tariff bill for companies in exchange to an entitlement to the full refund if the tariffs were ruled unconstitutional.
  - irishcoffee 7mo ago
    The order of magnitude of “money to be made” is the same.
    - 8note 7mo ago
      polymarket and kalshi are used as inputs to the rest of the market. placing bets on polymarket is a cheap way to influence the whole market
Aurornis 7mo ago
The bet amounts are small relative to the political scandal that would follow top administration officials who have decision making power. If there is insider trading it's most likely low-level staffers or friends of officials who speak too freely. If a high ranking official wanted to make a lot of money on these moves in an untraceable way, there are numerous financial market opportunities. The amount they could make on betting markets is peanuts and too easily tracked.
- fabian2k 7mo ago
  What scandal? They're openly corrupt and no consequences have followed so far.
  - Aurornis 7mo ago
    Noem was removed from her position recently due to scandal. Weeks ago.
    - bigfatkitten 7mo ago
      Noem was removed because she fell out of favour with Trump.
      - Aurornis 7mo ago
        Yes, due to the $220 million advertising spend scandal and her claims about it.
        decafninja 7mo ago
        Because she blamed it on Trump. Had she not blamed Trump, he would have likely protected her.
        unethical_ban 7mo ago
        She should have been tied to a wooden post and shipped out of DC on an uncovered railcar for labelling a peaceful protester assassinated by ICE a "domestic terrorist". Her scandal was not being subtle enough with the theft of government funds for Trump's taste, and he found a way to get rid of her that he could claim he had no part in.
wetpaws 7mo ago
[dead]
varispeed 7mo ago
[flagged]
coevcan 7mo ago
Are you really going to suggest trump cares about an $820k bet? He doesn't even care to collect his presidential salary. I'm sure he exaggerates his wealth, but we know he's at least a billionaire.
- KumaBear 7mo ago
  He milks the government through other means such as crypto, llc’s, and overseas bribes “I mean deals”.
- Hikikomori 7mo ago
  He's made billions in just crypto schemes. Then the bribes to pardon people. It just gles on and on. He never provided evidence that he didn't accept the salary, just said he donated it to federal agencies, which you cannot even do.
  - jasomill 7mo ago
    Sure you can: https://www.pay.gov/public/search/global?formSearchCategory=Donation+Contribution https://www.pay.gov/public/search/global?formSearchCategory=... Note that in addition to specific programs that accept donations, this list includes "Gifts to the U.S. Government" with no strings attached and "Gifts to Reduce the Public Debt".
netsharc 7mo ago
Isn't the problem that they can't end the war unilaterally? The Iranian regime is justifiably pissed off and is still flinging drones and rockets towards any viable target, and any ceasefire will be with acceptance of their terms. The Trump/Netanyahu collection of dumb ego won't be able to accept being dictated terms. So like in Game of Thrones, we hope a Jamie Lannister shows up...
- roadside_picnic 7mo ago
  This was my thought as well. Trump today claims he had long discussions with Iranian leadership over the weekend and Iran claims such a thing never happened. Not only is Iran justifiably angry at its attackers, they have no reason to trust a ceasefire would be respected, and, furthermore, despite damage taken, stand to gain quite a lot if the war progresses as it has. Currently Iran is exporting more oil than ever before[0]. If the war continues as is they stand to emerge a much, much more dominant power on the world stage. Essentially being to BRICS what the GCC countries have been to the US (although much better defended). Even the threats against their energy infrastructure can't really be backed up effectively. Iran has intentionally built its energy infrastructure to be highly distributed. Meanwhile Israel's infrastructure is highly centralized, with a small number of power plants providing massive proportions of the nations infrastructure. All this meaning that Iran can retaliate much more effectively the they can be harmed. 0. https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/irans-control-of-hormuz-means-its-exporting-more-oil-today-than-before-the-war-ede3cd91 https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/irans-control-of-hormu...
  - srean 7mo ago
    The last few times Iran participated in talks and agreed on a ceasefire it worked against them.
    - Hikikomori 7mo ago
      Israel also bombed their negotiators last year.
  - thrance 7mo ago
gos9 7mo ago
You think polymarket is where this game is being played? For a couple hundred thousand dollars? Since when do profoundly stupid people use this site?
- ratrace 7mo ago
  [dead]
- Tadpole9181 7mo ago
  Rich folk would have a man gutted like a pig for a crisp $5 bill. They would absolutely (have their secretary) commit legal inside trader for a few hundred thousand on every occasion they could.
  - gos9 7mo ago
    Your model of other people is profoundly broken and you should be stripped of your ability to use the internet
- Gud 7mo ago
  You live in a fantasy world if you believe the Trumps leave a penny on the table. They are burning your country to the ground while enriching themselves.
- thrance 7mo ago
  > Since when do profoundly stupid people use this site? Profoundly stupid people are the target demographics.
- tencentshill 7mo ago
  Companies can buy a congressman for less than $10k in lobbying.

