Big Digital Energy

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;25;16
Unknown
All right. I'm having a good hair day, I think. Looking at the camera. So I'm glad to be back. You are back? I am back there. It seems like you've had reasonably. If not significantly, justifiable other priorities and last minute cancellations. I have been. I apologize for that. The, software sales company, even even writing blogs on software.

00;00;25;18 - 00;00;49;03
Unknown
No. It's also. Yeah, exactly. The, you know, it's funny, I will fess up and go ahead and admit this. I have made grok listen to all my podcast and read my Twitter feed. So I write all my stuff with grok. Now me and grok talk and talking back and forth. And, I'll say we need a little bit more nimble, fatty style.

00;00;49;06 - 00;01;14;01
Unknown
And that. How is that gone? Well, I don't know. You've read the three of them I put out there. I thought they were pretty good. I like the original one. Is that different than the pea style or. I don't, it's just a little. Just a little. The, Although I will give, I will give Cain credit that kind of let me maybe, you know, to some degree, until they didn't, you haven't missed much in the last few weeks.

00;01;14;01 - 00;01;33;23
Unknown
I mean, there's really been nothing not that much going on. So is Netanyahu actually alive? Have you discussed that? Have you figured that out? Netanyahu. Where did that come from? Well, that's the all the rumors. I don't I don't have my crutch over on a show, which, you know, I, I don't know, you never see the panic in your eyes.

00;01;33;26 - 00;02;00;21
Unknown
It's like, no, but, that's the thing on, on, on X is, you know, that he got hit. He got hit by a bomb. Like this morning? No, like like two weeks ago. And the the the two appearances he's made since then, have been I generated one of them supposedly showed he had six fingers. And then when he was in the coffee shop, that was.

00;02;00;21 - 00;02;31;14
Unknown
Are you not following this, Chuck? Yeah. It's back. Bringing the conspiracy back to Beatty. Y'all been so professional about it with me. God, no. But, you know, I think I think some materially different or unprecedented things have certainly happened in recent days where we've had you know, certainly relevant and important to our perspective on all this, which is direct strikes on energy infrastructure.

00;02;31;14 - 00;02;58;10
Unknown
Yeah. So and that and I mean, that's the that's the struggle. If you wanted to cripple Iran, you just blow up all the energy fields. But look at what that does to the rest of the world, you know, which is not good. Plus you do want a thriving Iran with a new government, you know, and that's not going to happen unless they have access to their resources.

00;02;58;10 - 00;03;30;27
Unknown
You know, one of the things that we that we talked about, I think on the first episode, it was me and Kirk and Dave Purcell was we we highlighted some, if any, are real parallels with what's going on or has unfolded in Venezuela. And I heard, one of the trigonometry guys on a Rogan podcast a couple of days ago and he described, you know what?

00;03;31;00 - 00;04;07;02
Unknown
You know, what we achieve so far in Venezuela wasn't regime change, it was regime adjustment. Yeah. And so is that the practical outcome? Does that provide, you know, you hear more and more, Trump's off ramps are being closed because were the, the scope of this thing and the unprecedented targeting of civilian and energy infrastructure far beyond, you know, the the primary sphere of the battle was reaching into the the Gulf states.

00;04;07;02 - 00;04;35;03
Unknown
There was a a missile strike or a bombing of a, refinery on the Red sea side where the East-West pipeline is the workaround to take crude that would otherwise go through the strait. And, you know, from what I can tell, that loadings are at record levels on that side of Saudi, that of the peninsula. But, you know, kind of what is the what is this, the state of play?

00;04;35;06 - 00;05;10;03
Unknown
More importantly, the strikes on on Cutter and Russell off on I saw something I think it was this morning or the Qataris said that 17, 17% of their, LNG processing and production capacity is going to be has been extensively damaged and time frame of years in terms of recovering from that damage. You know, cutter declared force majeure pretty early.

