When Elon announced he would buy Twitter at $54.20 a share, I penned this fairly lengthy piece.
I always enjoy looking back at what I said to assess in what ways was it right and in what ways it was wrong. It was one of my better pieces, if I do say so myself, at a time when my mind was focused squarely on the external world: COVID, vaccine mandates and efficiency, the coming energy and food crisis, climate change, free speech. For 4 years I’ve been screaming from the rooftops on these and while predictions of “the what” (S&P will crash following lockdowns, millions of Europeans would freeze last winter, the vaccine won’t be better than a flu shot) have at times missed the mark on timing, wait long enough and even a broken clock is right twice a day. Anyway, Good for Elon now that he has all but announced he will, in fact, move forward with the deal. I think him owning Twitter is going to change a lot of things for good.
Next, the Biden administration had expectations that OPEC+ would listen to them in their pleas/request/demand not to cut oil production while they enact policy in the US to eliminate fossil fuels. By the U.S.’s own expectations, we the super bully in international affairs and believe that no amount of scorning or ridiculing a regime should do enough damage to the relationship to make them not listen, right? Well, MBS and Putin raised their middle fingers prominently in the air in a message to Biden that they aren’t particularly interested in lowering gasoline prices. So while the US Fed fights inflation of their own making, risk a major recession and fight a proxy war against a country with lots of resources and nukes, OPEC+ says “hold my beer.”
The reality is OPEC was already 3.6 mmbo/d below their quota anyway so lowering it today 2 mmbo/d is simply acknowledging the reality of the situation. They have capacity issues in the short term and the U.S., as I’ve been writing about since 2019 cannot grow it’s production. Hope is not a plan, and analysis needs to be done without knowing the answer you want.
Sadly, as David Blackmon pointed out in his substack today, the Biden administration is reported to have said that the oil cut is “a hostile act…”. Well, if I were a Saudi and knew that oil was key to my economy and “you” were telling me you didn’t want the world to use my product any more, I wouldn’t be that helpful either. So here we are. Buckle up.
The midterms are 1 month away, oil and natural prices are likely to surge in the coming weeks as winter arrives and Biden is truly in a bad bad place. The “Great Shrug” is working. Keep at it!!
Finally and far more important to me anyway, I have been writing and recording less of late in large part due to the dawning reality that my 17 year old is … 17. I mean holy F@&k. Everyone tells you it goes fast. They were wrong. It goes faster.
Amazingly Ben’s 4 year journey with high school golf that began as a freshman in tryouts shooting 104-105-97 ended yesterday with the putt in the video. It came after his best 2 shots of the week.
To recap, Ben went into the State Championships ranked #2 in 3A and was… how can I put this delicately… very confident. Reminded me of a certain squash player I know pretty well from when he was 17.
After starting -1 thru 3, he hooked a drive 6” out of bounds on 4 and was never able to get in a rhythm with his swing. Skulled wedges. Big pulls. Chunky chips. The weight of his own expectations collapsed on his swing and his psyche and Andrew and I watched 4 hours of a train wreck we weren’t able to take our eyes off of. Goodness, it’s so much easier to be the player than the fan.
Ben closed with a 78-75 to finish 18 while the winner, the kid ranked #1 heading into the week went -6 the last 6 holes to shoot 64 and run away with the title. Ben’s comment to me? “That kid is really good and I still have a lot of work to do, but I’ll beat him next time I see him.”
Ben’s expectation was that he was going to come top 2. The reality is golf is hard and it puts in perspective how good those guys on TV are, and especially how amazing Tiger’s incredible dominance for most of his career was.
It would be hard not to be sad for Ben today, but to do so would miss the fact he had 3 -1sts, 3-2nds, was named league co-Senior of the year and improved his stroke average by more than 26 shots since his freshman year. He’s a great golfer with lots of learn and a wonderful college career ahead of him. And making birdie on the last is a great way to start the next stage. But regardless, I sure was proud of him. We now pivot to college applications and figure out where he goes to continue the journey.
For dad, it’s been a heavy realization these last few months that my golfing buddy will be gone within the year. I guess I expected him to live with me forever.
Luckily for me, and to a lesser degree Andrew, Andrew’s gonna get a whole lot more attention in the coming 3 years. I’m the hockey team mom and will travel to Nashville tomorrow, coordinating 20-15 year olds meals, snacks, transportation and their visit to the zoo. Apparently, they’ll play 4 games as well. Perhaps Sober October wasn’t such a great idea, after all.
Expectations may cause suffering, but they sure make the journey to the box a whole lot more exciting.
Expectations cause suffering