If the administration decides to end this stupid war just so they can cash out some profitable bets... I don't even know what I would think. The whole thing is so stupid it makes my head hurt.

delecti 7mo ago

I think the main reason is that they were all too incompetent to realize what the effects of the war would be on the global financial system. The bets were probably just a happy opportunity for corruption. > The whole thing is so stupid it makes my head hurt Look on the bright side, at least the malicious actors aren't able to competently implement their goals.

huijzer 7mo ago
When do we cross the barrier from incompetent to nefarious?
- idle_zealot 7mo ago
  It's not an either-or question; they're very transparently both nefarious and incompetent.
  - edgyquant 7mo ago
    So what does that say about their opposition who lost all three branches of government to them?
    - Tarsul 7mo ago
      Not nefarious enough?
    - idle_zealot 7mo ago
      Populist evil polls better than technocratic evil.
    - bdangubic 7mo ago
      this is cyclical in america by design. see 2016 then 2018 than 2020 etc…
    - saulapremium 7mo ago
      it says that playing by the rules means losing work when the other party doesn't.
  - red-iron-pine 7mo ago
    they are incompetent at running a successful government and maintaining hegemonic domination for western interests. they're doing a fine job of screwing the world for their own gain, and/or working as sock puppets of foreign governments. at no point was there ever a true belief, except for the "idjit" demographic, that trump would ever do anything meaningful in a governance sense.
- delecti 7mo ago
  They're orthogonal, so there's no barrier. They're all nefarious, and most are also incompetent.
  - huijzer 7mo ago
    And they are not nefarious and competent while pretending to be incompetent?
    - XorNot 7mo ago
      The Nazis were hilariously incompetent, but it didn't make them any less dangerous.
      - deleted 7mo ago
        [deleted]
  - ragebol 7mo ago
    Getting yourself installed as president while knowing you are incompetent (I mean, look at all those bankrupt businesses, he should know) is nefarious in itself. His entourage is nefarious for supporting the incompetency for their own gain.
    - deleted 7mo ago
      [deleted]
    - jerlam 7mo ago
      If people are giving you money, are you truly incompetent? I think we're using different scales to measure competency.
      - ragebol 7mo ago
        Competent enough to receive money, not competent enough to run a country well. But now we're getting into very subjective stuff, I'm sure his handlers are quite OK with what he's doing. It doesn't matter it all looks super suspicious, they are confident they won't face any consequences.
- munk-a 7mo ago
  Probably January 6th 2021
colechristensen 7mo ago
The economic effects impact the rest of the world much more than the US, which may have been somebody's planning point, although on the surface they seem to be too stupid to come up with this idea. The US/North America is petroleum-product-independent-ish. We produce approximately as much hydrocarbons as we use. We also could produce a lot more but tar sands, shale oil, etc. are more expensive to produce and not very profitable at $60/bbl but it's there ready for the taking. When you're talking about how we aren't it's about how certain refineries are tuned for which type of oil and how we import unrefined and export the refined products, etc... but we're not RUNNING OUT of oil or energy. Many places in the rest of the world aren't like that and will suffer much greater losses while the US is relatively strong. Of course we're all linked, but a power hungry dictator might only really care who's on top in a relative sense even if everybody is dragged down.
red-iron-pine 7mo ago
their goal is to tank the market, make fast stacks of $$$, and then buy up everything. this isn't new, the techo-feudalism has been pretty clear since Thiel got his man (JD Vance) into the VP slot. the Israelis also figure he's probably not gonna last through the mid-terms, so they want the US to do their dirty work while they still have leverage over him via Epstein files. Russia wants the US to get into a similar long-slog war, and is desperate for high oil prices.