00;05;10;05 - 00;05;51;07
Unknown
You knocked off, I think, 19 or 20% of the world's LNG supply. But now you had you have had some relatively unprecedented damage being inflicted upon some pretty critical assets. From what I can, I can tell. Yeah. And, you know, it's it's interesting because I do think the lesson from previous wars, maybe starting with, with Vietnam, is we just can't do regime change.

00;05;51;10 - 00;06;30;16
Unknown
I mean, I guess, I guess in fairness, you could say Iraq is functionally, functionally functioning somewhat okay these days. But man, that was a lot of money and a lot of bloodshed. And I'm not sure it's ideal still. But you know, we just can't do regime change. And the the Trump Doctrine, like what we've done in Venezuela is, hey, you're up next, RFA and F0, you know, or yeah, might might be the way to go.

00;06;30;16 - 00;06;59;16
Unknown
Although that kind of harkens back to the Shah of Iran. I mean, he he did what we said, but he also wasn't very nice to his people. And, you know, kind of set up the revolution. So I don't know what the right answer is here. Yeah. And another thing on that was I remember the trigonometry guys saying trigonometry Constantine case and I forget the other guy's name.

00;06;59;18 - 00;07;36;04
Unknown
And Rogan, we're talking about, you know, Desert Storm was pretty quick. Do you recall. No. Yeah. And we didn't get entangled. All right. Midnight hammer was the same. But does this, you know, does this create kind of an incentivizing template to be overconfident that we can go do that? I think Afghanistan and Iraq were examples that, you know, this is what at least based on everything since World War two, this is kind of what happens, right?

00;07;36;12 - 00;08;11;04
Unknown
We are not successful in the democratic ideal concept of regime change. And so. There's a lot of differences between Venezuela and Iran with respect to, regime adjustment, if that is ultimately where it where it goes, you know, are the, the vestiges of the current regime more willing to play ball? And I'm not so sure that that's the case.

00;08;11;06 - 00;08;39;10
Unknown
Now, Venezuela is in our hemisphere. They're more religiously aligned with the West. Well, and I've never you know, and the reason I could see Venezuela doing this and not Iran is I've always thought if I'm like dictator of a third world country, there's no need to mess around with the Great Satan. Sure, America sends some more vaca. You know, this is great.

00;08;39;10 - 00;09;09;02
Unknown
Can you get me some of the champagne from France? Would you like a military base here? Sure. Have at it. I mean, if you're the dictator of a third world country, you got a pretty good gig. I'm sure I could be semi benevolent to the populace, you know, I don't get the rattle the saber take on the the Great Satan, except for religious fervor that comes from people like Iran.

00;09;09;02 - 00;09;41;02
Unknown
So I can see Venezuela backing down. Hey, I don't want to lose this gig. Who's pretty good gig. Yeah, and I think there's, I don't know, there's some pretty bad things that happen to the average citizen, dissident or opposition over the course of the Chavez Maduro years and, and got increasingly, nefarious. You know, here's Iran yesterday.

00;09;41;04 - 00;10;11;29
Unknown
Today's the 20th. On the 19th, they went ahead and summarily executed those three, rustlers and come. Yeah. When we were, you know, pretty pointed in and suggesting that they not do that right. And so it's a much harder line. I think that Iran has taken here just looking anecdotally at what's what's continuing to happen in the country.

00;10;12;02 - 00;10;42;00
Unknown
Plus, you know, we still got mostly an internet blackout in the country. And we don't know what the mosaic, kind of independent, operation of, the regime and, and the IRGC are but it that that seems to be much more of a vexing problem. If we're about getting them to kind of stop it with this, these human rights abuses.

00;10;42;03 - 00;11;23;05
Unknown
Yeah. I mean, the, we do know the it's a very young population. We do know they have more plastic surgery per capita than any other country on the planet. We do know that outside the regime, they seem to be pretty pro-Western and freedom loving, etc.. I don't know that I want to necessarily go here with this, but, does it make you rethink the Second Amendment that maybe the Second Amendment is not a bad thing, because that that's what's holding them back right now.

00;11;23;05 - 00;11;48;07
Unknown
They literally have no power over that. Over the, the regime and the regime has the best and the brightest that are trained, picked off the best equipped, best equipped, and, and so I, I don't, you know, and, I know Trump came out and said, hey, now's your time. Iranian people. I don't know how they can.

