I Predicted the 2008 Financial Crisis. What Is Coming May Be Worse.
Mr. Bookstaber is the author of “A Demon of Our Own Design,” which in 2007 warned of the potential for a financial crisis.
Sunday, March 22, 2026
This time, the danger isn’t financial engineering. It’s that our financial system has attached itself to the vulnerabilities of our physical world — power grids, water, land, supply chains — and created hazards that markets have no framework to analyze. Our models for detecting risk look at prices, volatility and correlations. They have no instruments for reading a grid failure, a drought or a severed supply chain. By the time warning signs show up in market data, the damage will already have been done.
Saturday, March 21, 2026
The country in Europe that most seems to appreciate this is Ukraine, of all places. President Volodymyr Zelensky has dispatched his experts on drone defenses to the Gulf, and that could well save American lives. The military in Europe most threatened at home is the one most willing to help the U.S. abroad. Mr. Trump might keep this in mind before pressuring Ukraine into a bad peace with Russia.
“We see little relief for the deepening energy crisis as more energy facilities come under fire,” RBC Capital Markets LLC analyst Helima Croft said in a note. “Administration officials have spent considerable manhours working to convey to market participants that the disruption will be short-lived as the war will soon wind down. Yet nothing points to a limited engagement at this juncture.”
Friday, March 20, 2026
The Pentagon satisfied with its Patriot missiles rebuffed Ukrainian specialists that had come to demonstrate their expertise with drones and had simulated, coincidentally, countering an Iranian attack. Now, eight months later, the region’s allies—from Saudi Arabia to Jordan, passing through Israel—are discovering a new equation: No one can indefinitely fire Patriots costing more than $1 million each against Shahed drones that cost $10,000.
America Bombs Iran, and Zelensky Suddenly Holds Aces
‘You don’t have the cards,’ Trump said a year ago. Today U.S. allies implore Ukraine for drone help.
ET
Wednesday, March 18, 2026
Mr. Trump is currently considering two actions that would almost certainly require ground action by American or Israeli forces: Taking over Kharg Island, where Iran loads most of the oil it produces onto tankers, and the underground site at Isfahan where it stores most of its 970 pounds of near-bomb-grade nuclear fuel. Mr. Trump told reporters that he was unconcerned that such moves could commit U.S. forces to a Vietnam-like boondoggle in Iran. “I’m really not afraid of that,” he told reporters. “I’m really not afraid of anything.”
Trump Says U.S. Does Not ‘Need or Desire’ Help From Allies on Iran
President Trump has faced mounting criticism over the U.S.-Israeli assault on Iran from allies and even members of his own administration.
Karoun Demirjian and David E. Sanger
Reporting from Washington
Friday, March 13, 2026
Despite President Donald Trump’s blustering that America benefits when oil prices surge, crunch time is fast approaching for both the war and the energy market. He either ends the conflict quickly, or sky-high energy costs will force him to do so. The oil market may not have the same fearsome reputation as the bond market but, trust me, it can be equally savage in twisting a politician’s arm.
When the first cruise missiles began detonating inside Iran, the strikes had all the hallmarks of previous successful US military campaigns — unstoppable, overwhelming force delivered without warning. But as the conflict extends toward a third week, the US war effort is showing unexpected signs of strain against an adversary whose military budget is smaller than the GDP of Vermont — but which has an arsenal of missiles and drones unlike anything the US has ever faced.
Iran’s Cheap, Plentiful Weaponry Puts US Military Under Unprecedented Strain
As the conflict extends toward a third week, an arsenal of attack drones and ballistic missiles has helped make Tehran unlike any adversary the US has faced.
By March 10, 2026 at 5:38 PM EDT
Thursday, March 12, 2026
The wall Street Journal's Editorial board has lost its mind stating "The reality inside Iran and the region is that the U.S. and Israel continue to make progress. The regime loses more of its military each day, along with the ability to hurt its neighbors. The Israelis estimate 70% to 75% of Iran’s missile launchers have been destroyed, and the U.S. has destroyed at least 43 Iranian ships." as if that was going to change the direction of a quagmire the U.S. getting deeper into with no end game obejctive articulated.
Iran Isn’t Winning This War
Wall Street Journal's editorial board doesn't recognize Trump isn't winning this war either
The potential human, economic and geopolitical costs of this demolition derby are harrowing and perilous, but none of it should be surprising. “NO PLAN” could be fashioned into a billboard fixed atop the 90,000-square-foot ballroom Trump wants to attach to the White House. And his hasty, tumultuous and open-ended prosecution of the Iran war thus far is entirely in character. The president — as heir to a sizable fortune, haphazard developer, dysfunctional casino impresario, reality TV curiosity, ubiquitous self-promoter and tectonic political force — has spent most of his nearly 80 years flying without maps.
Iran is demonstrating every day that the killing of the country’s supreme leader at the beginning of the war has not totally crippled its ability to fight, the officials and military experts said. Iran, they said, is not acting like a decapitated regime.
Iranian Military Shows It Knows How to Adapt, U.S. Officials Say
Iran appears to be targeting what it views as American vulnerabilities, including air defenses meant to guard troops and assets in the region.
Helene Cooper and Eric Schmitt
Reporting from Washington
Tuesday, March 10, 2026
It was said of Winston Churchill that he mobilized the English language and sent it into battle. Donald Trump’s trick with the mother tongue is to douse it in gasoline, set it on fire and drop it in a dumpster in the middle of his own parade ground.
In a War of Words, Trump Always Defeats Himself
The public started out opposing the conflict in Iran. That will be a problem if things go south.
ET
In October, Smith testified before the US Senate Special Committee on Aging as part of a panel on price transparency and drug costs. In a plaid blazer and tortoiseshell glasses, he used his six minutes to walk senators through SCO’s creation story and share a few tales from the hospital pricing crypt, including one about a family that declined a $72,000 tonsillectomy at a hospital outside Dallas in favor of the $3,875 version being prepped during Businessweek’s visit to Oklahoma City.
How a Die-Hard Libertarian Is Negotiating Lower Health-Care Costs
An anesthesiologist has spent decades pushing his surgery center toward more transparent prices. Others are now following his lead.
My guess is that this regime will break only from the top, which will be a process that will start only after there is a cease-fire. The best that the Trump-Netanyahu bombs-away strategy can do is start that process; just tilting Iran onto a better track where it is less of a threat to its own people and neighbors would be a significant achievement. The worst the strategy can do is so devastate Iran with endless aerial bombardments that it becomes ungovernable for anyone. That would be a disaster of incalculable proportions.
The U.S.-Israeli war in Iran risks redirecting world attention away from the war in Ukraine. But it has also given Kyiv an opportunity to use its hard-won expertise and advanced technology on a new front. The country has eagerly offered to help U.S. forces and their Middle Eastern allies defend against the sorts of Iranian-designed attack drones that Russia has been using in Ukraine for years.
Ukraine Helps U.S. Bases in the Mideast With Stopping Drones
As the war in Iran spreads, Kyiv is eagerly offering its hard-won expertise and advanced technology to counter Iranian drones.
Reporting from eastern Ukraine
Sunday, March 8, 2026
If war is God’s way of teaching Americans geography, perhaps it will also serve as a lesson to Trump. It should be a simple one: Other places and other people are real, possessing their own agendas and agency — and America’s actions have consequences it cannot control. Anything else is pure fantasy.
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