deleted 7mo ago

[deleted]

jmyeet 7mo ago

It's not really up to the US and Israel when this war of choice ends anymore. It's up to Iran. And Iran, justifiably, is going to demand their pound of flesh. That could require some combination of ending the (criminal) sanctions, de-militarizing the Gulf and reining in Israel. The problem is all of these things are politically untenable. This is the only reason why I think this war could continue long term because Trump simply cannot back down. I think the recession from this could actually get so bad that there's now a nonzero (but still small) chance Trump gets removed from office, either by impeachment or by being 25A'ed. It is hard to adequately state what a geopolitical disaster this was and it is I think quite easily the biggest mistake by an administration in the entire history of the US. I'm not exaggerating.

deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
maxdo 7mo ago
[flagged]
- beepbooptheory 7mo ago
  I never got how sanctions, which clearly only affect civilians in any real way, and in extremely life and death ways in that, are not considered "criminal" in a broad, moral sense. Does not Iran, which has been sanctioned for forever, demonstrate this particularly clearly? Why would it be in any state's interest to get to a situation where you would have mass revolt? Don't you think they'd want to prevent that if they could? No matter how evil they are?
- triceratops 7mo ago
  > promised not to build advanced records Like Dark Side of the Moon or Ok Computer? (/s idk what "advanced records" was actually meant to be)
pjc50 7mo ago
Still nowhere near as bad as the Vietnam war. Arguably not even as big a mistake as the CIA coup against Mossadegh, which is the poisoned tree from which the present situation grows. I wonder how the coup in Cuba will turn out. That has to happen before the midterms, and he's unlikely to wait for Iran to resolve.

xg15 7mo ago

That would be darkly hilarious, but I think it could also be the opposite way around: That there is a ceasefire shaping up, and some of Trump's staffers couldn't hold it anymore and placed bets using their knowledge - therefore accidentally "leaking" the plans. At least I'm having my hopes up for this.

lithocarpus 7mo ago
Or further, the bets themselves could be an attempt at market manipulation.

parsimo2010 7mo ago

The article isn’t implying that Trump is going to seek a ceasefire because of some puny bets on Polymarket, it’s implying that someone (or multiple people) close to Trump heard he was considering a ceasefire and placed a bet before Trump posted about it and the odds went up. Or they at least knew that him posting about it would affect the ours enough to make money, whether he plans to negotiate a ceasefire for real.

irishcoffee 7mo ago

The amount of money to be made on these markets is in the tens of millions at best. This administration doesn’t care about that. I understand why you feel that way, the numbers are just too inconsequential to even move the needle. Bit players with knowledge that have been perennially underpaid by the us govt. however, mortgage-saving money. I don’t blame them. Do you? “I’m aware of a big decision and I can make 23k off of it, probably.” Do it up, congress has been living off insider trading for a century, let the little guy get theirs. Until gambling commercials are banned in the same way cigarette commercials were banned, we’re all just yelling at the wind.

koolala 7mo ago
This is just one market. The other bets are all across the stock market.
- munk-a 7mo ago
  Or in paying a part of the tariff bill for companies in exchange to an entitlement to the full refund if the tariffs were ruled unconstitutional.
- irishcoffee 7mo ago
  The order of magnitude of “money to be made” is the same.
  - 8note 7mo ago
    polymarket and kalshi are used as inputs to the rest of the market. placing bets on polymarket is a cheap way to influence the whole market

Aurornis 7mo ago

The bet amounts are small relative to the political scandal that would follow top administration officials who have decision making power. If there is insider trading it's most likely low-level staffers or friends of officials who speak too freely. If a high ranking official wanted to make a lot of money on these moves in an untraceable way, there are numerous financial market opportunities. The amount they could make on betting markets is peanuts and too easily tracked.