00;11;48;07 - 00;12;16;20
Unknown
Right? You know, which is although, so I do want to I do want to say one thing because in December, actually, on December 5th, 2024, James Costa Hertz came on the Chuck job podcast and said the premium for a conflict with Iran and the closing of the strait is not priced into oil. I'd be all over oil.

00;12;16;23 - 00;12;53;27
Unknown
So it was that December. That was December 5th, 2024. So that's not a bad return. And in less than two years. So I'm I'm going to violate my, I a moratorium. Oh, not just because here's another, you know, just the the bald faced audacity from the agency there. Rory Johnson reposted it in the he, the IEA director is on record saying that.

00;12;53;29 - 00;13;37;25
Unknown
Politicians and governments underestimated the disruption and the crisis. And I'm thinking that's ironic coming from someone who's made a living out of underestimating oil markets for at least a decade. So, yeah, I just had to call out a number. I'll give you that one. So. So in all seriousness, we had a lot of rhetoric and discussion when Midnight Hammer went down last summer about, you know, I always was amused by an US Alhaji pointing out the reality of what the street is and what it isn't.

00;13;37;27 - 00;14;13;28
Unknown
There's not like this door that closes in the elements and dynamics around Midnight Hammer were not such that that that was ever a significant risk. However, wouldn't it behoove the advisory, including the IEA elements of of the West to maybe think more primarily about scenarios? If, you know, this thing starts to expand in scope, which it has clearly, starting three weeks ago.

00;14;14;00 - 00;14;39;19
Unknown
And so, you know, I do think it puts Europe in a particular bind. Not that they haven't kind of self inflicted a lot of their energy security problems, not the least of which I think heading into winter are they're going to be able to fill their gas storage with the shutdown, of a lot of LNG. Yeah.

00;14;39;22 - 00;15;19;26
Unknown
They, you know, if only the, United States were able to throw a switch and do things like waive the Jones Act, have got it for 60 days. Yeah. I don't know if that's enough to, to actually because you need to you need basically U.S. natural gas going to the East Coast since you won't build a freaking pipeline and then be able to use the the natural gas from Trinidad to, to, handle the rest of the world.

00;15;19;28 - 00;15;46;23
Unknown
If you saw yesterday where, I mean, the problems are most acute in, in Asia and Europe and in Asia. Yesterday, Omani crude traded over 200 a barrel. Really? Yeah. Holy cow. I think I sent that graphic out but again so yeah. So I don't I mean at the at the end of the day I guess we just keep killing leaders till we get one that wants to play ball.

00;15;46;23 - 00;16;06;07
Unknown
I mean, is that kind of ultimately where we're going or if we get to the point where they can't launch a drone at us or shoot a missile at us, we just walk to hell. The game of whack them all. Yeah. What are the off ramps? What a what do you think the ultimate strategy is? The stated strategy.

00;16;06;07 - 00;16;27;16
Unknown
And and at the end of the day, you know, you kind of have no reason to doubt Trump and Rubio when they say is we're getting rid of their ability, their defense shield, in effect, they can't launch missiles at us, they can't launch drones at us. And supposedly that's down, what, 90% since the start of the war. So maybe we're getting close.

00;16;27;18 - 00;16;55;11
Unknown
And I guess we just walk away. Makes our, our, our pleas for human rights seem a little hollow sounding because we're going to leave a regime in power. And again, I don't think we should replace the regime because we can't do it very well. But, you know, we're going to we're going to leave the the people under that tyrant, a tyrant of some sort.

00;16;55;13 - 00;17;16;17
Unknown
You know, he's he's only been been seen in the form of a cutout. Yeah. No, that's that's right. And, a lot of rumors that he's under, in Russia right now being treated, then, you know, I mean, I guess you could send in the Marines boots on the ground, but I just can't even see Trump doing that.