fabian2k 7mo ago
What scandal? They're openly corrupt and no consequences have followed so far.
- Aurornis 7mo ago
  Noem was removed from her position recently due to scandal. Weeks ago.
  - bigfatkitten 7mo ago
    Noem was removed because she fell out of favour with Trump.
    - Aurornis 7mo ago
      Yes, due to the $220 million advertising spend scandal and her claims about it.
      - decafninja 7mo ago
        Because she blamed it on Trump. Had she not blamed Trump, he would have likely protected her.
      - unethical_ban 7mo ago
        She should have been tied to a wooden post and shipped out of DC on an uncovered railcar for labelling a peaceful protester assassinated by ICE a "domestic terrorist". Her scandal was not being subtle enough with the theft of government funds for Trump's taste, and he found a way to get rid of her that he could claim he had no part in.

wetpaws 7mo ago

[dead]

varispeed 7mo ago

[flagged]

coevcan 7mo ago

Are you really going to suggest trump cares about an $820k bet? He doesn't even care to collect his presidential salary. I'm sure he exaggerates his wealth, but we know he's at least a billionaire.

KumaBear 7mo ago
He milks the government through other means such as crypto, llc’s, and overseas bribes “I mean deals”.
Hikikomori 7mo ago
He's made billions in just crypto schemes. Then the bribes to pardon people. It just gles on and on. He never provided evidence that he didn't accept the salary, just said he donated it to federal agencies, which you cannot even do.
- jasomill 7mo ago
  Sure you can: https://www.pay.gov/public/search/global?formSearchCategory=Donation+Contribution https://www.pay.gov/public/search/global?formSearchCategory=... Note that in addition to specific programs that accept donations, this list includes "Gifts to the U.S. Government" with no strings attached and "Gifts to Reduce the Public Debt".

netsharc 7mo ago

Isn't the problem that they can't end the war unilaterally? The Iranian regime is justifiably pissed off and is still flinging drones and rockets towards any viable target, and any ceasefire will be with acceptance of their terms. The Trump/Netanyahu collection of dumb ego won't be able to accept being dictated terms. So like in Game of Thrones, we hope a Jamie Lannister shows up...

roadside_picnic 7mo ago
This was my thought as well. Trump today claims he had long discussions with Iranian leadership over the weekend and Iran claims such a thing never happened. Not only is Iran justifiably angry at its attackers, they have no reason to trust a ceasefire would be respected, and, furthermore, despite damage taken, stand to gain quite a lot if the war progresses as it has. Currently Iran is exporting more oil than ever before[0]. If the war continues as is they stand to emerge a much, much more dominant power on the world stage. Essentially being to BRICS what the GCC countries have been to the US (although much better defended). Even the threats against their energy infrastructure can't really be backed up effectively. Iran has intentionally built its energy infrastructure to be highly distributed. Meanwhile Israel's infrastructure is highly centralized, with a small number of power plants providing massive proportions of the nations infrastructure. All this meaning that Iran can retaliate much more effectively the they can be harmed. 0. https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/irans-control-of-hormuz-means-its-exporting-more-oil-today-than-before-the-war-ede3cd91 https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/irans-control-of-hormu...
- srean 7mo ago
  The last few times Iran participated in talks and agreed on a ceasefire it worked against them.
  - Hikikomori 7mo ago
    Israel also bombed their negotiators last year.
- thrance 7mo ago

gos9 7mo ago

You think polymarket is where this game is being played? For a couple hundred thousand dollars? Since when do profoundly stupid people use this site?

ratrace 7mo ago
[dead]
Tadpole9181 7mo ago
Rich folk would have a man gutted like a pig for a crisp $5 bill. They would absolutely (have their secretary) commit legal inside trader for a few hundred thousand on every occasion they could.
- gos9 7mo ago
  Your model of other people is profoundly broken and you should be stripped of your ability to use the internet
Gud 7mo ago
You live in a fantasy world if you believe the Trumps leave a penny on the table. They are burning your country to the ground while enriching themselves.
thrance 7mo ago
> Since when do profoundly stupid people use this site? Profoundly stupid people are the target demographics.
tencentshill 7mo ago
Companies can buy a congressman for less than $10k in lobbying.