00;17;16;24 - 00;17;49;26
Unknown
I mean, that's just so anti Trump's DNA and I don't I don't see the kind of I think the, the over arching objective here politically and just for the good of the global economy is in any way, shape or form. We've got to get clear passage through the strait. Yeah. This disruption, this supply disruption goes on for many more weeks.

00;17;49;26 - 00;18;15;20
Unknown
You and I both know that there's there's a lot of precedent example of these types of shocks being, predicate for a or a catalyst for a global recession. Yeah. And I don't know about you. Average gasoline prices or not much more. In fact, they're below where they would be 20 years ago, adjusted for inflation. But that doesn't matter.

00;18;15;22 - 00;18;46;09
Unknown
And we've talked in the past about, well, you know, people don't pay as much attention to it in a political season, in a campaign season. Well, they actually do because it's something they see every day. Yeah, it's it's the actual pricing, the thing we need to start doing. And, we want all our listeners to start doing and maybe comment on threads or hit us up on on EC, send us the DMs is when you're filling up with gas, gasoline, look at the tanks and see how many are on like a round number.

00;18;46;09 - 00;19;12;26
Unknown
Yeah, like $2015 or $20 versus the odd number when people are just phony dollars, get you three, three gallons maybe in the Bay area. Yeah. I was driving around Phoenix two days ago and, you know, just driven cross-country and saw from Tennessee across Oklahoma, New Mexico, you know, the big sign boards. Loves the pilots for.

00;19;12;28 - 00;19;37;22
Unknown
It was progressively higher. But driving around Phoenix a couple of days ago, it was for 79 for 89 for 87. And Trump I mean Trump, you know, I hate the politics rules. The day. But at the end of the day he's got he's got a midterm. And if he loses the House he's getting impeached again. I mean, the Democrats have been straight up on on that.

00;19;37;22 - 00;20;14;23
Unknown
Yeah. And that is the hard, you know, part. We know fundamentally what the right path is, common sense path. And we certainly weren't on that from 21 to early 25. Right. But the electorate changes. It's you know, he he came in and won on immigration. Well that ran into a set of issues. Let's just say that now you've, you know fired the the secretary of Homeland Security.

00;20;14;25 - 00;20;44;19
Unknown
And at that time when we I think we did a we did a show right after inauguration, if you had told me that, it's been months now where it's almost certain that the Democrats are going to flip the House. If you had told me that right after the inauguration, that that momentum didn't feel at all to be swinging that way.

00;20;44;22 - 00;21;14;10
Unknown
Yeah. Because there were a lot of points, whether you believe them or not, being putting out $16 trillion of investment drill, baby, drill, we're you know, we're getting appropriately aggressive on, finding the the immigrants with, criminal records. And then it, it just kind of spins out into a perception thing that is completely different than in those early days.

00;21;14;12 - 00;21;42;20
Unknown
I think it's a testament. And I hate to sound like a Republican hammer because I'm way more libertarian than a Republican, but, I mean, this is a testament to the mainstream media, you know? I mean, if you had any, the just objective, these numbers where, you know, since, since, the inauguration, where did gas prices go? Where did overall inflation go, you know, check on down the list jobs, GDP growth.

00;21;42;20 - 00;22;06;01
Unknown
If you had that under Democratic administration, I mean, the narrative would be 180 degrees different. I mean, it's it's literally been the mainstream media every day. Or are you saying you're a victim of early onset Republicans, as Shane Gillis calls it? I don't know, have you seen that? But I haven't seen that. Very funny. Yeah. But, like most of the stuff he does.

00;22;06;03 - 00;22;32;27
Unknown
Shane Gillis hysterical. He's, he's really funny. So the, Yeah. So, interesting to follow or. But. Yeah, it's got to wrap up soon. I mean, that just the political, the political reality and the question is, do we send the Marines in to take that island or not? I mean, because once you choke off the, the oil, what's Iran going to do?

00;22;32;29 - 00;23;04;05
Unknown
I said it early on. Dan tweeted about, kind of the when when we came in with this notion of stepping in for the marine insurers. Yeah, but what are you going to do for the merchant mariners who actually crew these ships? You know what what what how high is that incentive in terms of what you got to pay those guys to go through an area that is in a hot zone and kinetic war going on.

00;23;04;08 - 00;23;33;15
Unknown
So there there's a lot of complexity below the, below the headlines for sure. And, you know, we we as, as a voting public, just generally have demonstrated, an ability to be very distracted very quickly and, change priorities and be somewhat prone to perception as opposed to a deeper analysis of the facts. Well, we'll definitely watch it.

00;23;33;15 - 00;24;00;26
Unknown
The, the one thing I'll kind of close on is, no matter where your politics are on all this, the lethality of the US military these days has just been stunning. I mean, what we pulled off and Venezuela, supposedly the strikes we did in Nigeria, the two strikes in Iran or, you know, the the war in Iran and the previous, midnight bombing.

00;24;00;28 - 00;24;29;10
Unknown
What did you take out, like 40 of the top layer of the regime in 40s? Yeah. First 40s. Yeah. No. And I mean, the the, the and literally doing it during daylight, you know, that that was a more game time decision and being able to operate and, and, you know, certainly, certainly, respect our soldiers that have given the ultimate sacrifice of, of passing away.

00;24;29;10 - 00;25;01;16
Unknown
But, mortality has been extremely low to this point. I mean, trade tragedies, all of them. And, thoughts and prayers to the family. But, yeah, it's it's been amazing what we've been able to achieve. Yeah. Just just hope that this doesn't have the elements of our more recent entanglements that have, you know, ultimately resulted in committing to boots on the ground and somewhat ambiguous objectives as it regards is a regime change or national security?

00;25;01;24 - 00;25;35;17
Unknown
Two other things we need to, talk about real quick rest in peace. I mean, Joe Green, arguably the greatest sports commercial of all, all time, him and the, the I won't push back on that too hard. Yeah. So, what was his name? Go out. Who was CEO of Coca Cola? Back in the, in the early 90s, came and spoke to my business school class because Charles Duncan was on the board at rice and was one of the largest Coke, shareholders.

00;25;35;17 - 00;26;00;20
Unknown
So when he said, come speak to my business school, the answer was yes. He got up there and he goes, you know, back in the 70s, we literally had the greatest advertising known to man, I'd like to buy the world of Coke. I mean, Joe Green. Hey, kid, toss in the jersey. He said it was so great, but we only sold, like, 12 packs of Coca-Cola during the whole 70s.

00;26;00;22 - 00;26;22;24
Unknown
Now we have a bunch of crap. I don't understand this dancing polar bear, and I'm selling more coke than I ever have. He goes. I don't understand advertising and marketing. I don't know if you've ever watched the series madmen. Oh yeah. Final episode ends with, you know, he's at that retreat and they come up with the, I'd like to buy the world of Coke.

00;26;22;24 - 00;26;47;22
Unknown
So a bit of nostalgia. They're built in nostalgia. We'll forget about the new Coke experiment. The, you know, the, it would be three d level, level, chess of that was actually, planned. So what's what's the second thing you had, Chuck Norris? Oh, rest in peace, Chuck Norris. When did that happen? Today as well?

00;26;47;22 - 00;27;21;04
Unknown
This morning. So super 70s always says super Sky point when one of, you know, one of his favorites passes on. So I'll, I'll look for that tweet. Yeah. No, the, the, the Chuck Norris jokes. The inner Chuck Norris counted to infinity twice. Chuck. Chuck Norris told a woman to calm down, and she did. My, my my favorite is, is, Chuck Norris was born May 6th, 1945.

00;27;21;04 - 00;27;46;02
Unknown
The Nazis surrendered May 7th, 1945. So, rest in peace. He and Lee majors were actually friends of her. Chuck's pretty good guy and all that and obviously was great action hero. I was always a big fan. His wife showed up. This is years and years ago. You know, I think every parent, suburban parent goes through some karate class.

00;27;46;05 - 00;28;11;19
Unknown
But the sensei that ran the facility up there, up north, was a long time, training partner. Oh, cool. With with Chuck Norris. So he knew him really well, and he, he and his wife came and spoke to the kids, and he was he was fantastic. Yeah. Yeah, he actually made a movie with Mattress Mack. The the karate movie.

00;28;11;19 - 00;28;37;25
Unknown
I forget which one it was, but Mack financed it, and so he, he spent time when they shot that in Houston. So anyway. Hey, opening day next week. There we go. Yeah, there we go. What are the Astros do this year? I've never gotten to depressed or excited about what happens in spring training, but, surprisingly, the pitching looks better than than the offense at this point.

00;28;37;28 - 00;29;06;19
Unknown
You got Jeremy Payne, you who got injured early in the WBC as a slight fracture on on one of his fingers. But, the new, Japanese addition to the rotation is guys attribute like his personalities. He's kind of a wild man. Oh, nice. You know, check him out. I'm. I anyway, he's he's look really, really good.

00;29;06;19 - 00;29;31;06
Unknown
Like upper 90s. Cool. Basketball as a starter. That's something we need after losing framber. But, you know, who knows? I've, I didn't, you know, I didn't think the Luhnow touch would last as long as it did, but I give most of the credit to him. Even though he left the organization in early 2020 for the 2022 World Series.

00;29;31;06 - 00;29;52;11
Unknown
And they've kind of mucked all that up. Yeah, well, there you go. The, I mean, I heard Major League Baseball really put the word to Crane on that, and he had to get rid of. Oh, yeah, somebody buys me, it gets me a World Series. I probably stand by. Well, I did, I did enjoy this this year.

00;29;52;14 - 00;30;04;24
Unknown
Wbsc. I don't know if you watched any of that. I watched a little bit of it. If anybody but the US had to win it, I think it was good that it was Venezuela. That that meant a lot in fact.

00;30;04;26 - 00;30;34;24
Unknown
Wilson Contreras, who was on the, Cubs 2016 championship, said, you know, playing for however many million people that he represented for Venezuela actually was a bigger deal and meant more than winning the 2016 World Series. I take a little exception to that. I get that and respect that. But as Derek Jeter said, that sounds like something that would come from someone who's never played in a World Series.

00;30;34;26 - 00;30;54;21
Unknown
Although he had the Cubs in 2016 that broke a hundred year drought. So that was a pretty big deal. That was no ordinary World Series. That's true. I remember where I was when they recorded the stuff that I was in Nashville at a bar night after an event. I don't know if that was the year that you came.

00;30;54;23 - 00;31;24;16
Unknown
I think he came the next year. Okay. Yeah. The, they, if you if you looked at, ESPN and ESPN, the Spanish Channel, what is that, Deportes or whatever. If you combine the ratings there, the, the Baseball Classic had higher ratings than the NBA finals, so and baseball is likely going to screw it up because the CBA expires at the end of the 26 season.

00;31;24;18 - 00;32;04;03
Unknown
And they're and their momentum and growth since the last CBA and with all the the rules changes, you know, has really brought in that casual their base is more stealing, you know, pitch clock, right, etc.. And the players association had got fired in a scandal. It was heaven. Farrow with his sister in law, Tony Clark. So you know that that kind of upsets any kind of continuity and negotiation.

00;32;04;03 - 00;32;29;10
Unknown
But, you know, salary caps, the big the big third rail here. I have opinions, but I, you know, I hope we don't have a stoppage because I think I think it would just be a real killer to the momentum that the sport has, has established over the last few years, a few years and, you know, showing better viewership and and attendance than the NBA and some of its marquee events.

00;32;29;10 - 00;32;53;25
Unknown
So yeah, we'll see. But excited about the season starting next next week. Yeah. Go Astros. If you enjoyed the show please share it with a, friend. Hopefully, we'll be back next week. I'm going to try to do better in terms of showing up, but, software sales manager 24 seven it is. It is having a job officially suck.

00;32;53;27 - 00;33;09;04
Unknown
Customers control your schedule. Yes, I do, yes I do. It was a lot different back when I. That's all right. Yeah, but a lot different back when I had the checkbook. So anyway, good to see you, Mark. Good to see you.